Faith Encouraged

Both sickness and even death is made well by faith. But this message isn't about any physical sickness or even physical death but the spiritual sickness and death that grips us and enslaves us to a life of self-centered choices. Being free from that sickness and death is the only path that leads to authentic human life! It's the only path to a renewed mind!

It is amazing to me that the more and more that we study and that we learn and we think, we discover the timeless wisdom that centuries of wise men and women have known, that how you think affects how you live. That all of your behaviors, everything you do, all of your attitudes, all of your actions, all of your thoughts are affected by what begins in your mind and that if your mind is filled with chaos, your life is filled with chaos.

If your thinking is filled…

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In a society where the noise factor of our lives threatens to drown out the loving Voice of God, learning to listen for that "still, small voice" that tells us who we really are is even more important.

Last week, in the city of Mosul, which is now under control of radical Islamic leaders, they issued a ruling to all the Christians left in Mosul. You have three choices, you can either convert to Islam or you can pay the tax levied against those who are under the protection of Islam or you can die. Those are your choices.

That is not new folks. For hundreds of years our brothers and sisters living under Islamic domination, lived under that system, very simple,…

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When Jesus heals a woman on the Sabbath Day, His act of love and mercy reveals the deep spiritual poverty of others whose hearts are gripped by mere rule keeping. This revelation is an invitation to you and me to examine our own attitudes towards our faith!

Have you ever raised children? I’ve discovered something raising children, children are like me or maybe I’m like children. Quick to desire and slow to learn. I never will forget, the first time I had to pop Catherine on the leg when she was misbehaving. It was horrible. By the way I never understood what my mother meant when she said, “This is going to hurt me more than it’s going to hurt you”, until I had kids of my own. Just a little…

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The celebration of the Enfleshing of God at Christmas is nothing less than a Divine Invasion of Creation by the Creator for the purpose of rescuing all of Humanity.

Christmas is a beautiful time, but there is a temptation in missing the point. This is a great temptation, because it is easy to do. We live in a world where it is easy to miss the point. We live in a world where it is easy to miss the focus.

Every child in here tonight is on pins and needles about what is going to be under the tree in the morning. Some of you have the audacious and heretical practice of actually opening gifts on Christmas Eve. I pray for…

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