I’ve been camping out in the Psalms a lot lately. I know that I’ve said this before, but the Psalms are filled with such raw emotion. There are words for people who are joyous and words for people who are in deep despair. And they are all God’s words to his people. Last week I listened to a couple of excellent messages on our emotions and I was reminded that God did not create us to be emotionless beings. He gave us our emotions, but sin has corrupted them and therefore we must wrestle daily through our feelings—feelings that can be up one day and down the next.
Missions Wednesday: Bolivia
Bolivia is a South American country with over 10 million people. They are landlocked in between Brazil, Peru, Paraguay, Argentina, and Chile. While over 90% of the country is considered Christian, only 16% is evangelical. The instability of the Bolivian government has led them to be one of the poorest countries in the Americas. In addition, Bolivia grows 50% of the world's cocaine, only increasing the instability of the country. The children of Bolivia face the brunt of these problems. The majority of children live in poverty and many are addicted to drugs. All of these circumstances present an opportunity for the gospel of Jesus Christ to be proclaimed among the people of Bolivia.
Studying Ephesians
One of the reasons I decided to go to seminary a few years ago was because of a firm belief that women need theology and serious Bible study. I wanted to gain a solid foundation so I could teach women the Bible someday. I'm always excited when I see a new resource for women that helps them dive into God's word and equips them to study theology.
Missions Wednesday: Afghanistan
Life is Not a Deadline
By nature I’m not a very disciplined person. It’s taken a lot of years for me to get a system in place that works for me. After conversion, my desire for discipline grew, but it’s still something I have to work at. So I create lists. If a task is written down in front of me I will do it. And there is something so satisfying about crossing something off a list. My most recent job was very deadline driven, so I had to learn to operate on a deadline every day when I went into the office.
Suffering Produces Faith in Future Grace
What You Can't Learn on an Island
The saying “no man is an island” is cliché and overused, but the gist of it is true. God made us to be relational beings. He didn’t create us to be autonomous, self-sufficient, loners. He created us for fellowship, and togetherness. And to use another cliché, he created us for community. Not so we can tout how community focused we are, or even that we are authentic, real people. These are good things to strive for, in fact they are crucial to living life as Christians.
Will You Please "Like" Our Church?
We've enjoyed getting settled here in Little Rock and finally feel like we have some time to actually think, plan, and relax. After a wonderful three-day weekend, it was back to reality today and with it came a new development with our church plant...we have a Facebook page! When you are in the beginning stages all developments are a big deal.
Count It All Future Joy
I’ve thought a lot about the experience of suffering and the Bible’s response to our suffering this past year. Before our miscarriage and infertility I quickly passed over passages on suffering, not because I didn’t see them as important, but I just didn’t relate to them. I had faced trials before, but nothing that really made me wrestle with God’s good plan for my life in the way I have recently. I don’t doubt his goodness; I just need to understand it more than ever before. While difficult, that is a good result of our suffering. It causes us to lean hard into him and desperately seek his face because without his presence in our lives we are hopeless.
Piper on Romans 8:28
"If you live inside this massive promise [Romans 8:28], your life is more solid and stable than Mount Everest. Nothing can blow you over when you are inside the walls of Romans 8:28. Outside Romans 8:28 all is confusion and anxiety and fear and uncertainty. Outside the promise of all-encompassing future grace there are straw houses of drugs and alcohol and numbing TV and dozens of futile diversions. There are slat walls and tin roofs of fragile investment strategies and fleeting insurance coverage and trivial retirement plans. There are cardboard fortifications of deadbolt locks and alarm systems and antiballistic missiles. Outside are a thousand substitutes for Romans 8:28.