What Christian has not had the experience of going through the motions of devotions without an engaged heart? To help believers overcome stagnancy in their time with God, I want to recommend a forgotten but highly effective devotional tool. I warn you, though, that this particular devotional aid is no longer a bestseller.
What does it mean for a Christian to be sanctified or set apart “wholly,” as in “spirit, soul, and body” (1 Thessalonians 5:23)? A lot …
How should a Christian react to all of the bad news in this world? Here are a few thoughts that might help us read the news in a redemptive way.
In the partnership between churches and missionaries, one party needs to take the lead role in making the relationship work. Often that role is foisted onto the missionary, but the ideal strategy is for the church to take the lead. Here are three ways that churches can take the lead role in missions.
The missionary who helps local Christians fulfill their ministries in a Biblical way will never have to worry about what will happen to the ministry after he leaves the field. It will continue in the capable of hands of local leadership.
Despite everyone’s diligent efforts and sincere desires, missionary activities sometimes involve varying degrees of ineffectiveness. Why? One explanation might be that Christians, churches, and missionaries simply are not thinking strategically about how to make a rescue operation achieve as many goals as possible. Here are two foundational strategies no Christian interested in missions can afford to ignore.
Any masterpiece painting can suffer from damage or decay over the years. God’s master portrait of marriage is no exception. Just as museums dedicate themselves to carefully restoring a masterwork, the church is now facing a time when it must carefully restore a Biblical view of marriage. As that restoration process begins, the church should take these five essential steps.
Although marriage is not the only place where one can find spiritual blessing, social blessing, or material blessing, it might be the only place where one can find all of those blessings so closely tied together. If the church is wise, she will promote this full package of blessings and nothing less.
In part 1, Zach observed that marriage ought to be a spiritual blessing. This week we continue with Part 2—Embracing Marriage as a Social Blessing …
Sinful society has twisted the blessed institution of marriage into something that all too often seems unpleasant, unworkable, or unattractive. For those wanting to experience the blessedness of marriage, the key is to stop looking at the world’s sketch of marital struggle and start meditating on the Bible’s masterpiece of marital harmony.
