Don’t Invite Jesus Into Your Life!

Growing up in a Baptist church I was always taught the importance of inviting Jesus into your life. Sin had messed up our lives, and we each needed to ask Jesus to come into our lives and save us from the mess that sin had caused. Truth be told, however, my life wasn’t all that messed up. Seriously, the...

God’s Offensive Love

God’s kind of love is the highest kind of love. It is unconditional, freely-given, abundant, never-ending, and steadfast through all circumstances. “What can separate us from the love of God?” Paul asks in Romans 8. “Nothing,” he says. Not the most powerful person on earth, now or in the future. Not death...

A Perfect Brutality

My dad was pretty hard on me growing up. No matter what I did, he wanted me to do it better, especially in school. If I got a B on a test, he wanted me to get an A, and told me so. If I brought home an A, he wanted an A+. If I answered 49 out of 50 questions correctly and got an A+, he’d want to know why I...

Transferring Clean

One of the basic laws of physics is that if you dress a child up for a special occasion—a wedding, a funeral, Easter Sunday, the opera, that kind of thing—as soon as you aren’t looking their clothes will no longer be clean. Dirt, slime, peanut butter, pizza grease, dog poop—all manner of nasty things will...

Tamar and Being Caught in Adultery

There is a story in the Bible about a woman who is caught having illicit sexual relations outside of marriage. The charge is undeniable, the guilt unquestionable, and the penalty indisputable: death. And thus she is condemned. But in an odd and surprising twist, her accuser and the man with whom the...

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