Walking Through the Fire

This week I’ve been reflecting deeply on the idea of justice — not in a cultural sense, but in a biblical one. A while back, I preached a message titled  “Social Justice?”  rooted in Jesus’ call for His followers to love as He loved. That love, as we talked about, is never meant to stay stagnant. It's a verb — it moves outward. It takes action. And in Scripture, God consistently challenges His people to care for the most vulnerable: the widow, the orphan, and yes — the foreigner or stranger among us. That teaching has been on my heart again this week, especially as I think about our worship pastor, Bruno, and his wife, Gabi. Many of you know them and have been blessed by their ministry. What you may not know is the incredibly difficult, expensive, and often confusing journey they have been on trying to navigate the immigration process. Their story is deeply personal, and I won’t try to summarize it here, but they’ve written it down — raw and honest — and I encourage you to rea...

  I've left this post up for posterity. This was my first attempt to start blogging my senior pastor journey. Be kind 😀 Th e Kingdom of God is the sphere in which what God says goes. It is where everything meets with God’s approval and delight. Jesus wanted to bring this realm, the Kingdom of God, into our realm. Jesus modeled the Kingdom so that all we have to do is take a look at Jesus and how he lived to find out what this kingdom is all about. Jesus’ good news, his gospel, was not, “Here are the minimum entrance requirements to get into heaven...” his good news is that living in God’s kingdom is available to you and to me right here and now. Jesus believed that people would do anything to be a part of the kingdom of God once they figured out what it was. To illustrate this, he told stories about it, earthly stories that people in his time might understand. In Matthew 13 is just such a story. Jesus said the Kingdom of God is like a man who found a treasure in a field. In his ex...

I've left this post up for posterity. This was my first attempt to start blogging my senior pastor journey. Be kind 😀 I can remember driving down the highway in that old ’84 red Ford Grenada station wagon. My sister and I were in the back seat and I was tired of her messing with me. “OK,” I said, “See this imaginary line right here?” I drew a line with my hand down the middle of the back seat. “You cannot cross this line.” “That side is yours and this is mine.” Most of you have been there at some time or other. Eventually negotiations break down and one or the other side crosses the line and gets real close, but then starts to say, “I’m not touching you...I’m not touching you.” You see, we all have our own kingdom. It is our sphere of influence, the place where what we say goes. As children driving down the road sitting in that back seat, our sphere was pretty small. Eventually, mom or dad gets tired of the whole deal and says, “This is my kingdom and I will stop this car right no...