Bankrupt

NOT a condition any of us want to experience!  Bankrupt.  Legally insolvent.  We would never plan to be in this condition, but we could certainly get there quickly without a plan, a condition where our deposits have been depleted.  So, what’s your plan? 

“If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere.  So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.”  Agains

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Law and Grace

“Two doctors,” as one old Texas preacher has said, Law and Grace.  They didn’t much match, meaning, you couldn’t pick and choose.  Dr Law could pinpoint your ailment, but it took Dr Grace to fix you up.

Apostle Paul (even older preacher!) would say similarly, “For you know all the ins and outs of the Law—how it works and how its power touches only the living.”  God laid out His Law for personal and corporate, and governmental good.  Jesus would simplify for us the multitude

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Basic Training

Along with honesty and integrity, truth is a virtue, part of a collection of character traits that converge into moral excellence, pleasing unto God.  Perhaps you’ve studied the very 12 men Jesus prayed for and assembled.  Like Military Basic Training, they were not a finished product, not even; just assembled.  One was a mouth, thought-to-mouth.  Another was all about truth, truth regardless.  And another was a liar and thief.  You might have wondered why did God-come-to-

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Because

Because begs a beginning, a reason; it does not stand alone.  We are and do and become because of where we live, work, associate, and because of our rooted values.  We Americans have a list of freedoms because of the foundational documents of our country.  Fought for and died for.  Free because, not just free. 

Similarly, we might become good, righteous in God’s eyes, because of what?  Certainly nothing of our own being or doing.  Is it us that reaches out to God, asking Hi

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Turns and Tidbits

Spring and fall, life and death, war and peace.  Sweet and sour, good, righteous, light, virtuous, and bad, evil, dark, vile.  Back and forth, on and off, open and closed, hard-hearted and soft, like putty in the hand of the artisan.  Getting and giving, distant, far and near, close, wealth and poverty, sickness, pain and healing; yelling, barking, whispering.  Ignoring and denying, yet provisioned with belief, faith and trust.  Grudge and forgive, even mood swings from sa

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Report!

We are often called to, report, give an account of ourselves and the projects or conditions at hand.  It could be as simple, informal, as “How’s it going?” Or “What’s up?”  Report! It could also be a pop quiz or a judgement hearing.  What a range! “Who ever knows what you’re thinking and planning except you yourself, the spirit within you?”  A penny for your thoughts? Report! 😊

“The same with God—except that He not only knows what He’s thinking, but He lets us in on it.  Go

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Flip Flop

From the victories celebrated by Easter, life resurrected, opening the door for us to go beyond death, we may this day or season flop into trials and challenges, truly part of life.  But here’s a different and engaging approach from what I often hear. 

“Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides.  You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors.  So don’t try to get out of anything

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Characterization

Taking on the troubles of the troubled, “Jesus waded right in and helped out.”  Example set, truly from on high, a fresh vision and visitation of God’s engaging character.  Although Scripture was written long ago, and much before Jesus visited His Creation, God confirms for all generations, “You can be sure it’s written for us.  God wants the combination of His steady, constant calling, and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert fo

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Missteps

You may be thinking, “Oklahoma! Is the place for me🎶 and O what a beautiful morning🎶.  And because of me, myself and I, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.”  This thinking is a “misstep,” no different than a wrong step in a cow field.

It matters not the location, Oklahoma, Dallas, L.A., Tennessee, or Salzburg.  It matters not our plans and goals, objectives, awards, ambitions, accolades, or other successes whereby, “Everything's going my way🎶

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What's Next?

I love hearing the stories of all that is going on with you, and with your families; working on this, another activity, “so many tests,” trip, dreams, adventure, or scenario, with children (including you) saying, “What’s next, Papa or Moma?” Always something!  And yet, you may be chin-deep in what’s going on, with “next” being imminently inbound!

It so reminds me of these thoughts.  “This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life.”  That sou

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Doing

Always doing and looking for rest, doing we do.  In all of our doings, we may or may not be remembered.  As for God’s doings, who could number or judge, those thoughts and actions, having, “thoughts that outnumber the grains of sand,” pertaining to only us. 

In His doing, He first created all creation, serving up natural order with kinds and cycles.  Secondly, “He condemned sin in the flesh by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering.”  This doi

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Reflection

We plan for regular times of reflection or find that account in arrears.  Without this habit, we lose the freshness of impressions and experiences needed for tomorrow, perhaps as help to another.  What are we reflecting, what are others seeing, us being reflectors?

Christ Jesus didn’t think so much of Himself that He had to cling to the advantages of His deity.  “When the time came, He set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human!  It wa

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Aggressive Agendas

Many issues need addressing.  Has there ever been a time whereby there was no agenda?  Laws are passed and sicknesses are cured; but is there not more that needs to be done?

And then we read, “All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers.  But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace.  When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down.  All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the e

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Invitations

“Jesus responded by telling more stories.  “God’s kingdom,” He said, “is like a king who threw a wedding banquet for his son.  He sent out servants to call in all the invited guests.  And they wouldn’t come.””  In the end, all were invited.  Not all came.

Through the years, we’ve been invited to many functions.  Some were “mandatory formations.”  Many of the others we chose to attend.  Jesus was making many points through His story, but one point is clear.  All were invited

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Babbling

We hear it all the time, constantly; babbling.  Empty, repetitive words and phrases.  News, weather, and sports come to mind, as well as youngsters learning to mimic us, babbling.  For many, it becomes a life habit, always something to say.

Imagine the contrast.  “While he was going on like this, babbling, a light-radiant cloud enveloped them, and sounding from deep in the cloud a voice:  “This is My Son, marked by My love, focus of My delight. Listen to Him.””

Father, thank

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