While it is true that the crucifixion of Christ is almost uncontested in historical scholarship (those who claim Jesus never even existed are rarely actual historians) what is contested by some is whether He actually died on the cross. It’s possible one of the earliest records of this is in the Koran, Surah 4: 156-157h 4: 156-157English: Contemporary English [...]

Two friends passed away this week. Frank Garrett, not quite forty, was in a motorcycle accident and Tom Morphis from severely aggressive cancer. I don’t know the details from either situation, but both friends went way back. Frank for 15 years or so, and I knew Tom going on 35 years as he was a [...]

Why do all religions claim that they are the only way? How do we know which, if any, is right? This is a very common question, one that is asked all the time. It’s also the one that gets a lot of Christians charged with bigotry and intolerance because we believe that Christ is the [...]

Warning: The Surgeon General Has Determined That ‘Self’ Contains The Drug, Pride, Which Is Extremely Addicting And Is Known To Cause Death. I recently prayed, “Make me humble, O Lord” but then, presumptuously, preposterously, added the clause, “but don’t break me completely.” Bake me a cake but hold the flour, sugar, eggs and milk, will [...]

Image via Wikipedia Raised was He three timesOn the crossFrom the tomband to His Father. The Father shares His glory with His Son,The Son shares His glory with His Bodyso do we return all glory and thanks,praise and honor to the Father in Christ Jesus. Ascension Thursday, 40 days after the Resurrection, marks the rise [...]

I was watching a panel discussion between William Lane Craig, Jim Dennison, Lee Strobel, another Christian guy I don’t know and Christopher Hitchens (you can see the whole thing here) and something that Hitchens said struck me. Not because it was especially profound (it wasn’t) or deep (it wasn’t) or even insightful (again, it wasn’t). [...]

Kingdom Grace has posted a few thoughts on “Not Starting a Church” originally from Wayne. The talkbacks are fascinating. Very insightful thoughts indeed. For instance, on the vacuum created by requiring care to occur in the context of relationship, For if there is no ‘group’ who cares about the person sitting beside me then there [...]

[Jakarta] has asked how to use Scripture to fight temptation. This is going to be a bit long (is it ever short?) but I think this one needs to be. If you want the short version, then I say, trust in Christ and pray His Word, walk away and let the situation pass. If that [...]

I just got an email from a friend that moved me to post its contents. If you haven’t seen it, I hope it blesses you. A lesson we should never forget: Several years ago, a preacher from out-of-state accepted a call to a church in Houston, Texas. Some weeks after he arrived, he had an [...]

Two train ads I did for Tokyo to share Christ, or at least spark interest, with the large Tokyo population. Taking in metropolitan mindsets, interests in Western art, fascination with English, simplicity and impact, I thought these might be a good way to use modern techniques to share. I haven’t actually printed these yet (I [...]

Brennan Manning is one of my top five favorite writers, easy. In his latest book, the furious longing of God, he punches through your chest and grips you by the entrails, rips them out, puts them back in the order they were supposed to be in before you went and messed them all up in [...]

I’m reading Gary Friesen’s Decision Making and the Will of God at the moment (great book, highly recommended) and he talks in one part about different ways to get into and remember the Word. The one that I’ve been using the past couple of weeks I’ve found quite good and so I thought I’d share [...]

“For me the dynamic of a commitment to Scripture is not “we believe the Bible, so there is no more to be learned,” but rather “we believe the Bible, so we had better discover all the things in it to which our traditions, including our ‘protestant’ or ‘evangelical’ traditions, which have supposed themselves to be [...]

“You have a such a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your own tradition!” Mark 7:9Mark 7:9English: Contemporary English Version (1999) – CEV9 You are good at rejecting God’s commands so that you can follow your own teachings!WP-Bible plugin It is for absolute certain no man, woman nor child has ever [...]

God has blessed me with a beautiful daughter and perhaps we will be blessed with more. Children are fantastic, but take a lot out of parents (and teachers, eh, Dave?).What I’m going to say here may prove un-popular in light of many “modern techniques” of child-rearing. Dr. Spock’s books have a lot of good stuff [...]

We’ve been getting a few enquiries lately about grace, and what it really means in laymen’s terms, so I thought I’d have a go at explaining it simply, and it seems to me that the best way to understand what grace is is to understand what it does, so let me detail that quickly. As [...]