Casual Christianity is the curse of the culture.  The church seems to be producing more fans these days than actual players.  We fill our “stadiums” from week to week; we cheer, shout, and hold up our spiritual banners; but the truth is, once the “game” is over we leave with little or no intention of living out what we have heard.

     God never intended for us to carry our crosses, pray, read Scripture, and share our testimonies only on Sundays.

A life committed to Christ requires a daily dose of the divine.  You may not go to church every day, …

Moses ascended Mount Sinai to experience the presence of God.  For forty days and forty nights he deprived himself from the basic necessities of this world in order to find the nourishment and nutrition he so desperately needed from another world.  In short, that is the essence of fasting- starving our flesh, while God feeds our faith.

We hear very little of the subject these days; and that’s not really a shock.  We are so enamored with self-promotion, self-fulfillment, and self-advancement that we give very little thought to self-denial.  We have traded the cross-centered life for the consumer-centered cross.  The …

“We don’t need more methods on file,” said Vance Havner, “we need more men on fire!” It’s true, the modern church has learned how to create a pretty effective religious experience; lights, visuals, sound, slides, screens, smoke, stage, mood, and atmosphere all play into the state-of-the-art modern worship service.  The problem, however, is that in spite of all the wonderful, sensational, and extraordinary experiences we have, very seldom does the church have actual encounters with God.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, can duplicate, replicate, or authenticate the presence of God except for the presence of God.  There are no substitutes.  But substitutes …

The Need of Repentance

The word repentance has become misplaced in the modern church.  Because of its unpopular tone, many have discharged it from their preaching; and those who do preach it perhaps do so with negativity and uncertainty.  We must know that repentance is not only a biblical concept; it is an essential truth for the regenerative life.

John the Baptist preached repentance to the religious crowd of his day.  Jesus preached repentance as the means of entrance into the kingdom.  Peter preached repentance on the day of Pentecost as the church was birthed.  It is the remedy against …

The great tragedy of trials is not going through them, but rather going through them and not learning anything from them.  God permits, and sometimes even sends, trials our way so that we can steward those trials for the benefit of others.  The apostle Paul alludes to this truth in 2 Corinthians 1:4.  He said,

“Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.” 

Notice three principles from this verse:

The Principle of Suffering

Paul used the word …