Culture

GENEROSITY – PART 2

Picture being a farmer who grows a number of crops during the course of a year. This is your livelihood. Now, as a farmer, read this verse: Honor the Lord with your wealth,   with the firstfruits of all your crops. – Proverbs 3:9 Why would this verse be very difficult for a farmer to handle?…

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GENEROSITY – PART 1

One of the reasons you may lack contentment is that you’re not giving enough away. Enough money. Enough time. Enough skill and energy. Let me explain… If I use a glass jar to pound in a nail, I’ll quickly find out two things. First, the nail won’t go into the wood. Second, the jar will…

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 6

Here’s the final installment in this series. Much more could be said, but we’ll leave it here. Unholy discontent arises when we perceive that we lack something. I’ll list a few examples to get you thinking about where the source of your discontent lies. This last reflection is meant to get you thinking about how…

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 5

Humility goes a long way in nurturing us to a state of contentment. It is pride that stirs the waters until the foam of discontentment is unmistakably present. Today we’ll think about one sign of each.  Sign of Discontentment: complaining The malcontent is ever complaining of one’s condition. Rather than deploying the calming power of…

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 4

Discontentment occurs when what I want and how it is are different. When there is gap between how things really are in my life and how I want them to be, discontentment often thrives. Let’s get to part of the solution to discontentment. Let’s talk about THE key ingredient that makes contentment come alive: faith….

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 3

So far we’ve discovered contentment doesn’t come naturally, but is something that is learned. We have to work at it. We’ve also thought about the relationship between discontentment and pride. Whenever there is discontentment, there is an underlying belief that my station in life should be different than what God has ordained for me. In…

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 2

There’s always a reason for our discontentment. Some situation we wish were different. But peel away the layers and what do you find? Lesson two: a discontented person is a proud person. How so?     If you believe in a sovereign and providential God who sanctions even the minutest events (Matt. 10:29), then your situation is precisely the…

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LESSONS IN CONTENTMENT – PART 1

“…I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.” – Philippians 4:11     Contentment. It’s a pearl of inestimable value. Yet it often feels like like a desert mirage – looming, but never within reach. I’m going to begin a series of blogs on the topic and today we begin with the apostle…

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IN PRAISE OF MULTI-ETHNIC COMMUNITIES

“After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb…” – Rev. 7:9 This picture of the heavenly scene is remarkable. The terms “every nation”, “all tribes”, “[all] peoples”, “[all] languages” is as exhaustive…

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EMOTIONS: A BARRIER TO SPIRITUAL HEALTH – PART 4

We’ve been looking at the topic of emotions. We’ve been doing so because emotions possess a tremendous influence on our spiritual maturity. Over the years, I’ve become convinced one of the reasons it’s possible for people to attend solid Bible-teaching churches, but not make much progress in maturity, is the issue of emotional maturity. I…

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