I read Karl Vater’s blog entry this week and I want to recommend it to you. It is well worth the read. I think that you will find it encouraging. If you can’t read it all, here is a highlight…
The Power of Fear: The Fear of Hurting People
My goal in life is to convince churches that their greatest challenge is to turn people attending their churches into four-directional Christians. At this point you may be asking: “What is a four-directional Christian?” For a detailed description you can…
The Power of Fear: The Fear of Change
Perhaps nothing is so destructive in a small-church setting as paralysis brought on by a fear of change. My mother had many wonderful qualities that helped to shape my life in positive ways. For that I will be eternally grateful.…
The Power of Fear
As a young man, only twenty-one years of age, my wife and I spent two years in Colombia as part of a church planting team. There were a number of disadvantages involved in living in another country but one of…
The Power Of A Quiet Life
As I begin this blog entry I am sitting in a hospital cafeteria in Northern Ontario as my wife and her three sisters care for their father who has been quite ill for the past two weeks. We don’t know…
A Prophetic Voice From The Past
I’m not a big fan of devotional books. I’m talking about the ones that have a verse for each day along with a short paragraph relating to the verse, followed by a short prayer at the end. I’m not suggesting…
Failure To Admit Personal Sin: An Obstacle To Growth
The Statement of Faith for Small Church Connections states the following: “We believe that each member of the human race is fallen, sinful and lost; that salvation is possible only through the shed blood of Jesus Christ and is received…
The Myth of the Perfect New Testament Church
I have been reading a book by Frank Viola and George Barna entitled Pagan Christianity?. The basic premise of the book is that for two thousand years Christians have been doing church wrong and that they need to get back…
A Note of Encouragement
As we enter a new year, I could think of nothing more appropriate than to begin with a note of encouragement. I hope that this entry fits that bill. As I look back over the year just completed, one of…
The Disciple’s Prayer
Another year is almost gone. We are just a few days away from New Year’s Eve. I think that for most of us a new year begins with mixed emotions. If you are like me, you will have some disappointments…