New posts will be posted every Tuesday. Pastor Ryan also blogs at his personal site, Looking at Christ, at www.lookingatchrist.com.
Navigating Fear, Faith, & Love: 3 Ways We As Christians Should Respond to the Coronavirus Outbreak
Coronavirus is spreading fast. Schools are being shut down. Events have been cancelled. And governments all over the globe are buckling down in an attempt to halt the pandemic. How are we as Christians to respond? While God’s world seems to be in panic, how are God’s people to act?...
Digital Images, Worship, and Joy
“Images have always become substitutes for God, and no age makes more images than our age,” writes Tony Reinke in his recent book Competing Spectacles (117). He’s right, but we Christians often we miss this. We know that in ancient times people made idols out of images. We read prophetic denouncements (like from Isaiah 44:9-20) and wholeheartedly agree. We know these ancients were illogical and mistaken to believe a piece of wood could be a god....
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Flies Only Fly Where He Wants
The plagues and the Exodus. These are famous displays of the wonders of God. Much has and could be written about this time in history. But I want to focus in this short post on the flies and the chariot wheels. Yes, those pesky flies, and yes, just the chariot wheels in the story. These might seem like they aren’t anywhere near the main point of the story, but God used these flies and chariot wheels for his glory. And what I want to meditate on here is how he did so and why it's so intriguing for us today...
Evil is Thwarted by the Enduring Love of God
Evil is thwarted, undermined, and outdone by the love of God. This is true especially at the cross where the love of God defeated the darkness that has spread over the world. By dying in the place of his people, God in his love enabled sinners to be genuinely forgiven, reconciled to him, and transformed. There, God’s love won......
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Do My Prayers Really Impact Worldwide Issues?
What really do our prayers accomplish when it comes to massive, worldwide issues? Do our prayer actually impact big problems and events that affect millions of people? To say the least, worldwide issues are complicated. There are innumerable moving parts in such things. So, once again, do our prayers really do much here?...
4 Pictures of God's Love
With what can we compare God’s love for his people? C.S. Lewis provides us with four helpful analogies to picture God’s love...
"It's All About Jesus" or “Union with Christ” or “Identity in Jesus”: What Do They Mean?
Being “in Christ.” Unified “with Christ.” It is one of the most important ideas in the New Testament...What I’ve noticed, however, is that we can hear this terminology often, especially in gospel-centered circles, but not clearly know what it means. We hear that our “identity is in Jesus,” that we're "united to him," that "it's all about Jesus," but what does this mean?......
Jesus, Money, and a Fish: What a Small Miracle Shows Us About Our Sovereign Master
One of my favorite miracles of Jesus is one that isn’t talked about too much. It probably is less famous because of how short it is; or because it only occurs in one of the Gospel accounts; or especially because it doesn’t directly impact anyone who is suffering or sick like so many of Jesus’ miracles wonderfully do. But the reason I love it so much is because of what it shows us about Jesus himself......
"Take That, Jesus is Better": How Trust-Soaked Obedience Gives Us Victory Over the World
Christians know the daily grind: We live in a world which is vying for our affections and actions, wrestling us and trying to make us forget God and live for self. It's governed by the "prince of the power of the air" (Ephesians 2:2), influenced by those who "do not honor God as God nor give a to him" (Romans 1:21), and filled with people living for money, sex, and power. And as we all know well, we ourselves still are struggling sinners, tempted in all directions, prone to wander, in need of daily grace......
Why Did Jesus Rise? 4 Reasons for the Resurrection
Three days after he died on the cross, Jesus of Nazareth rose from his grave. And we’re talking about historical fact when we make such a claim: Jesus of Nazareth was born around 4 B.C. and lived until around 30 A.D., he was crucified under Pontius Pilate on a Friday, and he came back to life a few days later on a Sunday. If you could go back around 2,000 years, you could watch Jesus of Nazareth die on a Roman cross and you could see him on Sunday alive again......