Ready for a Fight

The armed warriors from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh led the Israelites across the Jordan, just as Moses had directed. These armed men—about 40,000 strong—were ready for battle, and the Lord was with them as they crossed over to the plains of Jericho.Joshua 4:12-13 NLT These are the men from…

It’s all in the name

Sometimes I feel that we Christians say some things because we say them. I am not saying that we don’t understand what we are saying, or don’t mean what we say. I mean that we say them so often that we lose track of the meaning, or the power of the words becomes detached from them. At its worst, the words become a conversation filler.

On being a kept woman!

I asked Jesus to come into my heart and life when I was 5 years old. I had been and have been in the church all my life. I’m now in my 5o’s (not too far in yet) and have recently had what I can only describe as “a crisis of faith”. Robert and I recently left the church that I had attended all my life and have started going to another great church where we seem to be putting roots down again. But in the few weeks after leaving the church that had been such a big part of my life and for so long, I began to question what my faith had been in. Was it really in the God whom I had known all my life since 5 years of age, or was it in the church and all that is involved in it? The people, the services, the worship, the programmes, like Alpha etc. that we were involved in.

Coming up next

Maybe I am a real softie, but I really cannot imagine that I am any different to the next guy. As I watch each of the Chilean miners being rescued, I get a huge lump in my throat, and it is really hard not to let the tears fall! It is wonderful viewing. It is a very rare kind of news – it is GOOD NEWS! Normally, the only type of news which gets such huge coverage is of disasters, but this story has captured the world. Many words have been used in the story, but today I heard many references to “coming out of hell”.
I love good news, and as I watch this story and see the joy on the faces of the relatives as they see their loved ones coming to the surface, I cannot do anything but draw a comparison to the real Good News – the Gospel.

All in all

The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.The world and all its people belong to him. (Psalm 24:1, NLT)
All its people! All the earth’s people belong to the Lord. Not just some of them; not just the nice ones – all of them belong to him. Even the terrorists, the dictators, the murderers, paedophiles, addicts, thieves, men, women, everyone I don’t like. All of them.

You need hands

What would we do without hands? For most of us, very little. From our earliest moments, even before we are born, we use them.
Even in the womb, a baby will start sucking its thumb. The baby is perhaps learning the skills that it will need to feed once it is born. Once the baby is born, it will continue to suck its thumb, but will soon discover that those funny looking things at the ends of its arms are not just good to put in its mouth.