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You are Free!
Most of us know that the world of the earliest Christians included slavery. The book of Philemon details the return of Onesimus. And elsewhere, Paul flips the usual household codes, addresses slaves directly (scandalous!), and tells masters they, too, have a master. But even more personally, Paul refers to all believers as manumitted from sin and free to become slaves of righteousness. Here are three examples from his letters: Romans 6:16-23 Do you not know that if you present yourselves as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks be to God that though you…
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Helpful Hand Motions
To grow they have to eat and drink and move around and play so that their muscles grow strong. There are some things we need to do as God’s children if we want to grow big and strong in the Lord.
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Grace and Faith, Not Works and Striving
Nella, my close Indonesian friend and mentee, was distraught. She had just read Jesus’s words in the gospel of Matthew and she was certain she did not measure up. 41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire that has been prepared for the devil and his angels! 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink. 43 I was a stranger and you did not receive me as a guest, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they too will answer, ‘Lord, when…
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Powerful Love, Life Changing Love
In John 17:26 Jesus prays, “I made known your name to them, and I will continue to make it known, so that the love you have loved me with may be in them, and I may be in them.” What an amazing prayer He prayed for us in this priestly prayer. To those who have believed in Jesus, He has made known His name to us. Yet He promises the Father that He will continue to make it known. And, why will He do that? So that the very love that the Father loves the only begotten Son with might be in us and that He might be in us.…
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Beware Lest You Teach Another Gospel
Of course, there is only one true Gospel message but to misconstrue it in any form is to turn it into something that it is not.
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The Treasure We Give Back
All of us have something we value above all else. Something we can’t live without. Something that gives us a sense of importance or hope. What can we learn from a woman labeled with capital SHAME who relinquished the treasure she was saving?
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Boldly Belong
Some days we need a suit of armor to protect us in our workplace battles. Women often juggle performance scrutiny, gender inequities, and heightened competition. God says: “I see you. I love you. I created you for purpose.”
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No Little Pharisees!
I have been teaching children for just shy of 50 years. That is a lot of teaching. But have I been teaching them well? In recent years, I have had to stop and reevaluate the things I have said as I quoted God’s Word to the children. In doing so I concluded that there were times that if a child followed my teaching, they would come out more like a pharisee than a believer. How many times have we as teachers and parents been guilty of telling the children that God hates sin without emphasizing His great love for the sinner? The Pharisees had God’s Words in their mouths but…
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Some Lessons from a Forty-Year-Old Marriage
This spring my husband and I celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary. We are grateful to God for bringing us together and for His grace in our marriage. To celebrate, we wanted to find some trails in Colorado to hike. However, after looking for several weeks, we were unable to find any trails that would work. Unbeknownst to us, God had something else planned. A missionary agency contacted my husband to inform him Albania had requested some medical training in his specialty. The planning trip would need to take place during the time we had set aside to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary. We felt God would have us postpone (or…
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How to Talk in Church about Roe vs. Wade
Did you feel the earth move? Politico published a leaked copy of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s draft opinion relating to abortion laws in the USA, and the rhetoric about abortion ramped up. Way up. Thrive Women’s Clinic, a Pregnancy Resource Clinic in Dallas, Texas, provides pregnancy tests, medical consultations, and free sonograms to women in unplanned pregnancies, many of whom are considering abortion. And since my friend Sarah Rooker, BSN, RN, is a nurse at Thrive,* I asked her if she’d noticed any changes as a result of the leak. Her answer? Yes! She said women are seeking options with more urgency and secrecy. But one thing hasn’t changed: as disputes…
