Leadership God’s Way

A read through 1 and 2 Kings of the repeated succession of Judah’s good kings to bad kings is laborious to absorb, while the constancy in the account of Israel’s bad kings is completely depressing. In Judah, the succession to the throne followed the family line of David, but Israel’s…

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Spiritual Growth

Growth occurs both as part of an inherent life process, and with intentionality. Disciplines such as church attendance, Bible reading and prayer are considered staples of intentional spiritual growth. Interestingly, the experiences of life will either grow us, or stunt our growth, depending upon our ability to apply what we…

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Still Large and in Charge

cesarea-israel

Day after day, most of us would describe our lives as “making it.” If we reach the end of a day with a sense of accomplishment, then it has been a good day. Minus that, the optimists would declare survival a win. But is this really the way we’re supposed…

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Blessing Follows Obedience

From the time the Lord made a covenant with the Israelites that they were His people and He was their God, He has demonstrated that He has a plan, a Way, and the power to carry it out. He purposed to give them a land flowing with milk and honey:…

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Pleasing God

sheep

Christians are sometimes called “do-gooders” by skeptics that observe our actions and scoff, rather than being impressed with our altruism. Many years ago, I worked with one of those. He explained to me that I, as a Christian, had the need and duty to give, therefore, he was there to…

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Applying Effort Where It Matters

purple-grapes

Most people – Christian or not – believe that Christ followers should be characterized by their behaviors, and this sets up a whole realm of expectations. Non-believers label Christians as hypocritical when we fail at those expectations. Therefore, many Christians try even harder to prove by their actions that they…

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Salvation’s Value

1 Peter 1:9 tells us that the goal of our faith is the salvation of our souls. It really should be, but as Christ-followers, has our salvation become such an accepted, taken-for-granted part of our lives that we focus our faith elsewhere? Do we see our eternal lives hanging in…

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Chasing Goodness (aka Righteousness?)

How many of us have said or thought about ourselves, “I’m basically a good person”? If we could be brutally honest, I believe it would be 100% (minus all sociopaths). Most of us have an inner need to be considered good. That is why we so often compare ourselves to…

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