For thousands of years, Jewish people all over the world have prayed the same words every morning and every night to express devotion to God. This prayer is called the Shema and it reads like this: Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your […]
Do You Like to Read?
I don’t read nearly enough but I love to open up a book and get sucked into a story. Ya know, one of those books that you can’t put down. When you’re forced to put it down, because well adulthood, you return at every opportunity to read just one more page. Personally, I’m a big fan of teen fiction […]
It Is Written…
Have you ever been doing something difficult and knew you had the answer to making it easier available? This was a constant struggle for me in college, I did all my classes online and the answers to the questions were always readily available on the internet. Which is good and in this instance a very […]
Nothing Else
The last couple of Sundays, the worship team has led us in the song Nothing Else. As I’ve listened and sung this song, God has used it to speak to me. I sing that I need nothing else but Jesus, but am I living like that is true? Let’s look at our relationship with Jesus […]
Escape Darkness: Walk in the Light
Have you ever experienced true darkness? Like, real absolute darkness? I remember the first and probably the only time I’ve experienced true absolute darkness. We took the youth group caving several years ago. When you enter the cave, you get suited up with headlamps and other gear. You climb into this little hole in the […]
Love Them & Pray for Them
Love. A word that is thrown around rather recklessly today, I love pizza, I love football, I love coffee, I love my wife, I love my kids, I love Jesus, I love church, etc. Today, we love everything. But do we actually love anything? Because we may love pizza but do we love it when […]
Are We Really “Following” Jesus?
Have you ever followed someone like your life depended on it? A few years ago we took the youth group on a day trip during the summer, the day had several activities planned but the highlight was a trip spelunking! Spelunking is the process of caving and going deep into caves in the earth and […]
Obey Without Objection
Has someone ever asked you to do something that you really didn’t want to do? Like doing chores, homework, or run laps. My wife does, on a daily basis. She’s a tidy person, I am not. I have a very one-track mind, I’m focused on whatever I’m focused on and miss about everything else. She, […]
How to Follow God
We’re going through a series in a youth group called One Small Step, we’re walking through Hebrews 11 at the hall of faith and reflecting on how our lives will look if we move into a practical active faith that we live out, One Small Step at a time. This week, we looked at Hebrews […]
Time to Clean Out the Junk Drawer
How clean are you? Are you someone who is really tidy or.. not so much? Let’s ask these questions a bit differently. If we were to send a group of people your house right now, with no warning, we were all able to see your bedroom in its current state, would you be embarrassed with […]