Here’s a deep-thought exercise for your final weekend of the summer. First, using as many commas as you need, summarize your life in a sentence. Some of you will find this exercise to be an energizing challenge. Others will have no interest in this kind of...
This week will be our third consideration of Paul’s opening prayer in Colossians 1:3-14. One thing I have noticed is how he begins and ends his prayer with thanksgiving to God. If we follow Paul’s pattern, our prayers and our lives will be changed. In the prayer,...
All who set themselves to obey the command of Christ to persist in prayer experience times when they simply don’t know what to ask. Not knowing how to pray can happen when the situation is complex, when we are overwhelmed with emotion, or when we’ve prayed...
The language used in reference to the gospel makes it clear that it is alive with power. That makes us want to pay attention and give ourselves to its influence in our lives. In the introduction of Colossians, Paul gives thanks for these Christians’ faith and...
Modern greetings have become casual, carrying little meaning and adding almost no value to our conversations or correspondence. But when the Apostle Paul opened his letter to the Colossians, he made a bold claim that his readers were called to believe as they began to...
This Sunday at Grace Community Church we will begin a series of sermons from the letter to the Colossians. This weekend, I encourage you to begin well and press on in the months to come in this New Testament book that will lead us to...
Though the temperature reminds us that we are in the middle of summer, the first week of August marks the beginning of the fall season of ministry at Grace Community Church. Let’s take the weekend to pray for a deep work of grace by the...
We have had a great summer in the Gospel of Mark hearing Jesus tell us about discipleship and call us to faith that leads to following him. We will bring this sermon series to a close this Sunday, but that doesn’t mean we’ve heard the last...
As a gift for graduation from college in 1985, a professor of mine gave me a copy of The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. My professor was both a deeply committed Christian and a historian. So, the book was a perfect representation of himself...
Every generation of Christians since Christ has had its challenges to discipleship in the world. Christians have not always been aware of these challenges, and so, have not faced them with faith and in faithfulness to Christ. Some, being aware, have made the decision to...
