What Would Jesus Say to Lance Armstrong? ““No one, Lord,” she answered. “Neither do I condemn you,” said Jesus. “Go, and from now on do not sin anymore.”” (John 8:11, HCSB) This week we learned what some people (including my wife) has suspected for many years: Lance Armstrong used drugs to enhance his ability to win seven Tour de France titles. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey this week, Lance confessed to using performance-enhancing drugs and hiding it from... Read more
Sexual Pollution ““Don’t pollute yourself in any of these ways. This is how the nations became polluted, the ones that I am going to drive out of the land before you. Even the land itself became polluted and I punished it for its iniquities—the land vomited up its inhabitants. You must keep my decrees and laws—natives and foreigners both. You must not do any of these abhorrent things. The people who lived in this land before you arrived did all... Read more
Blamegoats ““When Aaron finishes making atonement for the Holy of Holies, the Tent of Meeting, and the Altar, he will bring up the live goat, lay both hands on the live goat’s head, and confess all the iniquities of the People of Israel, all their acts of rebellion, all their sins. He will put all the sins on the goat’s head and send it off into the wilderness, led out by a man standing by and ready. The goat will... Read more
How Much Is Your Soul Worth? “Look, does it make sense to truly become successful, but then to hand over your very soul? What is your soul really worth?” (Matthew 16:26, The Voice) There is a website which gives you a quiz to play to determine a value for your soul in “soul dollars.” It claims that Satan will place a value on your soul based on answers to a set of fifteen questions. He does a very good job of... Read more
The Sin of Manipulation “Herod had arrested John, put him in chains, and sent him to prison to placate Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife. John had provoked Herod by naming his relationship with Herodias “adultery.”” (Matthew 14:3–4, The Message) I imagine the conversation went like this: John: Why are you with Herodias, don’t you know that she is another man’s wife? Herod: You are right, but she is so beautiful and… John: She’s not yours to have. Herod: But... Read more
Musical Promoters of God “After the death of Aaron’s two sons—they died when they came before God with strange fire—God spoke to Moses: “Tell your brother Aaron not to enter into the Holy of Holies, barging inside the curtain that’s before the Atonement-Cover on the Chest whenever he feels like it, lest he die, because I am present in the Cloud over the Atonement-Cover.” (Leviticus 16:1–2, The Message) Sometimes I wonder why people don’t take the worship of God... Read more
Walk Lovewards “And this is love: that we walk according to His commands. This is the command as you have heard it from the beginning: you must walk in love.” (2 John 6, HCSB) What does it mean to walk in love? To put it another way, what does it mean to walk “lovewards”? I can walk forward and backward. I can walk sidewards (or sidestep). I can climb upwards and downwards. I can walk in many different directions, depending... Read more
Let Go and Serve God “God said to Moses in Midian: “Go. Return to Egypt. All the men who wanted to kill you are dead.” So Moses took his wife and sons and put them on a donkey for the return trip to Egypt. He had a firm grip on the staff of God.” (Exodus 4:19–20, The Message) In the previous chapter, God appeared to Moses in a bush, which was burning, but never consumed. God appeared to Moses and called him to lead... Read more
Soaked in Holiness “Make atonement for the Altar and consecrate it for seven days; the Altar will become soaked in holiness—anyone who so much as touches the Altar will become holy.” (Exodus 29:37, The Message) “Getting soaked” is a term we use to mean that someone is wet. They get drenched in water completely from head to toe. As a result, they are full of whatever made them wet. If they were dunked in a dunking booth, then they... Read more
What Is It? “When the Israelites saw it, they asked one another, “What is it?” because they didn’t know what it was. Moses told them, “It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat.” (Exodus 16:15, HCSB) The Hebrew word man-hu, literally means “What is it?” This is the name the people of Israel gave the bread which God provided on their way out of Egypt in the desert. This “bread” is strange indeed. It would only appear... Read more
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