Life's Inanities and Ironies

I was a very fortunate young man. When I first began high school in the small town of Argos, Indiana, the Lord in His kind providence connected me with a group of young people who would become friends for the rest of my life. This vibrant Christian group influenced me in ways I am still discovering more than fifty years later. It was not only those young people themselves, but their families who left such a profound and lasting impact upon me. At that critical season of life, I learned far more about what a true Christian home should look like simply by watching them than I ever learned in my own home. No matter how earnestly I tried over the years, I was never able to fully replicate the warmth, the godliness, and the Christ-centered atmosphere I observed in those homes. How I wished I could have! What brought all of this into sharper focus for me was the news, just a couple of days ago, that one of the "kids" from one of those families had unexpectedly been called home to b...

Scripture Focus: 2 Corinthians 5:10 (KJV) > "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." There is a coming day that no blood-bought believer can escape. It is not the Great White Throne judgment reserved for the lost. It is the Judgment Seat of Christ — the Bema Seat — where every Christian will give an account for the life we lived in these mortal bodies. The Apostle Paul writes with Spirit-inspired clarity: *we must all appear*. There will be no exceptions among the redeemed. This is not a judgment to determine our salvation. That question was forever settled at the cross when we trusted in the finished work of Jesus Christ. We are justified by faith alone. But our *works* — our service, our motives, our stewardship, and our faithfulness — will be examined in the blazing light of His holy presence. Works Tested by Fire The Bible is clear in 1...

Beloved, have you ever felt that holy longing deep in your soul? That quiet but persistent sense that this world is not your final home? Like the old gospel songs express it, “I feel like traveling on.” The Apostle Paul gives us the same blessed assurance in one of the most comforting passages in all of Scripture. As Bible-believing, conservative Christians who hold fast to the inerrant Word of God and the literal promises of our Lord, we find here a glorious preview of what awaits every child of God. Here is the text from the King James Bible: > For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: If so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might ...

In these challenging days, when faithful conservative Christians often feel “troubled on every side,” the inspired words of the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:8-18 shine like a beacon of hope. Cultural opposition to biblical truth, moral confusion, personal trials, and spiritual warfare can press hard against us. Yet Paul, who endured beatings, imprisonments, and constant danger for the gospel, declares that we are afflicted but not crushed, perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not forsaken, cast down but not destroyed. Here is the full passage in the King James Version: > 2 Corinthians 4:8-18 (KJV)    > We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;   > Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;   > Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.   > For we which live are alway delivered ...