Double Take

More Bessies to tip over today!

Perfect will vs permissive will, God wants our holiness not our happiness, and more.

Welcome back to language class. How many of these phrases have you heard before? And have you ever wondered about any of them?

Being "in the word," staying on fire for Jesus, and more!

(audio only)

Do you speak Church? Call it Church Speak or Church-ese, but we bet you are fluent in this language. This is our next series of sacred cows to topple.

Can we add just a few more to our list?

The Sinners’ Prayer. Baptism. Rededication. Revivals.

Have you ever wondered about any of these sacred cows?

The Great Commission. Don’t forsake the assembling of yourselves together. Altars in church. Communion customs.

While watching a TV show years ago, a scene came on that just wrecked me. It brought me to tears and stayed with me for a long time. I couldn’t put my finger on why it affected me so much. Then just a few months ago I could finally identify the emotion: rejection. That took me in a direction of seeing the rejection in my life that I couldn’t identify at the time.

Religion would teach us that we need to focus on our sins. The Law of Moses demands that we behave in a way consistent with the law of Moses and keep all the laws all the time. In Matthew and Mark we read that John the Baptist tells us to repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand. So are we saved sinners or are we saints?

Sometimes Christmas gets lost in the commercialism and religiosity all around us. We have some thoughts on this Christmas Eve.

Sweet little baby Jesus in the manger, calm and quiet, halo around His head, with arms outstretched. That’s how we see Him portrayed in every nativity scene. It’s beautiful and peaceful and we get the point. But every mother knows how unrealistic that picture is.

We know her story well. And because the verses are so familiar we tend to tune out as they are recited each Christmas. But today we take another look at this innocent young woman who loved God with all her heart.

The shepherds and the wise men are mentioned in another very familiar passage about the birth of Jesus. Here is a bit of storytelling about those nameless but favored people that were chosen to be major players in this supernatural event. 

Have you ever heard someone say “Pray to God. He said He is everywhere, He fills the whole earth, so He is there with you and will hear you if you pray according to His will.” It’s true He is everywhere. He is omnipresent. Is getting closer to God about what you should or could do?

When a health scare ends well, the promotion happens, a big tax refund arrives, we say God is so good! To be honest, we often judge God’s goodness by our circumstances. When things are going our way it’s easy to say God is good, all the time! But when the opposite happens, is God not good? Was He not paying attention? Or was He trying to teach us a lesson? Maybe God’s goodness is different than we think. 

We’ve been talking about what it means to stand. In Ephesians 6 we hear about putting on the full armor of God and after that we read “and having done everything, stand.” What is everything? And how does this relate to the armor? Did it fall off overnight?