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The Birth of Christmas: The son of god and The Son of God
The year was 4 BC, and much of Galilee was in turmoil. Caesar Augustus, the son of god, had ordered a census for tax purposes, and some in Israel had to go to their home communities to comply. So it was that an unknown couple, Joseph and Mary, from an obscure town called Nazareth of Galilee had to go to a small village named Bethlehem nearly 100 miles away. To complicate things even more, Mary was pregnant and about to deliver her firstborn son, Jesus. Caesar Augustus, Gaius Julius Octavius, was one of the greatest leaders in history. A brilliant administrator, a talented team builder, aware of his…
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Blessed Are the Pure In Heart
When Blessings Abound Series The Beatitudes Attitude: Passionately Pursuing Christlikeness Through Desperate Dependence on Him { Hidden in The Folds } Who can be pure in heart? Who I ask? Certainly not I! Can I think I am pure in heart? Of course. Can I be pure in heart “as far as I know?” I can—as far as I know. The problem is I don’t know very far. Only God knows if I’m pure in heat, and He’s not telling me. The heart is an active deceiver (Jer. 17:9), and this is why God searches us (Jer. 17:10) so He can reward us according to the secrets hidden away in…
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Blessed are the Driven
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken When Blessings Abound Series The Beatitudes Attitude: Passionately Pursuing Christlikeness Through Desperate Dependence on Him { Blessed are the Driven } Blessed are those who hunger and thirst. . . (Mt. 5:6) Hungry and thirsty people are driven people. When we are hungry and thirsty, the drive for food and water takes over, and nothing else matters. After all, food and water mean life and not death. So when Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,” He was saying that our longing for righteousness and freedom from the death that sin and the shame bring is a blessing. That’s…
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Blessed are the Bankrupt
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Blessed are the poor in spirit . . . (Mt. 5:3) What stunning, shocking words! What king announces his rule by calling the poor in spirit to him, the bankrupt, those with no resources who bring nothing to him? Only one. The King who is lowly in heart, who offers a light burden because He is not bent down by the weight of pride. Amazingly these are the first recorded words of discipleship Jesus uttered. Jesus requires bankruptcy to enter His kingdom… That’s what it means to be poor in spirit: spiritual bankruptcy, a total lack of resources to do what ultimately…
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Last Things First
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken The Great Commission was the last words Jesus said, but it was among the first thoughts in His mind as He began His ministry. Why was it that one of the first actions He took was to choose disciples (Mt. 4:18-22) if He did not have a purpose in mind for them? He certainly did not intend to spend the better part of three years preparing followers for nothing… And why did He persevere so relentlessly with them when they rejected His message and thought like Satan (Mark 8:33) or created more confusion than clarity when a father sought their help for…
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Start With the End in View
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Jesus started with the end in view. From the first day of His earthly ministry to the last, He had His two-fold purpose before Him: redemption and preparation, the cross and the commission. He came to provide redemption for dying men and women. But what good would His redemptive death be if there were no one to tell others what it means? How could He establish a redemptive movement if He had no one to start it? That’s why He declared to His Father before the cross that He had accomplished His will by making the Father known to those He had…
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The Beatitudes Attitude: Introduction
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Today we start a new series drawn from the Beatitudes which describe the abounding blessings of Christ in us. We start with the introduction this week, go to a preview with our next entry, and then we will look at each of the Beatitudes to see what these blessings mean to us as we seek to grow in the Beatitudes Attitude. Blessed are . . . (Matthew 5:1-12) The first recorded words of Jesus to His future disciples were words of blessing, and what blessings they are! These blessings are the essence of life that have endured through the ages and define…
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The Ultimate Wilderness – Series Finale
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Wilderness Wanderings Series Finale: Learning to Live the Zigzag Life AD 33, 9:00 AM Passover Friday, the Place of the Skull, a public place near Jerusalem. Many people are coming and going, some stopping to see what was happening, observing three men on crosses, two criminals with Jesus in the middle. A large crowd had followed the crucifixion detail out of the city to the place of execution, the place of the ultimate wilderness… No one knew it was the ultimate wilderness on that spring morning. Not the Pharisees or the Sadducees, the instigators of the crucifixion. Not the high…
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The Lucky Wilderness
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Wilderness Wanderings Series: Learning to Live the Zigzag Life John Paine calls himself “the luckiest man in the world,” and most agreed with him some years ago. When John was in the seventh grade he decided he would be physically strong, and he worked until he became a superior athlete who played for college football. Then he decided to transfer to a top ten engineering school and strive to become intellectually strong, and he succeeded by graduating Summa Cum Laude. Upon graduation, John married his high school sweetheart and started his family. At the same time he decided he would…
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The Parenting Wilderness
Leadership is broken because leaders are unbroken Wilderness Wanderings Series: Learning to Live the Zigzag Life Among all the books on parenting that are floating around these days, there is one missing. It’s hard to believe that we’ve overlooked anything, but we are lacking one vital title. I’m not sure how the publishers would respond to this, but in this time of self-publishing, they are not as dominant as they once were, which means this book might make it to the market. The title? Parents Who Did Everything Right and Got it Wrong. There, I told you it would be a best seller. Well, maybe not. Unwanted…