Thought For the Week

Dear Friends, This week's 'thought' comes to you from a book entitled: "Why Does it Have to Hurt?" by Dan G. McCartney. It's a book that deals with the suffering that earnest,believing, godly Christians often endure. So, if that describes your condition at this time (or the condition of someone you know) I offer his wise words to encourage your soul! Enjoy. "The Second Lesson of Job: Honesty is the Best Policy." "In the New Testament, James refers to Job as a great example of patience and perseverance (James 5:10-11). [Yet] Job does not look to us like a great example of either patience or piety. He complains bitterly chapter after chapter. He moves from simple complaint and confusion in the earlier chapters to outright accusation of God in the later. This ought to show us that the proper response to suffering is not "grinning and bearing it" or uttering pious platitudes. Job...

Dear Friends, Today’s “thought” was written to pastors and for pastors by Gordon MacDonald. Yet, what he says can apply to all believers who are in any way involved in serving or doing ministry. These are things we can all tend to do, or may have done – sometimes without even being aware we were doing them. Things which can gradually sap us of our spiritual passion and vitality. Siphons are those things that suck the life out of us over time. And the reason it takes time is because most siphons begin so small we barely notice we’re even doing them! They often start like a small leak from the outlet faucet at the bottom of a water tank that wasn’t closed tightly enough. The loss of water is so small – and seemingly insignificant – that we see no immediate need to remedy it. Other times we may even see our life-sapping siphons as virtues we don’t need to remedy. One example would be the workaholic, who thinks that working incessantly without any regular Sabbath rest is a ...

Greetings Friends, Given all the events of the last year, the conflict in relation to the election, and much of the turmoil that has so many people concerned, worried, or even afraid, I did want to take the opportunity to send out a “thought” which is taken from two authors I referenced in my recent sermon on “God’s Absolute Sovereignty Over All – Including Satan,” which was from John 13:1-30, and brought in elements of Luke 22:22 and Luke 22:31 as well. If you have no interest in this topic, these two excerpts will seem too long. If you do have an interest in this subject, you will wish I quoted more!   The first author is A.W. Pink from his classic work, “The Sovereignty of God” (written in 1928). And the second is taken from Erwin Lutzer’s book, “God’s Devil – The Incredible Story of How Satan’s Rebellion Serves God’s Purposes.” (Lutzer was the pastor of Moody Church in Chicago from 1980-2016.) I encourage you to consider their words, let them (if needed) alter ...

Dear Friends, I have had two good friends (one who left us years ago to be with Jesus) who said the same thing to me, in two different ways, ten years apart! Back in the late 1980's when Jimmy Swaggert and James Bakker fell into sin in a very public way, an elderly minister told me (and a group of other younger pastors with me) that a good reality check for ourselves when such things happen is to say to ourselves in honest confession: "There, but by the grace of God, go I." He was right. In the late 1990's another friend shared a memorable "take-away" he'd learned from a training class for church volunteers he'd attended. One of the pastors leading the class told them all (and I can't remember every word exactly, but the summary went like this!): Be aware and guard your heart against temptation. Because given the right mix of circumstances, trials, pain, stress, betrayal, and failure, or even more so, th...