Nick’s Walk

This picture has nothing to do with the blog topic. It just seemed kind of cool. I really struggled getting my shoes on this morning. I was doing it in the dark at 2 a.m. I did’t want to wake up my wife. Some people think you should be asleep at 2 a.m. They have a very narrow sense of propriety. The struggle with my shoes taught me a valuable lesson: You should always put your shoes on the right feet. Once I got the right shoe on the right foot, things went much better.  I sang all the songs pretty loud at church Sunday. I am disappointed to report that I still am tone deaf. My apologies to those who sat near me. The bad thing is I know I can’t sing and seem to get perverse pleasure in making other people around me miserable. Perhaps I should confess that.   I also apologize for thinking that when the Pastor said I deserved a standing ovation that he meant I should stand up. I felt kind of foolish so I gave the queenly wave around the room to my subjects, who seemed to get a big kick out […]

Sometimes things don’t turn out as predicted. Yesterday was my first full day home after knee replacement surgery. My understanding has been that I am supposed to be in horrible pain, packed in ice, sipping soup carefully prepared by tearful family members. Something went wrong and yesterday I made my own breakfast, supper and midnight snack. Lunch was a whole different delightful surprise. I am not sure my family was aware I was home. I have been calling my different experience a miracle, others seem to insist it’s just a somewhat unusual variation to what normally happens. They keep promising me that tomorrow it will be horrible as advertised. Not surprisingly, I have chosen to hope they are wrong. Sometimes when things don’t turn out as expected, it’s not so great. Sometimes someone expects a simple outpatient procedure to be a bump in the road and it turns out to be a painful nightmare not unlike what I should be having. That’s not called a miracle. Many years ago my Saturdays were spent in a dream world. I drove a little red car to parks with a special girl. We played and had fun like there was no one […]

  Yesterday I discussed the difficulty of distinguishing between accusation and conviction. Both begin with a feeling of “guilt.” Yesterday I experienced another “guilt” experience that’s very strange. I had an episode in which my blood pressure fell low…very low. I have to admit that after years of saying I’m ready to be with Jesus whenever He’s ready, the reality of what I perceived as a life threatening situation, gave me a huge dose of reality. I’m not ready to go. I still have things to do, lots of things to do. Even in the midst of that situation I never lost the sense of the blessing of God’s presence. While in the hospital I have witnessed many other patients suffering much greater pain with their recovery than I have experienced. Why have I been so blessed to survive? Why have I been so blessed to suffer less than others? There is a feeling of guilt which comes with that experience. I know that like the guilt that comes with Satan’s accusations, the guilt of blessing is not healthy. Blessing should inspire us to recognize we have responsibility and purpose. To whom much is given much is expected. It’s […]

As an attorney, when I am hit with a question my first reaction is to fall back on my legal background. I was considering how often we have a conscience pang. We feel bad about something we’ve done. Sometimes that can be a conviction. A conviction is from God, a move of His Holy Spirit. On other occasions, it’s an accusation. Satan is the great accuser. We obviously need to respond very differently in these situations. How can we tell, then, the difference? Starting, as I like to do, with a legal distinction, there is a huge difference between an accusation and a conviction. Anyone can accuse anyone else at any time. Often I am asked “Can I sue them?” The answer is always, “Yes.” But there is a big difference between suing someone and winning your case. In the criminal law, there are many steps between accusation and conviction. A conviction results only after proof has been produced. A conviction is an accusation that has been proven. That’s a good place to start in differentiating the two in the spiritual realm as well. If the Holy Spirit is convicting, it’s because we have sinned and have not addressed […]

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, (Romans 3:23, 24 ESV) After spending considerable time in explaining the Bad News which prefaces the Good News, Paul gets to the good part, and is it good. In What is the Gospel, the authors summarize beautifully: We are accountable to the God who created us. We have sinned against that God and will be judged. But God has acted in Jesus Christ to save us, and we take hold of that salvation by repentance from sin and faith in Jesus. God. Man. Christ. Response. What Is the Gospel? Gilbert, Greg; D. A. Carson page 31-32 Kindle version. It’s important to remember that there are two parts to the Good News part of the Good News. Jesus is God’s answer to the problem, but the solution is not applied universally (as so many now seem to believe). There is something we must do. We appropriate that salvation by repentance from sin and faith in Jesus. It is popular today to focus on the faith portion and to skip over the […]

What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin, as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” (Romans 3:9-12 ESV) If Paul were writing the Book of Romans today, he might begin with “I have Good News and Bad News.” Since he wrote it centuries before that phrase became popular, he just dives in with the bad news. The bad news is this: We are accountable to God and none of us measures up. He isn’t satisfied with that simple statement. He goes into details over multiple chapters. He starts with the gentiles and when the jews start to feel pretty good about themselves, he turns on them. It’s obviously important to Paul, that we get this point. Nonetheless, it’s a point we often miss. We really want to jump to the good news. Or we feel better pointing out how others fall short. For example, it’s in this section of Romans that Paul points out […]

  For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 1:16 As Christians we know that we have an obligation to share the gospel, the good news. What is it? Try right now to articulate what the good news is. Most of us will have to think about it for a couple of minutes and eventually will spit out a rambling statement which will probably mention Jesus, love, and wonderful plans. Some might throw in something about sin, repentance, and conversion. “Born again” will probably be mentioned in most answers. But shouldn’t we be able to clearly and precisely articulate what’s so good about the Good News? I understand that a huge part of sharing the gospel is telling someone what Jesus did for me. It’s the sharing of a personal story. But shouldn’t we also be able to explain the “theology” behind it? Can our only response be “Come to church with me and you’ll find out.” Think about this: If we can’t clearly articulate the good news, do we really understand it? Can we enjoy […]

  A recent bestseller asserted that the original manuscripts which form the basis for our bible were destroyed and rewritten to include new verses which support doctrines like the divinity of Christ. Real bible scholars have little problem refuting these arguments. The willingness of the public to accept unsupported claims that reduce the claims of Christianity is fascinating. Most folks just can’t handle the complete truth of Jesus. They might concede He was a prophet; but can’t accept that He died and rose again. They might be able to live with His wisdom; but not his miraculous powers. They can live with the thought that He was a great man, but reject that He was God. These same folks want to believe that there are multiple paths to God and that one “faith” is as good as another. They like to think the original manuscripts had Jesus proclaiming He was “A way, A truth and A life.” That’s not what He said and it’s not what He is. Before we are too quick to condemn a world that won’t accept Jesus for all that He is, we need to make sure that we, who claim to follow Him, are […]