Today’s roles and responsibilities of the church Deacon vary widely and have morphed to meet the both the spiritual and managerial needs of our modern churches. The Need for Deacons in the Church Acts 6:1 gives us the origin of the need for Deacons: “And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were being neglected in the daily ministration.” A need for service to the widows was growing, and the murmurings were rooted in the thought the Hebrew widows were being favored in their allotment from the church. Deacons originated from conflicts in the early church as the number of believers was steadily growing. The qualifications of the Deacons, stated below, are vital to th...

  For many Christians the gospel is something for the uninitiated. It is a message of hope and forgiveness for the lost and condemned. The good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection is often laid aside by believers looking to move on to deeper, more profound, and more practical truths. I fear a majority of Christians quickly tune out when an evangelistic message is given based on the idea that they have already received Jesus, thinking such a word is good for others but not necessary for themselves. It’s impractical. But the real reason a Christian isn’t moved by an evangelistic message is precisely because he thinks he only needs to receive Christ once, believe in him once, turn to him once. This kind of thinking is one of the main reasons so many believers are cold...

Setting the Tone for Advent The first Sunday of Advent sets the tone for the season by looking forward to the second coming of Jesus Christ. Through the Scripture passages read and the spiritual practices observed, Christians are called to re-orient themselves to a mindset of watching and waiting for Christ’s return, while at the same time evaluating their lives on the basis of Christ’s first coming. The Scripture and Theology of the First Week of Advent While there are many traditions and festivities tied to the Advent season, the theological center is found in the Scripture readings read during each of the four Advent Sundays. The theology of Advent is rich with significance. Old Testament Readings Readings from the Old Testament during Advent I ground the entire season in the story of I...

People like Proverbs. When I ask my high school students what they’d like to study, Proverbs always appears toward the top of the list (right behind Genesis and Revelation). And, when pastors preach through Proverbs, they often get more comments from people expressing how much they appreciated the sermon.  And I’m sure it’s because Proverbs has so much practical advice for daily living: disciplining unruly children (Proverbs 13:24), controlling your temper (Proverbs 14:17), managing your money (Proverbs 21:5), finding the perfect wife (Proverbs 31:10), just being wise (Proverbs 6:20), and much more. This is good stuff! Unlike those boring laws in Leviticus, these are things you can apply every day. (Before you start defending Leviticus, I don’t really think this. But admit ...

Any student of the Bible might wonder why the book of Genesis devotes more space to Joseph’s life than to Adam and Eve, the first couple, or to Noah, the hero of the ark and the flood, or to Abraham, father of the Jewish nation. I believe the answer is that Joseph illustrates one of life’s most important choices: the choice to forgive. Think for a moment what would have happened if Joseph had not forgiven his brothers. Imagine that when his brothers came requesting grain, Joseph had answered, “You want food? Funny you should mention that. Just today I was thinking about how much I wanted food when you left me for dead in that stinking pit.” Had Joseph held on to his desire for vengeance and allowed his brothers to starve to death, the lasting consequences would have reverberated throughout...

  With echoes from REM’s “The End of the World as We Know It” reverberating through our cultural psyche, the Mayan apocalypse – predicted for December 21 – is looming large. According to the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, December 21, 2012, is the end date of a 5,125-year-long cycle.  What might be called a “New Age” interpretation is that this date will inaugurate a new era marked by massive spiritual transformation. Or it will bring the catastrophic end of the world. As in the arrival of the next solar maximum, Earth being swallowed by a black hole at the center of the galaxy, or the collision with another planet. Sound far-fetched? Not to a lot of people.  Consider the reports coming from across russia’s nine time zones. Inmates in a women’s prison near the Chines...

  Introduction The second Sunday in Advent (Advent II) continues on the path started in the first week by looking forward to Christ’s first and second coming. Advent II focuses on John the Baptist, the Gentiles being included in God’s family, Christ’s coming in judgment and peace, and the church’s hopeful expectation of the completion of his promises. The Scripture and Theology of the Second Week of Advent Whereas the Scripture readings for Advent I speak broadly about God’s promise to bring Israel out of exile, the readings for Advent II focus more specifically on the Messiah and what his coming will look like. Old Testament Readings Old Testament readings for Advent II reflect on the type of kingdom the coming Messiah will bring: one of judgment and peace. Isaiah 11:1 says, “There s...

As the earliest extra-biblical Christian confessional document, the Apostles’ Creed has stood the test of time as the preeminent testament to creedal orthodoxy.  The creed, attributed to the earliest missionary followers of Jesus, distills the basic outline of what it means to be a Christian into a short summation that belies the depth and richness of what it proclaims. The Apostles’ Creed We believe in God, the Father Almighty, the Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord: Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; (He descended into hell.)1 On the third day He rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father; from which he w...

At long last, Bilbo Baggins is back. Whether you’re fanatic enough to dress up for the midnight showing, or patiently awaiting a weekend outing, or even content to meander into a theater after the crowds die down, here’s some advice for how to make the most of your experience of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Don’t worry, there’s no spoiler below. My hope in seeing an early screening of the film is to be at your service in preparing you for the viewing, not by letting any cat out of the bag — although if you’ve read the book, you know where this film is going. It is fitting to mentally and emotionally prepare yourself for an experience like this. That’s precisely what the story’s creator — he would prefer “sub-creator” — J. R. R. Tolkien would have you do, and it’s no necessary sign of...

The nation is watching, with horror and disgust, news reports out of Connecticut of a horrific act of violence against an elementary school filled with defenseless children. While every act of murder ought to provoke outrage, there’s something especially condemnable about the murder of children. I think there’s a reason for that. In the hours after the shooting, Jewish political and cultural commentator John Podhoretz called attention to a concept most Americans don’t like to think about at Christmastime, if ever: hell. Podhoretz noted the heightened iniquity of child sacrifice in the Hebrew Scriptures’ denunciation of the god Moloch. Moloch, of course, was a blood-thirsty deity who demanded his followers to pour out the lives of their children. The valley of this atrocity was ca...

Kinism is rooted in the belief that God designed each race to be separate from every other race. The Kinism ideology takes Old Testament verses, such as those below, and misinterprets the passages to justify racial separatism. “The sons of Israel who returned from exile and all those who had separated themselves from the impurity of the nations of the land to join them, to seek the LORD God of Israel, ate the Passover.” (Ezra 6:21) “So when they heard the law, they excluded all foreigners from Israel.” (Nehemiah 13:3) According to Matt Slick on Christian Apologetics & Research Ministries (CARM), Kinists teach that “God, in the Bible, has ordained a specific means of cultural behavior that is based on same-race families, or ‘kin.’  [Kinism] maintains that people are to be involved ...

Introduction The third Sunday in Advent (Advent III) shifts from a tone of expectation of Christ’s coming to one of rejoicing at the arrival of God’s kingdom with the coming of Jesus. The Scripture and Theology of the Third Week of Advent Scripture readings for Advent III reflect on the salvation and restoration Jesus brings, which is cause for rejoicing and perseverance. Old Testament Readings         Old Testament readings for Advent III highlight the universal restoration Jesus accomplishes. In Isaiah 35:1, the prophet looks forward to the future promised for the people of God—a future inaugurated at the first coming of Christ and consummated at his second coming. When Jesus returns, the effects of sin’s curse will be removed: the wildernesses and dry land will bloss...