Provocative Bible Verses: Honoring Obama Even When You Completely Disagree

This morning I was confronted with one of those Bible passages with which we like to do one of two things. It is a passage that we either try to ignore altogether or explain it away so that we become convinced that it could never apply to our situation. The passage deals with giving honor [...]

Reba, Reincarnation, Recycling, and Redemption

Reba McEntire is an amazing talent and an inspiration on many levels. Please don’t take this as a personal attack on the Country and Western icon. But among the list of her many talents, theologian is probably not near the top of the list. Why do I say that? It comes as a result of [...]

Provocative Christian Living: Crossing the Racial Divide

Recently former President Jimmy Carter made the accusation that the opposition to health care reform, including the outburst by South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson is motivated by racism. http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/15/carter.obama/index.html On the other end of the spectrum there are many who are saying that racism plays no part what-so-ever in that debate or other disagreements with [...]

Does God Need a Therapist?

I recently got involved in an email exchange in which a gentleman asked, “Why does god have petty human emotions like jealousy and anger? History has proven that these emotions have never been good for anyone”.  A bit later in the email the writer made it clear that if God saw a therapist then He [...]

The Gospel is NOT what you have been told

If your Christian experience has found you in a more conservative church that focuses on people asking Jesus into their hearts then you have probably been trained that the Gospel is all about loving God and making sure you will get to heaven. If your experience is more of a church that focuses on serving [...]

Everyone Wants a Piece of Jesus

Having taught several courses on World Religions I find it fascinating that people strongly object to the Christian doctrine that Jesus is the only way to heaven. It is especially curious when you consider that other major religions have included Jesus in their systems. In some cases they seem to revere Jesus as much as, [...]

When Are You In Church?

“For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.” Matthew 18:20 If a few followers of Jesus are gathered together in His name and He is there as He promised, doesn’t that mean by definition that you have “The Church”? If the church is the ekklesia, the [...]

Learning to Live as a Minority

Two weeks ago I was at a conference in Nairobi, Kenya. There were over 300 people there for the African Forum on Religion and Government. Now you may be wondering what in the world I was doing there. I suspect that some people at the conference wondered that as well. I was invited because the [...]