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It’s Sunday that makes all the difference. Friday provided the once for all sacrifice that gives us the blood that brings forgiveness. Sunday gives us the power to live. We can be Followers because of Sunday. We partake of the divine and become Sons of God because of Sunday, Glorious Sunday. We don’t do a good job of teaching or living the Sunday life. We are used to calling on the blood for forgiveness when we fail. We don’t do as good a job calling on the power to resist sin and follow Him. It’s Sunday. The tomb is empty. Death is conquered. Fear is banished. Life is possible.  Alleluia.

Friday was a noisy and frantic day, crowds screaming for blood, the cold sound of nails into flesh and wood. It was a visual day with darkness in the middle of the day and the renting of the temple curtain. Saturday was different but no less frightening. The silence was chilling. The disciples had to wonder if the Jews and the Romans would be making sweeps to clean up the “cult” of Jesus followers. They had to spend frightening time in silent thought wondering if they had erred in following, if they had misunderstood Him and His purpose. Silence is like that. We wonder what the devil is up to and where God is. We wonder how we got to where we are and if we will be left there to fend for ourselves. It may be scarier than the flashing and loud days when the spiritual battle is visible even in the natural world. Silence challenges our faith, our hope and our love. We are reluctant to break the silence, fearful that we will call attention to ourselves and be, like Peter, tempted to deny.  We consider that our faith may have been in vain. We see no […]

It’s time to square up to the cross of Christ, to all that happened on this Good Friday and take responsibility. It’s time to drop all the universalist language and stop saying “He died for the sins of the world.” Just admit it. He died for me. If I had been the only person in the world, not only would he have died, but His death would have been just as horrible, painful, humiliating, and gruesome. It’s all about how bad sin is. I’m not talking sin in the generic. I’m talking about personal sin, mine and yours. When I first met my wonderful fundamentalist wife, she kept talking about a personal savior. It took me a long time to get it. It’s all about Jesus and me. It’s about me and Jesus. It’s about my sin, my salvation, my savior. Failure to Face Friday is the reason for anemic churches and powerless Christians. We want to claim the blood without really looking at it. We want resurrection power, by skipping to Sunday. It won’t work we have to face Friday. Today, enjoy your crawfish boils, and fish fries. Enjoy your time away from work. Enjoy the beautiful spring weather […]

 3 Then the chief priests and the elders of the people assembled in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, 4 and they schemed to arrest Jesus secretly and kill him. 5 “But not during the festival,” they said, “or there may be a riot among the people.” Matthew 26 The chief priests and elders saw the people hail Jesus as Messiah and give Him a royal welcome into Jerusalem. They couldn’t have that. It threatened their place and power. They reacted like all cowardly leaders: they schemed in secret. We need to be aware of how the world will react when followers begin to truly believe and faithfully follow. They will react like threatened animals. They will become dangerous.  While His enemies schemed, Jesus continued on His mission: He taught in the temple. Believe Followers the scheming in secret is going on. Our natural tendency to try to smoke out the schemers needs to be resisted. They are a distraction. We need to act as Jesus did. We need to stay on mission. Increase in scheming and raging among the “heathen” are signs that the mission is on target and the return of Christ is near. When persecution […]

Jesus Curses a Fig Tree 18 Early in the morning, as Jesus was on his way back to the city, he was hungry.19 Seeing a fig tree by the road, he went up to it but found nothing on it except leaves. Then he said to it, “May you never bear fruit again!” Immediately the tree withered. 20 When the disciples saw this, they were amazed. “How did the fig tree wither so quickly?” they asked. 21 Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. Matthew 21 On the week before He died, Jesus cursed to withering a fig tree because it bore no fruit. You would think that everything that Jesus did, including lessons he taught, were particularly important in his final week. The withered fig tree is such a lesson. The purpose of a fig tree is to bear figs. What good is a fig tree that fails to do that? Our purpose is to bear fruit. What good is a Christian who fails […]

21 For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. 22 If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! 23 I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; 24 but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. Philippians 1 Most of the time I can’t help but believe that Christians are full of it. By that I mean they are completely inconsistent. To a man they claim to await eagerly the return of Christ, praying for it to promptly occur. On the other hand, they cling to life ferociously. If we really, want to be with Christ, shouldn’t we as eagerly await death as we do his return? Nevertheless, we pray for miracles for ourselves and others. We seek healing even after our lives have been full, our mission obviously complete, and we lay racked with pain and the despair of uselessness. I don’t get it. Well, maybe I do. Is it that we don’t really believe the promises of Christ that to die is gain […]

Sometimes the words of a song say it all: Listen to the song.  Jeff Johnson – Glorious Day Lyrics One day when heaven Is filled with His praises One day when sin was as black as could be Jesus came forth to Be born of a virgin He dwelt among men, my example is He [Chorus:] Living He loved me Dying He saved me Buried He carried my sins far away Rising He justified Freely forever One day He’s coming Oh, Glorious Day Oh, Glorious Day One day they led Him Up Calvary’s mountain One day they nailed Him To die on a tree Suffering anguish Despised and rejected Bearing our sins, my Redeemer is He One day the grave could conceal Him no longer One day the stone rolled away from the door Then He arose o’er Death He had conquered Now is ascended My lord evermore [Chorus] Oh, Glorious Day Oh, Glorious Day One day the trumpet will Sound for His coming One day the skies with His Glories will shine Wonderful day My beloved was bringing Glorious Savior this Jesus is mine [Chorus] Oh, Glorious Day Oh, Glorious Day Oh, Glorious Day Oh, Glorious Day Oh, […]

Spring has sprung. The vast brownness of winter has given way to spring green. I have heard this season described as “If it’s green, it must be a weed.” It’s as if in its excitement to respond to warmer temperature and summer rains, everything comes charging out of the ground. On closer examination, what really looks good is mostly just weeds. My front ditch looks like a rain forest. Our flower beds are covered in weeds. Even the lawn, to the extent it’s green, on closer examination, it isn’t so much grass as it is a variety of weeds.  You want to charge in with a weed eater and herbicide, but care is needed because the first shoots of the “good” plants are buried in with the weeds. Some of my worst spring disasters have occurred when in my weed killing frenzy I have destroyed some of my wife’s favorite plants. The great thing about spring is newness. There is new life coming out all over. We seem to love newness. Like the spring growth, life produces new things which aren’t all great. There are more new weeds in our lives than anything else. We are suckers for the […]