Morning Musing: 2 Peter 1:5-8

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“For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

Do you want to be effective?  We all do, don’t we?  We want to be able to have an impact on the people and environment around us.  Not only that, but we want to do so in a way that will last and have meaning.  The question, then, becomes: How do we do this?  How can we have an effective impact on our situations? Read the rest…

Digging in Deeper: Proverbs 30:7-9

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“Two things I ask of you; deny them not to me before I die: Remove far from me falsehood and lying; give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me, lest I be full and deny you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God.”  (ESV)

If you could ask anything of God, what would it be?  Agur here asks for two things.  He firsts asks for God to make him honest, to take all falsehood and lying away from him.  We can understand that.  Now, that may not be the first thing we would think of if we had a blank check from God, but it’s a pretty good thing if you think about it.  He’s basically asking for God to help him live a life that is consistent with reality all the time.  Most of us could probably use a little more reality in our lives.  Living with fantasy may feel nice for a while, but eventually it runs out and usually leaves you lower than you were before you sought the fantasy high in the first place.  This is a good thing.  We get this one.  The other thing…after the beginning…not so much. Read the rest…

Morning Musing: 1 Peter 3:15

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“…but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect…”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

This is perhaps the chief theme verse for the discipline of apologetics.  Apologetics is, of course, the discipline of making arguments in defense of the Christian faith.  Much has been written about this verse.  Let me make three observations here. Read the rest…

Digging in Deeper: Psalm 139:13-16

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“For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.  My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth.  Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

There are two great truths that come out of this passage.  One of them is deeply personal and has been greatly encouraging to me for many years.  The other is prophetically cultural.  It speaks a word of truth into an area of cultural and political division in our country that is increasingly sharp in its contrast between the two sides. Read the rest…

Morning Musing: 1 Peter 2:20

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“For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure?  But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

Peter wrote to a group of believers who were facing unjust suffering.  He wrote to them to offer them encouragement to keep on in their faith in spite of the things they were enduring.  His message was and is so powerful that 1 Peter is still a favorite book of the Bible among people who are facing persecution today. Read the rest…