Studying God’s word requires proper heart preparation. I proposed in last week’s post that the necessity of prayer, the requirement of purity, and the mindfulness of perspective are important as we approach the word of God. We need to realize our dependence and desperate need of divine guidance as we look to God’s Spirit inspired word. God requires our hearts and … Read More

The Bible is God’s divine revelation to man. This is how God has spoken to us (2 Pet 1:19-21) and this is how we can hear his voice. It is verbally inspired in every word and absolutely inerrant in the original documents. The Scriptures contain the very mind and thoughts of God (Isa 55:8-9), as well as the will of … Read More

On four of the final six Sundays this year Immanuel will gather for an evening worship service. I want to challenge you to attend. I think that if you come you will not only benefit yourself but also bless others. I hope you will break the habit of never coming and build the routine of showing up. I hope you … Read More

Hospitality and Pie At 5:00 pm on Sunday night, November 18th, our church family will gather in the Fellowship Hall for Thanksgiving Pie & Praise. You can register HERE. Please bring one pie per family and deliver it to the kitchen on Sunday morning. When you arrive, start with dessert, find a place to stand or sit, and enjoy conversation … Read More

With the launch of iOS 12 last month, Apple now tracks and reports your phone and app usage in a weekly Screen Time report. You can review time usage per-day, weekly time usage, average daily pickups, and total notifications with each category reported individually by the app. I screen-shot my iPhone. You can see that I spent 3 hours per … Read More

I remember the beginning of my first pastorate, the congregation included faithful, loving Christians who worshiped together for decades. As any tight-knit group will do, a few odd church family rituals embedded themselves in their unwritten, but expected traditions. One of which was singing “Happy Birthday” to prominent members in the church during the Sunday morning service. The ratio was … Read More

  Church membership is a centerpiece of a Word-centered church. In recent blog posts, we’ve defined a Word-centered church as focused on expositional preaching, shepherding leadership, meaningful membership, and healthy gatherings. In the last post, I described the character of shepherding leadership, and shepherding leadership assumes a flock to teach, oversee, and protect. Membership is the biblical means by which … Read More

A Word-centered church is a congregation gathered for the receiving of God’s Word. Rightly understood, a Word-centered church must agree about the teaching, leading, adding, and gathering of God’s people. We’ve set out in this series of blog posts to address this using the headings expositional preaching, shepherding leadership, meaningful membership, and healthy gatherings. In this article, we will consider … Read More

Previously, I described what it means for Immanuel to be a Word-centered church. You can find that post HERE. A Word-centered church is a congregation gathered for the receiving of God’s Word. But how should we express Word-centered convictions? What is it about our attendance, order of service, and demeanor that validates it? In upcoming blog posts, I will describe … Read More

As a pastor, I frequently get caught in a conversation describing the church. People expect a pastor to give a sales pitch with a church invite. Often my answer doesn’t satisfy the expectation. I can see it on their faces. They expected to hear about a church identified by location (Monument and Thompson), history (128 years), or denomination (Baptist). Their … Read More