Morning Musings: Ezekiel 11:5

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“And the Spirit of the Lord fell upon me, and he said to me, ‘Say, Thus says the Lord: So you think, O house of Israel.  For I know the things that come into your mind.'”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

Ezekiel is announcing some pretty grim judgment here, but I just want to give a bit of attention to the end of this verse.  “For I know the things that come into your mind.”  You probably already knew or guessed this about God, but here it is explicitly stated.  God knows what’s going on inside your mind. Read the rest…

How We Know It

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In this second part of our series, Reason to Believe, we take some time to examine the primary source for our knowledge of the truth: The Scriptures.  The Bible is a tough book made even tougher by the things it says.  Yet, making a full and comprehensive case for its reliability and trustworthiness is well beyond the scope of a single sermon.  In what follows we examine the problem together, talk about what we do believe as followers of Jesus, and build a small case for the reliability of the Gospels.  If we can prove those are trustworthy, making the case for the rest of it becomes all the easier.  Keep reading for more and stay tuned for next week as we wrestle with the challenge present by the doctrine of Hell.

 

How We Know It

How many of you spiritual souls would count the Bible as your favorite book?  I have a lot of different favorite books depending on the genre.  For example, my favorite kids’ book (and author) is The BFG by Roald Dhal.  I once considered stealing the library’s copy because I read it so many times.  When it comes to history, Larry Schweikart’s A Patriot’s History of the United States is top of my list.  In the world of fantasy, I greatly enjoyed Robert Jordan’s immense series, The Wheel of Time.  If you want to talk fiction more generally, I would probably rank C. S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce at least near the top of my list.  I would count each of these books as my favorites because of the impact they had on me when reading them.  I could read them over and over—okay, that’s not entirely true; Schweikart’s history was a pretty intense time commitment, but you know what I mean—and enjoy them every time.  There was no part of them that I didn’t like.  I suspect most folks who can identify one or two books as their favorite would use similar guidelines for their choices. Read the rest…

Morning Musings: Ezekiel 1:1-3

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“In the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, on the fifth day of the month, as I was among the exiles by the Chebar canal, the heavens were opened, and I saw visions of God.  On the fifth day of the month (it was the fifth year of the exile of King Jehoiachin), the word of the Lord came to Ezekiel the priest, the son of Buzi, in the land of the Chaldeans by the Chebar canal, and the hand of the Lord was upon him there.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

Ezekiel is a wild book.  Of all of the prophets, much of his work has always been some of the hardest to understand for me.  With that in mind, these first three verses are really important.  You see, as wild as some of Ezekiel’s visions were (and as you read the rest of this chapter, they start out pretty wild), they really happened to him.  They may have stretched the limits of what he was able to mentally process, much less try and explain to someone else, but there was a clear and firm historical context to them. Read the rest…

Digging in Deeper: Titus 2:7-8

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“Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us.”  (ESV – Read the chapter)

There are calls to Christ-like behavior all over the New Testament.  We see them in all kinds of different contexts.  And most of them seem to offer little more reason for this aim than that it is right and honoring of God.  Sometimes they focus on the benefit such behavior will bring to us.  But there are times I’ve been left wondering: What else is there?  Is there a reason to put so much effort and energy into this beyond the fact that it is right? Read the rest…

Morning Musings: Psalm 119:140

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“Your promise is well tried, and your servant loves it.”  (ESV)

I love what this is saying here.  When it comes to the promises of God, we don’t have some beta version of a program that doesn’t yet have all the bugs worked out of it.  We have something that was not only true and reliable from the start because of its source, but something that has also been tested and tried by hundreds of millions of users along the way. Read the rest…