The story of Uzzah in 2 Samuel 6 illustrates the grave responsibility of carrying God’s presence. Although Uzzah acted with good intent, he disregarded divine instructions, resulting in his death. This serves as a warning for Christians today to treat God’s name with reverence, avoiding unholy alliances that damage His reputation. … More Holy Priests or Unstable Jackass?
Somehow the church tends to pick up the idea that we’re supposed to win. That our place in the world is not one of suffering love, but victorious power. It’s so easy for the church to forget that Christ did not call us to rule but to serve. He called us, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, to come and die. … More A Long Defeat … into Victory
The “truth” has always been a slippery thing, easily manipulated, easily spun, misplaced or lost in the couch cushions of public discourse. The atomic, bone rattling, earth-shaking radioactive Truth Bomb of the ages is that since the incarnation of the Word, all human ideas, arguments, concepts, abstractions, formulas, presentations, editorials, principles, etc. of “truth” must now stand before and buckle its knees in the presence of the Truth Incarnate. … More Truth Bomb
A dark shadow is threatening to block out the light of Jesus’ ethic and Kingdom vision for many today. This eclipse has been slowly ongoing for years, and the shadow grows ever larger by the hour. Today, some find themselves in the path of totality, where this lunar / lunatic figure now seems to block out 100% of Jesus-shaped light and reason and truth. … More Beware the Eclipse of the Son
Imagine returning home from a night out when traffic suddenly halts. Your eyes are drawn upward to a magic door descending from the heavens, suspended over the city. The mayor and fire department scratch their heads as crowds slowly gather. Soon the entire city is gathered around that mysterious door. It’s cracked a bit, and strange light is piercing the cool evening air. … More Magic Doors & Open Houses
“Isaak, grab a notepad and pen, and go watch Trump’s victory speech. Tally up how many mean things he says about someone else.” Isaak loves counting, and he’s very sensitive to bullying, so he relished the assignment. He caught only the last 10 minutes of the speech, but the photo here shows the result. … More 32 Put Downs in 10 Minutes
Something is rotten in the vineyard. The owner will soon return, and will he cut us down, or give us time to heal this mess we’ve made? … More Rotten Fruit in God’s Vineyard
What gives is that Paul has a very different notion of evangelism than we modern evangelicals do. Paul is not interested in training his churches on how to initiate gospel conversations with their friends and family, nor is he concerned with teaching them how to present the four spiritual laws to a passerby on the street. Paul’s vision of evangelism does not look like ours. … More Wise Evangelism
Jesus invites us into his boat, and sends us onto the seas of culture to be wise and winsome, gathering others into his boat. In this message, Jeremy offers 3 different postures Christians can have toward the culture (Reflect, Reject, or Redeem), urging us to resist the first two and embrace the third. … More WATCH: Sailing the Cultural Seas with Jesus
In the midst of all the “alternative facts” and “fake news” and outrageous conspiracy theories being proffered, I wanted to cut through all the crap and simplify things for those who claim to follow Jesus. … More Truth is a Slippery Thing
“Beloved brethren, we are philosophers not in words but in deeds; we exhibit our wisdom not by our dress, but by truth; we know virtues by their practice rather than through boasting of them; we do not speak great things but we live them.” -St. Cyprian (AD 256) … More Words of Wisdom: Cyprian (AD 256)
When a “ship” (or society) begins to come apart at the seams, you reinforce it with what has hitherto bound it together, and toss overboard the things that are sinking it. … More Shipwrecked 3: Wise Leadership in the Political Storm
From Walter Kim, President, National Association of Evangelicals Dear friends, For U.S. citizens, the next couple weeks have many of us focused on one of the fundamental responsibilities of our citizenship: to vote, electing our governmental leaders. The right to vote is a significant responsibility – one not available to all people in our world … More Voting as Faithful Stewardship
“You’re familiar with the command to the ancients, ‘Do not murder.’ I’m telling you that anyone who is so much as angry with a brother or sister [on social media] is guilty of murder…Thoughtlessly yell ‘stupid!’ at a sister [via Twitter] and you are on the brink of hellfire. The simple moral fact is that words kill.” -JESUS … More Jesus on Social Media
In this 4-part series we ask, “How would Jesus conduct himself on social media?” Listen to this adaptation of Jesus’ most famous teaching — Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5-7) — applied directly to online interaction. … More Jesus on Social Media – Pt. 1
This is a challenge to follow King Jesus into greater public goodness and witness just one day before our country was rocked by the murder of George Floyd sparking protests around the world. … More Daily Spark: “A Bigger Story to Live In”
I aspire to be a broad-minded person with strong convictions. I hope to inspire and cultivate this rare combination in those I teach and lead as a pastor. I fall short of this ideal daily, but we’re at least aiming for the right goal. Why is this a rare combination? Consider the two popular alternatives. On … More The Middle Path to Civility
“And a child shall lead them.” Isaiah 11:6 Our 7-year old, Peter Bjorn, made this precious cityscape that really caught my eye. It reminds me of a passage from Philippians. Followers of Jesus are called to cultivate a countercultural way of life that sets us apart from “a world of corrupt and sinful people.” Paul calls … More Peter Bjorn: Shining Like a Star (and van Gogh)
“Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and PROCLAIMING THE GOSPEL of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest … More Do Millennials Think Evangelism is Wrong?
Source: The text below is the full story, from around 160 AD, of the martyrdom of Polycarp, the Bishop of the church in Smyrna, a city in Asia Minor (modern Izmir in Turkey) devoted to Roman worship. The account is in the form of a letter from eye-witnesses to other churches in the area. It … More The Martyrdom of Polycarp (155AD)
The climax of every Asian food experience is breaking open that fortune cookie to gain new insight our own imminent futures. I keep waiting to open the one that says, “Your love for deep-fried Cream Cheese Puffs will shorten your life.” But my fortune this time was: YOU WILL BE A LION IN YOUR NEXT … More CrossRoad 5: Lamb Power in a Lion’s World
This Holy Week, as an outflow of our CrossRoad sermon series, I am sharing some stories of early martyrs who took up their own cross and bore the ultimate witness to the cross-shaped Kingdom. One of the great treasures of church history is the collection of writings called The Apostolic Fathers. These are the earliest writings outside the … More The Martyrdom of Ignatius (c.107AD)
This is an excerpt from a much longer essay I wrote called “Royal Scribes in the King’s Court: Ancient Education & Christian Discipleship” published in a little book of essays called “Life in King Jesus’ Colony” from my doctoral studies. I hail from good Lutheran stock from the Midwest (Minnesota) where we shared … More Political Discipleship in the Christian Colony
In this series I’m sharing some of the Scriptures that have most radically influenced my own life and faith. Read full series here. I love the moment in The Lord of the Rings when Samwise turns to Frodo and asks, “I wonder what kind of a tale we’ve fallen into?” The two hobbits perceptively realized that their … More LIFE VERSES 9: Acts 17:17
“Render to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” -Jesus My politics actually haven’t changed all that much over the years. When I go to the polls every two or four years to give “caesar” my opinion on how best to run this particular “kingdom of the world” called America, I still … More Church & Politics: A Jesus-Shaped Approach
Jeremy L. Berg 