Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
THERE WILL ALWAYS BE WEEDS
Jesus described another kind of soil which is filled with weeds and thistles and torpedo grass and other kinds of things. When Giovanna and I moved into our house, it had been vacant for a year. It’s built in an old flood plain of Lake Pontchartrain, which means that
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
THE STORY OF FAITH HOPE
Myah Hope was given the news that she was pregnant. Like most mothers to be, she dreamed of what giving birth to a child and raising them would be like.
But when she was 19 weeks pregnant, she was told that something was wrong with her baby's head. The doctor said that
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
PEALE: A SIMPLE CHRISTMAS IN AFRICA
Norman Vincent Peale writes of spending Christmas in Africa with his wife, children and grandchildren. He was hesitant but his wife told him he would love every minute of it. And yet, as Christmas day approached he was troubled because everything Christmas was
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
DOING CHRISTMAS DIFFERENTLY
Donald Miller, author of Blue Like Jazz, tells of his pastor in Portland Oregon at Imago Dei Community. He and some his friend decided they wanted to do Christmas differently. So he stood up in front of his congregation and challenged them not to go into debt that
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
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THE CHRISTMAS SCOUT
In spite of the fun and laughter, 13 yr. old Frank Wilson was not happy. It was true, he had received all the presents he wanted, and he enjoyed the traditional Christmas Eve reunions with relatives for the purpose of exchanging gifts and good wishes but Frank was not happy.
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
EVERYONE WANTS TO BE A WINNER
You want to know how bad it was to be a New Orleans Saints. Derland Moore, the Saints nose tackle from 1973 to 1985, once was asked what it was like to be a Saint, and said: "We were the league's doormats. When I went out and people would ask me if I played for the
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
AVOIDING THE ROCKS
Alan was my prayer partner at a previous church and he tells the story of going white water rafting on a Christian retreat. He said he always got stuck being the captain of the boat and sure enough for the 4th year in a row, he was named captain. So his job was to direct the men
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Smith on Mar 17, 2011
GOD USES PEOPLE LIKE DERRICK
In Dayton, Ohio, attorney Derrick Farmer gave a motivational talk to at-risk teens. Derrick is 48 years old and has been an attorney since 1999. Now, what was unusual about this event was that it was picketed by 30 Dayton police officers. Why? When Derrick was 16 years
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Methodist
Contributed by Tim Chinn on Apr 4, 2011
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SUBMISSION?
A poll was taken a few years ago asking, both men and women this question, “Should wives submit to their husbands?”
(In 1998, the Southern Baptists also sparked controversy with their statement that wives should "submit graciously" to the "servant leadership" of their husbands. At that
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Evangelical/Non-Denominational
Contributed by Tim Hinrichs on Apr 20, 2011
POTATO PROVISION
I remember just a few years ago when we lived in Poland as missionaries. We were struggling so much financially. The dollar had plunged in value and we lost about 1/3 of the value of our money and were wondering if we would have to return back to the States. So we were praying for
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Lutheran
Contributed by Tim White on May 7, 2011
LEADERS ARE BORN AND MADE
J. Oswald Sanders in his classic “Spiritual Leadership” believes that leaders are both born and made. “While conversion does not normally make leaders of people who would never become such otherwise, Church history teaches that in the hour of full surrender the Holy
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim White on May 7, 2011
BOSS: MARK DEVER ON THE FOUR ASPECTS OF LEADERSHIP
B=Boss. The leader "reproves, rebukes, and exhorts with all longsuffering and doctrine."
There is a delicate balance in local churches between pastoral authority (Hebrews 13) and congregational authority (Matthew 18). The pastors must exercise
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim White on May 8, 2011
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LEADERSHIP AND PRAYER
Henry and Richard Blackaby in Spiritual Leadership in chapter seven "The Leader's Influence" stress that leaders influence others through prayer. They give six reasons why leaders should pray. The fourth reason is "God is all-powerful. . . .God can do far more than even the
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim White on May 9, 2011
I heard Adrian Rogers give this example:
"We all have seen Canada Geese fly in their V formation with one leg of the V formation longer than the other leg. Why do they fly in the V formation? The lead goose is making it easier for the other geese who are following his lead. He is moving the wind
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim Hinrichs on May 31, 2011
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JAPAN'S SEA WALL
New York Times, April 16, 2011: So unshakable was this town's faith in its sea wall and its ability to save residents from any tsunami that some rushed toward it after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of northeast Japan on the afternoon of March 11. After all, the
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Denomination:
Lutheran
Contributed by Tim Hinrichs on Jun 1, 2011
TRAPPED ON A TRAM
It was a beautiful sunny day in Ostrava, Czech Republic, a city of 300,000. It was 1995, and I had just moved there to take an intense Czech language course. After half a day of Czech grammar, I was tired. I got on the tram and spaced out for my 20-minute ride to the suburbs
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Lutheran
Contributed by Tim White on Aug 15, 2011
HATING TO LOSE
As a young man growing up, my family enjoyed TV sports. Part of the fun was choosing a team and cheering for them. What maximized the fun was having someone in the family pick the other team, and it became personal.
My brother hated to lose. He was noted for changing teams mid-game
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim Spear on Sep 1, 2011
GIVEN, BUT NOT TAKEN
I like to use coupons to save money especially when eating out or for lodging. Businesses give coupons all the time, but not all are used. I found two such coupons in my wallet this week and started to throw them out, but then I thought they would be useful as an illustration.
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim Spear on Sep 6, 2011
These are those hard moments when God does things we do not understand. We cannot figure them out...Yet what they reveal is how little we understand. It is God who is the realist. He never deceives himself. He always acts in perfect accord with what the situation
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Baptist
Contributed by Tim Spear on Sep 6, 2011
Let us only take heed that this office of Christ is not set before us in vain. It will profit us nothing at the last day that Jesus was a Shepherd, if during our lifetime, we never heard His voice and followed Him. If we love life, let us
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Baptist