When Religion Becomes Obsolete, Christ Does Not
By Russ Lackey | Mark Mattes
01/20/26
19mins

When Religion Becomes Obsolete, Christ Does Not

American religion did not become optional because the gospel failed. It became optional because religion slowly redefined itself around usefulness.
Behold the Lamb
Bradley Gray
Bradley Gray
01/19/26

Behold the Lamb

The Passover wasn’t just Israel’s story; it’s ours.
Psalm 12, Part 2: The Saint Fails, The Word Purifies
Steven Paulson
Steven Paulson
01/16/26

Psalm 12, Part 2: The Saint Fails, The Word Purifies

God makes us pure saints by planting us back in the earth we imagined we needed to escape.

All Articles

Chad Bird
Chad Bird
05/13/15

How Do I Know I’m a Christian?

What about the question, “Are you a Christian?” Does this one belong to that second category, where we must explore our hearts, test our actions, focus inside ourselves to get to the right answer?
Daniel Emery Price
Daniel Emery Price
05/11/15

Tattoos With Mom

The lighting is fluorescent, the music is loud and heavy. There is a table in the corner with bottles of iodine, rubbing alcohol, and a biohazard container full of used needles.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
03/03/15

What Bible Story Has CSI’s Fingerprints All Over It?

If Abel’s blood is spilled all over the ground or if a mere speck had been lodged in the fabric of Cain’s shirt, that blood cries out. It has a voice and it will speak to whomever is willing to listen.
Sam P. Schuldheisz
Sam P. Schuldheisz
02/26/15

Sundays are for the Walking Dead

There are several reasons why I nerd out when it comes to AMC’s The Walking Dead.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
01/19/15

Losing that Holy Feeling

It’s like I’m eavesdropping on the two friends and the stranger who walks with them. Something about the way they hang their heads, something about the desperation in their voices, and certainly something about the stranger, has me grasping hold of every word as if gold is spilling from their lips.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
11/08/14

Here's What Happened on the Day of My Funeral

The pastor put a hand over my mouth, another between my shoulder blades, and backward I fell into the dark waters, buried beneath Noah's flood, the Red Sea, Jordan's stream, all the way down into a borrowed tomb outside Jerusalem where a crucified man lay waiting for me.
Rick Ritchie
Rick Ritchie
11/04/14

The Stephen King Method

King has some kind of belief in God, but was probably under no inner compulsion to do anything we would term evangelism.
Mark Jasa
Mark Jasa
10/08/14

My God, My God

I explained to her that Jesus was quoting Psalm 22 and pointing us to the prediction of His crucifixion. She then replied, "Isn't there more to it than that?"
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
07/29/14

Songs are Musical Time Machines

The psalmist writes that our earthly lives last “seventy years, or eighty, if we have the strength.” As if proving the poet right, and showing the world that she did have that kind of strength, Alvena fought on to her eightieth year.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
07/11/14

Please Don’t Say These Six Things at My Funeral

Because I do care now, and will care even after I’m with the Lord, here are some things I hope and pray are not said at my funeral. I care about those who will be there, about what they will hear.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
06/27/14

Anniversary of a Dead Marriage: The Painful Lessons of Divorce

Every year, when this day rolls around, I turn over the stones of remembrance that litter my mind, to see what lurks beneath.
Chad Bird
Chad Bird
06/20/14

Go, Old Man, and Sin No More

My life will be unwritten, erased by the hand of mortality. And fool that I am, I stand here threatening to snuff out the life of a woman caught in the act which I have acted out in my heart with a thousand women.
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