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Freed by the Blood
Frankly speaking, sin not only contaminates, it also subjugates. It enslaves. Like a great snake — a python or anaconda — sin wraps itself around us and slowly entangles and strangles us. Like the hunter’s net, the more we struggle against …Read More
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The Secret of Sanctification
One of the most beneficial things I learned from my professors during my seminary days was that ministers must continually preach the message of the cross to the people of God for their growth in grace. One professor in particular …Read More
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Killing Anger
In marriage, anger rivals lust as a killer. My guess is that anger is a worse enemy than lust. It also destroys other kinds of camaraderie. Some people have more anger than they think, because it has disguises. When willpower …Read More
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What Made David Great?
Everyone who knows the Bible knows that King David was a great man. And yet everyone familiar with the Bible also recognizes that David did a lot of not-so-great things. Of course, there was the sin with Bathsheba, the murder …Read More
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Our Pasts Don’t Have to Matter
During our election cycles in the U.S., we see a lot of headlines and hear a lot of talk about the past of candidates for public office. We wrestle with and quarrel about the question, Do their pasts matter …Read More
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Daily Confession, Enduring Reform
I have a friend who is a Roman Catholic. Not too long ago he went to “confession,” after which he told me, with tears welling up in his eyes, he felt “clean like a new born baby.” Confession is an …Read More
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Lessons from the Fall
The Gospels depict the arrest and trial of Jesus in a way that shows us not only the insensibility of His accusers, but also His own steadfast faithfulness to the will of God through suffering and humiliation. Our Lord’s …Read More
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The Reluctant Prophet
Anyone who has ever attended a Sunday school class knows that Jonah was the man who was eaten alive by a fish and then vomited out three days later. But that’s about the extent of most people’s understanding …Read More
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The Witness of Love and Forgiveness
As Christians, how we treat other people speaks louder to the world regarding the authenticity and validity of our beliefs than the doctrines we teach, the creeds we confess, or even the moral and good lives we try to …Read More
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The Emblem of Full Forgiveness
There is a small detail in the Hebrew text of the Joseph narrative that is like the masterstroke of a great artist in a masterpiece painting. When Moses describes the envy and jealousy of Jacob’s severely dysfunctional family …Read More
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Remembering God’s Grace
For many of us, at the beginning of our Christian journeys, we thought of and spoke often about the radical forgiveness of a God who has been greatly sinned against. I remember myself going on and on about God’s …Read More
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Forgive Us Our Trespasses
We need daily pardon and daily protection as well as daily provision. So after Jesus taught us to pray, “give us today our daily bread,” He also taught us to pray, “and forgive us our debts, as we also have …Read More
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The Prodigal Brother
It had been twenty years since Jacob had deceived his father and received the blessing Isaac had intended to give Esau. It had been twenty years since Jacob fled for his life from a furious brother intent on killing …Read More
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Changing the Past
Some cultures have no central government. Their only social organization is the family, including the extended family that constitutes a clan, and the organization of clans into a tribe. So in the absence of laws, a police force, and a …Read More
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Christians Aren’t Perfect…
“By this,” Jesus said, “all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Here Jesus gives us an apologetic we seem to have lost sight of. One of the blessings …Read More
