Sometimes people try to discredit the Bible by saying that the God in the Old Testament is not the same God we read of in the New Testament even though He claims to be the “same yesterday and today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). Others try to use the same argument but to make almost the opposite point: that it is much easier to please God today because He is more loving now. They usually point out actions recorded in the Old Testament that seem more harsh while highlighting verses from the New Testament like 1 John 4:8 which reads, in part, “God is love.” My son Daniel is extremely good…

I suppose one of the most common ways to refer to what some call “Sunday School” is to refer to it as the “Bible school program.” Children, teens, and adults attend classes and, over the years, hear hundreds of lessons. But today I want to give three times when calling it the “Bible school program” is not accurate, and each one provides something to honestly evaluate. First, don’t call it the “Bible school program” if it is not actually a program; in other words, if there is little-to-no organization. A great deal of time and attention needs to be paid to evaluating curriculum, for example. And, by the way, that…

If you came to this article expecting some “7-step process” on Bible study, you might as well click away now. Instead, this is based on something I am getting ready to teach and I am really excited about it. But, in some ways, I’m more excited about the process that led to this teaching opportunity. Starting next Wednesday, I will have a class of probably about 10 people and we will be taking the fall Bible school quarter (September through November) to walk through a class entitled “How to Study the Bible.” Here’s the thing: those 10 are our teenage boys…and the teen girls are studying the same thing in…

It started rather subtly a number of years ago, and it seems to have started in the political class. It was barely noticeable to many people, but words mean things, and what was conveyed was intentional and has now spread throughout our culture, and even into the church. It was when people started saying that we have a “freedom of worship” and not a “freedom of religion.” Do you see the difference? To state that we have a freedom of worship confines things, does it not? It says that, if you want to go to a church building and worship, that is fine. By avoiding saying “freedom of religion”–which is what…

Imagine getting in your automobile in Jacksonville, Florida and traveling west on Interstate 10. According to mapquest.com, after about twelve hours of driving, you would find yourself in Houston, Texas. You would also have driven approximately 870 miles. Now, imagine one more thing (if you can). Try to imagine a bookshelf or any number of bookshelves that would cover that same distance.  If you would have stopped about thirty miles before you arrived in Houston, you would have driven about the same distance as the shelf space used by the Library of Congress to hold all of the material it has. The actual number I read was 838 miles.  On top…