EXHORTATION
From time to time, you may hear one of the ministers end our prayer of confession with words like, “if we regard sin in our lives this prayer will be ineffectual…” What does it mean to “regard sin”? To regard sin is to respect sin. It means to let sin have some place in your heart or life. To regard sin is to make peace with sin—to invite it into your life and make …
Call to Confession
During the last 6 months, we have all paid more attention to cleanliness than ever before. Every time I go into a grocery store someone takes a rag and wipes out a buggy before giving it to me. Hand sanitizing stations are all over the place and people carry mini bottles in every vehicle, purse, or suitcase. And it’s all for good reason. We know there’s a virus that can make someone …
EXHORTATION
The Christian faith isn’t just a faith of ideas. It’s also a faith of practices. And that’s because human beings aren’t just brains on sticks. There is more to us than our minds. We have bodies made up of hands, eyes, ears, and stomachs.
God isn’t just out to form your mind. He wants to conform every part of your body to the image of Christ. And one of the ways he does this …
One of the secrets to having a loving and peaceful family is regular repentance. Regular admission and confession of sins. Regular forgiveness.
Imagine two identical families. In each family, there’s a father and a mother. Both families have two children. Now imagine that these identical families live in two identical houses. Same square footage. Same layout. In both houses, you have the same number of dirty dishes, the same number of dirty clothes, and the …
EXHORTATION
Psalm 62:5 says:
For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence,
for my hope is from him.
As Christians in America, our faith runs the risk of being colored and shaded by the values of the culture we inhabit. If culture loves excess, the unconscious church will value self-indulgence. If culture worships success, a blind church will begin promoting growth and numbers more than holiness and true proclamation.
Our culture is obsessed with …
Galatians 6:9 says, And let us not grow weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.
When you’re trying to grow a vegetable garden you have to sow a lot of seed, you have to protect those seeds until they can germinate, then you have to constantly pull weeds, and water (but not too much). Your hands have to ache. Your face has to sweat. And then you …
EXHORTATION
1 Corinthians 13:7 says…
Love… believes all things
This means that Christians who are growing in love choose to believe the best in others. The word for believe is the same word we translate as “faith.” So, literally, love has all faith.
Believing all things means we give others the benefit of the doubt. We take one another’s word at face value. It means we open ourselves up fully to one another. We believe …
EXHORTATION
Hebrews 3:13 says
13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
As Christians, we aren’t called to love one another in theory—we’re called to actually love one another. It has to be lived out. And, among many things, this means that we are always dealing with one another’s temptations and sin. If you can’t name a …
EXHORTATION
One of the most spiritual things a Christian can do in life is work a job. The first command God gave Adam included the divine commission to work. This means that getting up early on Monday to put in an honest day’s work is itself an act of worship.
Christians are called to consider their work holy. To do their work as unto the Lord. To see their work as a way to bring …
But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. – James 1:4
One of the great challenges of following Jesus as an American is practicing patience. We know what we want. We know how we want it done. We know what they are capable of if they’d just apply themselves! And why don’t they try harder?
• We’re impatient with our children when they struggle to learn simple …
