Just a Thought

With heavy hearts we want to share that David McDowell passed away this past Sunday, July 18, 2021.  This blog, which he started in 2011, provided him the opportunity to continue in the ministry after his retirement.  He loved the Lord and wanted to share his joy all the way up until his final breath. We know this to be true because even in Dave’s final weeks here on earth, he was convinced of…

The Difference Between Being a Winner or a Loser…

Billionaire Warren Buffet was asked by a group of college students about being a success and what separates winners from losers in the game of life. The question itself shows a worldview based upon wealth equals success, but let’s run with it. I don’t know much about Buffet’s story, but he has demonstrated some aspects of wisdom that earn him a hearing. The first point he made to these students…

How Have You Shaped God?

News from the art world: An Italian Artist Auctioned Off an ‘Invisible Sculpture’ for $18,300. It’s Made Literally of Nothing. Seriously!? Yep. Last month, 67-yr old Salvatore Gaurau auctioned off an “immaterial sculpture”—in other words, it didn’t exist! The artist named it Sono, which means “I am.” He claims that the sculpture finds its form in its own nothingness. “The vacuum is nothing more…

Mercy or Justice: What Do We Deserve?

Testing

The Hands of God…Kind or Harsh?

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties upon him, because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:6, 7-ESV) Last week I was released from the clinical trial for which I waited so long to qualify at the National Institutes for Health in Bethesda, MD. They did not like me and I feel totally rejected—just kidding. A…

The Deeper Magic: the Inevitability of Death and a Greater Hope

Holy Week…The Way of the Cross

The following are a series of Scripture readings and prayers for each day of the Passion Week. May the Holy Spirit use the Word to engender within you a deeper love for Christ, a greater adoration for his suffering and sacrifice on your behalf, and a firmer conviction to extend the love of Christ to a broken world at war with itself. March 28, Palm Sunday…  Philippians 2:5-11 Mark…

Lenten Devotionals, Week 6…March 22-27

As we prepare for next week, Holy Week, let us do an inventory of our spiritual lives as the basis for personal revival. May we not shy away from a close examination of our own sinfulness before a Holy God. We do all this in the light of God’s grace and forgiveness in Jesus Christ. March 22, Monday… Acts 2:37, 38  When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the…

The Future of Hope…

I have observed that one of the side-effects of our present pandemic is to narrow our focus on life down to the present and muddle our ability to see the big picture offered by the future. Any crisis does the same thing, because it crushes future hope by the incredible weight of present circumstances. I’ve had to struggle with this with my cancer; the tendency to lose perspective and to allow my…

Lenten Devotionals, Week 5… March 15-21

March 15, Monday…Psalm 42:5  Why are you downcast, O my soul?  Why are you disquieted within me?  Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him for his help. .   The mistake we often make is that we look for a source of comfort in ourselves rather than in God. Our hope is in God not what we feel him to be at the moment. For it is only in His countenance or presence (not our own) that our help…

Listen up, you people…part 2

Listen to this message from God, O King of Judah, sitting on David’s throne; and let your servants and your people listen too. The Lord says, “Be fair-minded. Do what is right! Help those in need of justice! Quit your evil deeds! Protect the rights of aliens and immigrants, orphans and widows; stop murdering the innocent! If you put an end to all these terrible deeds you are doing, then I will…

Listen up, you people… part 1

Listen to this message from God, O King of Judah, sitting on David’s throne; and let your servants and your people listen too. The Lord says, “Be fair-minded. Do what is right! Help those in need of justice! Quit your evil deeds! Protect the rights of aliens and immigrants, orphans and widows; stop murdering the innocent! If you put an end to all these terrible deeds you are doing, then I will…

Lenten Devotionals, Week 4…March 8-14

Monday, March 8… Romans 6:1, 2 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? The apostle Paul is saying that the key to victory over sin is to preside over our own funeral, as my friend Dick Burr used to say. In other words, victory over sin comes when we see ourselves as dead men/women…

Lenten Devotionals…Week 3, March 1-7

Monday, March 1…Psalm 68:24 Your procession has come into view, O God, the procession of my God and King into the sanctuary. In front are the singers, after them are the maidens playing tambourines.  The Psalmist here describes the festal procession celebrating the occasion of the Ark of the Covenant being brought back to the Temple. He says that the worshippers actually see God processing as…

Lenten Devotionals – Week 2, February 22-28

May the Lord continue to bend your heart towards him in humility and repentance… Monday, Feb 22…Matthew 4:3, 4   After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’ Jesus answered, It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’  (Deut…

Lenten Devotionals, Week 1

Please use these brief daily devotionals throughout Lent as an aid to your faith and a help in the bending of your soul toward God in humility and repentance. ASH WEDNESDAY, Feb 17… Luke 15:11- 24 Ash Wednesday begins the 40-day period leading to Easter known as Lent, which simply means “Spring.” Ash Wednesday has developed throughout the history of the Church as a day of repentance. It is a…

Above all things the heart is deceitful, and desperately sick…

Jeremiah 17:9; Mark 7:21-23 The recent news of the frivolous sexual dalliances of Ravi Zacharias is a disturbing case in point. I met Ravi at a conference at Gordon Conwell many years ago. We were the same age. He was beginning his upward rise as an apologist and I was just beginning as a young pastor of a church in New England which (ironically) just had a pastor leave because of alleged sexual…