Were you raised in church with certain understandings that were not well rooted in Scripture?  I can think of a few teachings on eschatology that were pretty rough. I'm sure you can as well.                                    What about Easter????  Well, Christianity Today posted this helpful post this week. Titlted:  Five Errors to Drop from Your Easter Sermon I've put a short form version here. Be sure to check out that post linked above because it was written by Kostenbeger and Taylor.  Andreas Köstenberger is senior research professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina. Justin Taylor is senior vice president and publisher for books at Crossway. They co-authored  The Final Days of Jesus: The Most Important Week of the Most Important Person Who Ever Lived  (Crossway). 1. Do...

Gossip is not common only among those who sow discord in the church. No, we all can fall into this sin. Why? Because pride must always be put to death. While it is painfully true that some are more bent this way than others, especially when they do not get what they want, we all have to see the subtle danger of gossip. Regardless our frustrations, we must not participate in gossip. Chuck Lawless has 9 observations here to remind about why we must turn from this and confront it when it comes into our lives.  It is prideful for us to gossip and to listen to gossip too. Let's not do that. Let's do what would please Jesus.  9 REASONS GOSSIP IS DESTRUCTIVE TO A CHURCH  via  Chuck Lawless It's both a verb and a noun. We've certainly all heard it, and perhaps we've all done it. Maybe we've even been the butt of it. "It" is gossip – and it's destructive to a church. Here's why: 1.       It's evil.  Ho...

Baptism symbolizes our spiritual unity in Christ. If you want to publicly identify with Jesus, baptism is the way. https://t.co/rXUpNIxal9 — 9Marks (@9Marks) March 18, 2016

Often criticized, neglected; and at the same time, often abused is the practice of church discipline.  It is the most difficult of tasks set before the church. It takes love and courage to do this work.  Here is a summarized post what was written by Jonathan Leeman on the Crossway blog. Here is the link where you will find all the points explained.  10 Things You Should Know about Church Discipline   I highly recommend you read it on the link above.  10 Things You Should Know about Church Discipline. March 07, 2016  by:  Crossway 1. Jesus and Paul both command churches to practice church discipline. 2. “Church discipline” goes by different names. 3. Nearly every organization practices discipline. 4. Churches should practice discipline for the sake of love. 5. Church discipline was a common practice among churches until the 20th century. 6. A failure to practice church discipline undermines the p...

Exodus 15 v 25 25 Then Moses cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a piece of wood. He threw it into the water, and the water became fit to drink.  Could these be pointers to Christ? He himself was hurled into the death we deserve so that we could have life.  Could it be that  this one piece of wood here in Exodus 15 was an instrument of curse reversal? Is it a foreshadow of the ultimate pieces of wood, namely the cross of Christ, the instrument that God used to reverse our curse into blessing?  ---------------------------------------------- There are several miracle stories in the OT that involve someone’s throwing something into something (see Culley 1976: 72–96).  Second Kings 2:19–22 records the story of Elisha throwing salt (2:21) into the bad water, which then becomes good to drink.  Second, 2 Kings 4:38–41 records Elisha making the poison stew edible by throwing (NIV has “put” in 4:41) meal/flour into the pot. ...

A three-day trek through an arid wilderness has turned up no water (also see Num. 33:8). As Talmon (1992: 188) has shown, “three days” or “the third day” is a common literary convention in the OT. As here, it suggests a survivable period of deprivation (1 Sam. 30:12; Jon. 1:17 [2:1]; 3:3; Acts 9:9). A journey of three days is common (Gen. 22:4; 30:36; 31:22; Exod. 3:18; 5:3; 8:27 [23]; Num. 10:33; 33:8). Three days, or the third day, may represent a period of purification (Exod. 19:10–11, 15–16), or the time of preparation for some important event (Josh. 1:11; Judg. 20:30; Esther 5:1; Ezra 8:15, 32). It also designates the time for recuperation after illness (Gen. 34:25; 1 Kings 3:18; 2 Kings 20:5, 8; Hosea 6:2), or the time to abandon a fruitless search (Josh. 2:16; 1 Sam. 9:20; 2 Kings 2:17). Hamilton, V. P. (2011). Exodus: An Exegetical Commentary (p. 240). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.