We can bring our troubles, griefs, sorrows, and sins to Jesus, who meets us smack dab in the middle of our messy mob.
Confession isn’t a detour in the liturgy. It’s the doorway.
American religion did not become optional because the gospel failed. It became optional because religion slowly redefined itself around usefulness.

All Articles

ohn begins transcribing this first letter from Jesus to the Church of Ephesus, the Ephesians, his home congregation. In this letter, out of all seven letters, is contained the highest praise and the lightest rebuke.
In the beginning, we read about the invention of religion. It begins simply enough in Genesis 3
The Gospel is our freedom from sin. It is Christ in the mirror, Christ for me and for you.
We take what we perceive to be freedom and turn it into a new credo, a new law, an idol to be lifted up and lived out.
We tell our children if they work hard and play by the rules, they’ll succeed in life. Jerks, cheaters, and thieves won’t. They’ll end up in the gutter. Or jail. Or worse.
Galatians 5 isn’t a move beyond Christ to the Christian life. Galatians 5 is the Christian life in Christ.
The salvation of wretched sinners by an omni-holy and forever-righteous God is, by all accounts, a categorical impossibility.
On this day, the church remembers all the saints who have gone before us.
My email was once hacked and read, then used to send emails to contacts in my address book.
I’ve had a lot of nasty things done to me in my 43 years of life. Many of which were done by church people while we were worshipping and serving Jesus together.
What do Habakkuk and Israel have? Nothing but the word of God. Nothing but the promise of God. Nothing but God himself. They have the vision that Yahweh gives, the words of hope he utters. And that, amazingly, is enough.
But there is something far more serious and important: being reconciled to our Father in Heaven.