Christian Living

Shining Idols: What They Demand

Shining Idols: What They Demand

Are you an idolater? I already lost you, didn’t I? Most wouldn’t raise their hand to affirm their idolatry.  

Idolatry doesn’t preach well to us 21st-century Westerners. A couple of years ago, I had someone leave the church after I preached on idolatry. “You preached for most of your sermon on the Old Testament, the law against Idolatry, and how might we be guilty of idolatry today,” she reflected. She said that the sermon didn’t connect with her and didn’t offer “spiritual encouragement.”

Oh, friends, the dangers we face when we think that biblical passages on idolatry don’t apply to us!

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations
  1. Biblical Archaeology’s Top Discoveries of 2022: I missed several of these. The monument to Hezekiah is really neat. And so is the new magnetic dating technology.

  2. In the End, There are Yellow Tulips: Madelyn Canada’s post is stunning. Don’t miss this one. ““You look beautiful in ‘lellow,’ Ms. Madelyn.” She was in my arms, had put her little hands on my face and said it with the deepest sincerity. I chuckled and thanked her, setting her back down on the floor so she could join her other friends playing with baby dolls.”

  3. The Five Not-Points of Calvinism: Speaking of TULIP(s) ;), Scott Hubbard shares, “The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) once described Calvinism as a lamb in wolf’s skin: “cruel in the phrases,” but “full of consolation for the suffering individual.” The words unconditional election, for example, can feel rough on the surface; they can seem to snarl and bare their teeth. Yet as countless Christians have discovered, beneath Calvinism’s wolfish exterior is the softness of a lamb.”

  4. Nurturing Emotional Well-being: Betty-Anne Van Rees begins, “One of the great misunderstandings about the human experience in our era is the idea that our emotional state is something that happens to us; that we are powerless to impact it. The truth is we make choices throughout our day that profoundly impact our emotional and mental well-being.”

  5. 5 Things a Leader Always Gets Right: Carey Nieuwhof is right on with this. “Knowing how to handle failure well is essential to success in leadership. But do you know what is harder? How you handle success. You would think success would be harder, but it is, and I’ve seen far more leaders blow success than I have leaders blow failure. Failure is, by nature, humiliating. It crushes pride. Success does the opposite. It naturally inflates a leader’s pride. It’s intoxicating.”

  6. Visualized: the World’s Population at 8 Billion: I love looking at these sorts of infographics. The world just hit 8 billion people: how does that break down over across the globe?

Would You Help The Hurting?

Would You Help The Hurting?

During a crisis, we feel a sense of urgency to step in and take charge. But we must wisely sit in the backseat if we want our assistance to have long term effectiveness.  If the affected population is not bought-in in terms of leadership and on-the-ground help, aid fails. In fact, there have been many instances where outside help has shown to be unnecessary and unhelpful. In short, “Avoid paternalism. Do not do things for people that they can do for themselves.”

What's Keeping You Away from Church?

What's Keeping You Away from Church?

Not long ago, Pew Research released a survey[i] on why Americans do and do not go to church. While 73% of Americans identify as being Christian[ii], surveys say Americans who report going to church weekly is only around 35%.[iii] Our best estimates for our own city (Tucson) are that less than 3% of the population gathers in a local body of believers on any given Sunday.[iv]

I write this as an appeal to the 65% nationally and 90%+[v] in Tucson who don’t attend church regularly.

First, I want to understand you and your reasons for not attending. In a recent survey, those reasons were expressed this way[vi]:

Does that list express your reasons for why you don’t attend church? I would love to hear from you what your reason is.

I am going to walk through the reasons given for not attending and ask if you would reconsider:

“I practice my faith in other ways.”

The largest group of those who don’t attend (37%) say that they practice their faith in other ways. That is wonderful! I’m so glad that you practice your faith beyond Sunday morning. Our faith is to be expressed daily and through various means (prayer, reading the Bible, service, stewardship, etc.).

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations
  1. The Worshipper: Jeremy Walker begins a post that comes with a twist, “He is a worshipper. His life revolves around his worship. Nothing stops him.”

  2. The Serious Business of Laughing at Myself: Seth Lewis tells a very funny story about himself and concludes, “If I can’t embrace my own smallness, my own humiliations, and my total dependence on the God who made me, then my pride has grown out of control. That’s a serious problem.”

  3. Unborn Images Matter: Alan Shlemon begins, “Abortionist Dr. Joan Fleischman says she sometimes shows her patients the pregnancy tissue she removes after an abortion. She says that post-abortive women are “stunned by what it actually looks like,” and the women “feel they’ve been deceived.””

  4. 16 Passages to Read to Fight Lust: These are worth memorizing.

  5. A Spiritual MRI of the Heart: Warren Peel explains, “In Scripture, the word ‘heart’ is used more than 1000 times, but it almost never refers to the physical organ inside our chests. The Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament sums up all the usages of the term in this way: it is ‘the richest, most all-encompassing biblical term for the totality of a man’s inner nature.’ The heart is said to do a wide range of things in the Bible, but all its many activities fall into one of the three main faculties of the soul: the mind, the affections and the will. It includes the mind—our thoughts, imagination, fantasies, judgments and attitudes. It encompasses the affections—our emotions, our desires and longings, our revulsions. And it describes the will—our choices, decisions and motivations.”

Can I Change?

Can I Change?

Can you change in 2023? Yes, yes, you can! And that change begins not by never giving up on you, but by never giving up on God. He has made you for something far bigger and far more satisfying than what the world offers. And he promises that when you give up on yourself, you will change….May 2023 be the year we behold his face. Are you willing to give to God your plans, hopes, dreams, and desires to experience his transformation? The reward is worth the price.

300-Year-Old Resolutions

300-Year-Old Resolutions

Nearly three hundred years ago, on August 17, 1723, in New York City, a twenty-year-old supply pastor, in his first pastoral call, reflected on the type of man and pastor he wanted to be. This young man would one day become the most important American theologian, and God would use him in a tiny frontier town in Massachusetts to bring many to Christ in the First Great Awakening.

This Week's Recommendations

This Week's Recommendations
  1. Help! My Employer Celebrates Gay Pride and Pays for Abortion Travel: Miranda Carls steps into a conversation that impacts many. She wisely treads lightly, “Christian decision-making doesn’t rest squarely on the shoulders of human understanding. It doesn’t fit into a neatly organized decision tree of binary questions.”

  2. Harvesting Idols: Chris Thomas warns us, “Though I reason with myself that money is not the problem, but instead the love of it, the very presence of wealth is a danger to my soul.”

  3. Why the Church? HB Charles shoots straight, “’Unchurched Christian’ is not a biblical category. Ask Paul, John, or Peter what they think about unchurched Christians and they would have responded, ‘Why are you calling them Christians, if they are not a part of the church?’”

  4. Remember: Glenna Marshall reflects on a hard year, “I want to always remember. Pain teaches us to be thankful. Grief keeps us near the cross. Remembering recounts God’s faithfulness. While there are events people experience that cause levels of trauma that must be counseled and handled delicately, what I’m talking about are those significant sequences of suffering that the Lord draws us through that change us, sanctify us.”

  5. Comedy Wildlife Awards: I always enjoy these. How about that squirrel or the big cat’s face plant into the tree?

  6. It’s a Wonderful Telescope: A fun and beautiful connection between the classic Christmas movie and the James Webb telescope you probably didn’t know (I didn’t!).

The Best of the Bee Hive in 2022

The Best of the Bee Hive in 2022

In 2017, I began The Bee Hive out of obedience to a call I knew God had on my life, but I wasn't sure who God would use my writing to shepherd. In my first year of blogging, I was encouraged to have 1,767 unique visitors to my website with 3,939 page views. I was glad that my writing was being read and hopeful that it blessed some. I was concerned that maybe after an acquaintance read the blog a couple of times out of curiosity or courtesy, the interest would diminish, and the impact would wane.

I Hope your Advent is In Tents

I Hope your Advent is In Tents

Our girl arrived home for Christmas last night. Everything feels better when we are all together. Camille headed off to college in Southern California this fall, and we have felt her absence. We missed her laugh, her hugs, and her quiet presence in the house, crafting on a quiet Sunday afternoon. But now she’s home! My heart swells to be able to squeeze her, to wake her up with a kiss on the forehead, to listen to her laugh at my dad jokes. Even in an era where we have technology like Facetime, there is nothing like being face-to-face. I feel joy to worship with her this Christmas Eve and look forward to having our family whole, enjoying cinnamon rolls and coffee in our pajamas on Christmas day, unwrapping one another’s gifts, and squeezing each other in thanks.

God concurs.