A lot of pastors are fat, including ME. The other day I stepped on the scales and was promptly mortified with round mass of man I have become. This is sad because a pastor that refuses to address his weight is hypocritical. I will often tell people to have “self control” when it comes to sex before marriage or have “self control” when it comes to smoking…but I can’t seem to practice “self control” in a buffet line. In Baptist world, the one I am most familiar with, many of the pastors have a problem with people drinking alcohol but they would NEVER speak against someone eating too many biscuits. There is even a inside joke of “Baptist Butts” to refer to the oversized nature of our posteriors in our churches. Statistics prove that way more people die every year due to obesity or obesity related (and preventable disorders) than alcohol yet the SBC remains silent on the subject and it’s literally killing us.
landing the plane
Almost 2 years ago I announced that our family would be leaving the great city of Kansas City and moving 2 hours east to Jefferson City. Quickly my time hear is coming to a close as the residency has moved into the dreaded interviewing stage. Recently, I was invited to step into a process with the Rock Church’s Soulard campus. Overall, our time there was great and as we continue to pray through this process I wanted to share the sermon that I preached. This is not the quality of video or audio but hopefully you are able to enjoy God’s word. The title of this sermon is “Sign or Savior” and was based out of John 4:43 – 54. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did proclaiming it.
Train wreck
As I sat in my “Introduction to Preaching” at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Rev. Dr. Charles Briscoe asked a question I’ll never forget “Which one of you want to be a preacher?” Honestly, it seemed innocent enough so I, along with everyone in the class, raised my hand. Dr. Briscoe chose myself and 9 others and made these statements, “I want the 7 of you to raise your hands.”
Racial Reconciliation
This is a blog post written by Dr. Eric Mason who is the lead pastor of Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia and originally featured here. This subject is very near and dear to my life as we try to model this to others in our spheres of influence.
Sanctity of life and MLK
Over the last few years of my life, around this time of year, I have been placed in a conundrum in my life. Every January the celebration of Martin Luther King’s (MLK) Birthday and the Sanctity of Life Sunday seem to fall on the same Sunday.
the stats are in and they are staggering
“A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling.” – Psalm 68:5
A few years ago I was given a book by my best friend and it blew me away. The book is called “Church for the Fatherless: A Ministry Model for Society’s Most Pressing Problem” by Pastor Mark Strong. The book itself served as no surprise to me but as I dug deeper I found myself trying to better understand the Churches role in the remedy. Here are the stats
- According to 72.2 % of the U.S. population, fatherlessness is the most significant family or social problem facing America.
- An estimated 26.63 million children (33%) live absent their biological father.
- Of students in grades 1 through 12, 39 percent (17.7 million) live in homes absent their biological fathers.
- Currently 57.6% of black children, 31.2% of Hispanic children, and 20.7% of white children are living absent their biological fathers.
- The 1997 Gallup Youth Survey found the following among U.S. teens:
- 33 % live away from their father
- 43% of urban teens live away from their father
- In 2010 over twenty million lived with no father (biological, adoptive, or step).
Looking at this epidemic is seriously overwhelming. The question I have is how do we equip communities to bring healing and change to the fatherless landscape in our cities?
This is not something that the Bible is quiet about yet at all. As I read through the Bible God speaks about the orphan with great care and HE also charges us with engaging them. Throughout history Christians have spearheaded movements in this arena and we have a distinct opportunity to do it once again. The question is simple, how? How do we engage a culture so different the the one we have built our churches around? How do we respond to this with the heart of the One who says, ‘Father, He is father to the fatherless?’ You see this is a theological issue, it’s not just a social issue that the government has to take care of kids, because God Himself calls Himself Father to the fatherless. Our response is that we have to be reconcilers—that we have to enter the shame and suffering of a generation. We have to step into their lives with the same intimacy in which Christ stepped into ours at the incarnation. This a messy process but one that we must be engaged in to affect our communities and reflect our God.
[update] I saw this video and it broke my heart, yet it fits right in with this subject.
[vimeo http://vimeo.com/67922579]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- …
- 43
- Next Page »