Sundays
Find out what to expect on a Sunday. What time is the service? Where are we located? Is there a dress code? Can I bring my kids?
Christ our Sanctifier, Part II: Our Response
This is part 2 of a 2 part blog on Christ our Sanctifier. If you have not read the first part, you may want to read that first and then come back to this one. The first part focuses on recognizing that Christ is the one who sanctifies us and this second part focuses on
Christ our Sanctifier, Part I
Did you know that Western Union originally rejected the telephone, saying in an internal memo in 1876, “The device is inherently of no value to us.” In 1903, the president of Michigan Savings Bank advised Henry Ford’s lawyer not to invest in the Ford Motor Company, saying “The horse is here to stay but the
Christ our Savior
For the last forty years the Heimlich maneuver has been synonymous with the abdominal thrust procedure for saving someone from choking. This method is named after a surgeon from Cincinnati named Dr. Henry Heimlich who apparently published this idea in an essay in the Emergency Medicine journal in June, 1974. Over the years this maneuver has
Father Abraham
Abraham is one of the most famous fathers mentioned in the Bible. According to my best calculations, Abraham or Abram as he is first called is mentioned 287 times in the Bible, including about 73 times in the New Testament alone. He is all over the place. Typically when talking about him we might turn
Ordination and Mission
This past Sunday we were blessed to host the ordination service for Chris O’Dell at The River. Chris and his wife Jamie were part of The River in the early days and then left for ministry in Taiwan. They serve at a coffee shop/church called The Aroma. You can find out more about their ministry and
Traps and Snares
One of my best friends in college was a kid named Eric. He was a country boy from the farmlands around Lancaster, PA. We were very different. He grew up hunting and fishing, hanging out in the woods and living on a chicken farm and I grew up playing games at the video arcade and
Discerning God’s Will
I was recently asked a question about discerning God’s will. How do we know what God wants us to do? I believe that Romans 12:1-2 is a great passage to help us answer that question. In Romans 12:1-2 Paul writes: I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies
Rahab’s Example
Rahab was a prostitute in the city of Jericho when the people of Israel showed up with the command from God to go in and take the promised land. The Israelites sent in spies to check things out and they wound up at the home of Rahab in Jericho and she went out of her
Does God Contradict Himself?
I was recently asked the question, “why does God contradict himself?” This person was focusing on how God says, “thou shalt not kill,” but then there were lots of times in the Old Testament where he called for whole cities to be wiped out, which seems a lot like genocide. Have you ever struggled to
Good, Good Father
In Matthew 7:7-8 we read: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. So in this passage Jesus is speaking