Providence

It had been a hot summer in the south, but the heat didn’t match that of my own heart. I felt like I was trying to walk through a desert with no water, or slug through mud without getting anywhere. Years of battling chronic pain had worn me down. A ministry plan that didn’t materialize the way I...

God “works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Eph. 1:11). We study God’s decree—his eternal plan—to grapple with his sovereign foreknowledge. We reflect on God’s providence —his working all things—to appreciate his present involvement in our world. God has not left us to fend for...

It was 8 a.m. on a Saturday in Southern California while I was settling to watch my four-and-a-half-year-old son play basketball when I received a call from a sister in the Lord, Anne, dying in Minnesota. [1] We never met, but similar difficult providences had connected us for counsel and we became...

The wonder of God’s mercy is cause for worshiping Him, working for His glory, and witnessing about His great name. In the midst of hardship, it is sometimes difficult to see God’s mercy. However, if we will look for it, we will, by God’s grace, see it. We see an example of this in Paul’s letter to...

Johann Von Staupitz – Luther’s “First Father” in the Doctrine of Predestination When Johann Von Staupitz first met Martin Luther, probably in 1506, he saw a young man who was both inquisitive and talented, with a strong potential to teach at the newly founded University of Wittenberg where the...

In Matthew 5:9, Jesus preached, Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God, proclaiming that God’s children are shown to be His by extending their Father’s peace to others as something they enjoy, often by exertion. Peacemaking is not keeping the peace at all costs,...

There’s a bright thread of connection between the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the way the sermon on the mount begins. The tree stood as a perpetual sign for Adam and Eve to rely upon and walk submitted under God’s word. God declared all that was good or not good and they, as His...

“At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles...

Solomon, in wanting his son to pursue and know wisdom, instructs him to “consider the ant” (Proverbs 6:6). The command is to observe and learn the ways of this small but impressive creature. What impressive wisdom does the ant teach us? Diligent. Hard. work. In short, the ant is productive. And...

This combination of words appears to put the Christian on the “horns of a dilemma”. It seems that you must, “pick your poison”. To hold to belief in the sovereignty of God seems untenable because God somehow cannot eliminate or control the evil in the world, or, if he is sovereign, he must be...