I’m a United Methodist, which means we meet a lot. One of our biggest meetings is annual conference which, as the name implies, is a yearly gathering. This past week, we met in Waco for three days, where we worshiped, heard reports, and deliberated on a number of important issues,...

Are wives to submit to their husbands? Paige Patterson, the recently-ousted president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, thinks so.  But now, in light of the Me Too movement, Dr. Patterson is in hot water for tapes that have surfaced of him allegedly preaching that wives should be submissive instead of...

Leave your Bible on the bookshelf, where it belongs. At least, that’s the recommendation of the editors at GQ Magazine, who listed the Holy Canon among the “21 Books You Don’t Have to Read.” The reason? The Bible is “repetitive, self-contradictory, sententious, foolish, and even at times ill-intentioned.” That’s quite a list. ...

“Is that really the way you talk?” the woman asked with a little chuckle. I was preaching at an out-of-state event and meeting some of the leaders in the church. “Yep,” I replied. “This voice is all mine!” I guess the woman had never heard a real-live Texan before. We...

If you were to paint a picture of a sex trafficker, it probably wouldn’t look like Allison Mack. The perky blonde co-star of Smallville, the popular TV series that chronicled the teenage years of Superman, Mack was recently charged in a New York federal court in connection with a secret...

Not too long ago, a seminary student interviewed me for a class assignment on “non-traditional ministry roles.” I guess a grown man who dresses up in church would be considered “non-traditional,” so I was happy to oblige. At one point, my interviewer asked how I viewed my vocation as an...

This must be “Pick On an Old Man Week.” I was playing “Draw Something” with a randomly-chosen player, and he obviously saw my profile pic because he sent me this message: “You’re too old to play this game.” A few days later, I ran into a retired colleague and said, “You...

If you could custom-order a messiah, it probably wouldn’t be Jesus. In His day, He did not fit the popular idea of a savior — and still doesn’t by many people today. Consider this unlikely Messiah: HE HAD AN UNLIKELY BIRTH He wasn’t born in a palace to wealthy or...

On Good Friday, we hear a lot about the Cross of Jesus, but not a whole lot about our own crosses. Jesus made it explicitly clear that if we were to be His disciples, we would have to take up a cross and follow Him (Matt 16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23). If you...

I did not give up anything for Lent this year. My only resolution was to get through a devotional book that’s been collecting dust on my shelf for a while. However, my wife and I inadvertently took up a Lenten discipline after our youngest son moved out a few weeks...