From Outcast to Outstanding

Hidden within Israel’s annuls is a reference to an ostracized man called to lead the struggling nation through some of its darkest days. The son of a prostitute and a carousing father who was driven away by angry half-brothers intolerant of his existence, “Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob READ MORE

When Your Adversary Roars

I was asked recently to share about the way spiritual warfare works in my own life. What a tough thing to tackle! Dare I be brutally honest, conveying the depths that I can go in my own struggle against the “cosmic powers over this present darkness” (Ephesians 6:12)? Generally speaking I shared along two lines. READ MORE

A King, A Fisherman, and an Old Woman

Bethel Church is a disciple-making community helping the spiritually hungry experience and proclaim the life-changing power of Jesus Christ. This is what drives everything that we are about as a church family. But what does it mean to be a “disciple-making community,” especially in a world in which the word “disciple” seems so utterly cliché? READ MORE

An Others-Centered Life

Throughout the Bible we are charged with the mandate to serve those around us. Thus, the Apostle Paul says in Galatians 5:13, “through love, serve one another.” The Apostle Peter tells us that “each has received a gift” and that we must “use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace” READ MORE

What is Your Leprosy?

In a simple but powerful and emotional moment Jesus not only sends a shot across the bow of a stoic and stuck religious establishment, but summarizes for all of humanity the full nature of his mission. Consider the passage as revealed by Mark in the historical narrative that bears his name: And a leper came READ MORE