Genealogies are hardly spellbinding. Perhaps, like me, you are tempted to skip them in your Bible reading. Yet genealogies are a significant part of the Bible. The book of Matthew’s genealogy is a family tree of Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God incarnated as the Son of Man. Matthew wrote his gospel primarily to the Jews. Strictly speaking, the purpose of this genealogy is to prove to Jewish readers that Jesus of Nazareth as the seed of Abraham and the son of David was the long-awaited Messiah.
Making Advent Count
Advent is a time for our hearts to be stirred and strengthened as we consider God’s unwavering faithfulness and unmatched love, shown in the sending of His Son.
December 1: Noah’s Ark
The wickedness is too much to bear. Cruelty and violence are overwhelming. Everything is corrupt to the core: “every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually” (Genesis 6:5).
December 3: God’s Promise to Abraham
On a night when you’re far from city lights and the sky is cloudless, the view is enough to stop you in your tracks. Plum-black backdrop, speckled with a thousand pinpricks of light. And the longer you stare, the more those thousand multiply into a thousand thousands. The dimmest distant stars reveal themselves.
December 2: The Promised Land
Moving isn’t most people’s idea of a good time. Packing feels overwhelming, loading and unloading the truck are exhausting, and settling in seems never ending. (Who doesn’t have one box still unopened in the basement?) Then there’s the way moving often takes us far away from the places we know and the people we love.
Should Christians celebrate Juneteenth?
“Anytime, anytime while I was a slave, if one minute’s freedom had been offered to me, and I had been told I must die at the end of that minute, I would have taken it—just to stand one minute on God’s earth a free woman—I would.” – Elizabeth Freeman (also known as Bet or MumBet, was the first enslaved African American to file for and win a freedom suit in Massachusetts.)
During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862, with an effective date of January 1, 1863. It declared that all enslaved persons [only] in the Confederate States of America in rebellion and not in Union hands were to be freed. There is no one reason why there was a 2½-year delay in letting Texas know about the abolition of slavery in the United States. Some accounts place the delay on a messenger who was murdered on his way to Texas with the news, while others say the news was deliberately withheld. Despite the delay, slavery did not end in Texas overnight, after New Orleans fell, many slavers traveled to Texas with their slaves to escape regulations enforced by the Union Army in other states. [Read more…]
The Meaning of Easter
Christians around the world will soon be celebrating Easter.
Whether it’s circled in marker on our wall calendars or programmed in our phones, many of us are anticipating Easter weekend next week. Often our traditions emphasize either resurrection rejoicing or cross-centered sorrow at the expense of the other. Which is the right posture? [Read more…]
Introducing Lent
The season of Lent is an invitation to meet Jesus in our suffering. It drives us toward the love of God and reminds us that Jesus shares in our sufferings and we get to share in His—all for the purpose of becoming more like Him.
Almighty God, whose blessed Son was led by the Spirit to be tempted by Satan; come quickly to help us who are assaulted by many temptations; and, as you know the weaknesses of each of us, let each one find you mighty to save; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
— A Lenten Prayer from the Book of Common Prayer
Genesis
The book of Genesis has a groove to it. It runs from poem to song to narrative to poem to song.
The Book of Genesis has a unity to it that fits with the entire Torah (the Pentateuch, or the first 5 books of scripture). There is a definitive strategy laid out, and sometimes this leads to a narrative that isn’t always smooth and uniform. This has led many people to assume that Genesis was written by different authors and is a disjointed mess. [Read more…]
Singleness and Valentine’s Day
It is an honor to pastor a church with a growing and vibrant community of college students, young adults and single adults. I have discovered that nothing is more besetting to this demographic than the sting of loneliness and certainly days like Valentine’s Day only reinforce that sting. While much of our culture celebrates love in an endearingly tacky way, singles are tempted to view the whole spectacle as at best nauseating, at worst depressing. So I have prayed for you and I would like to offer as well some words of encouragement. [Read more…]
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