Life's Inanities and Ironies

 I’ve about reached the end of my rope. I could handle getting old, and I could handle being sick, but both at once is more than this old frame can bear. We got slammed with snow here in Indiana the last few days. My job at the fairgrounds still includes keeping the lots and sidewalks clear, so yesterday I was out there most of the day battling it, just trying to keep things open for an event. I can’t remember ever being so glad to hear the words “We’re shutting it down.” They canceled the rest of yesterday and today too. Indiana doesn’t throw many tantrums anymore, but when winter decides to roar, it roars loud. This morning the wind finally laid down and the snow quit falling, so I went back out. You couldn’t tell I’d done a lick of work except my snow piles kept getting taller. I thought I’d just fire up the snow blower and finish the sidewalks. Guess what’s still sitting at the repair shop  where its been since August ? Exactly. So I grabbed a shovel. Ten minutes later...

 “In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”   — 1 Thessalonians 5:18 ( NKJV ) We live in a complaining culture. Social media feeds are filled with grievances, news cycles thrive on outrage, and even many Christians find it easier to grumble than to give thanks when life gets hard. Yet the Holy Spirit , through the Apostle Paul , issues a crystal-clear, non-negotiable command: in everything give thanks. Notice the little word “in.” Not “for” everything (though sometimes we can get there by grace), but **in** everything. In the diagnosis and in the healing. In the layoff and in the provision. In the prodigal’s rebellion and in the homecoming. In the coffin and in the empty tomb. This is not positive thinking . This is not “fake it till you make it.” This is the revealed will of God for every born-again believer. If you have ever wondered, “Lord, what is Your will for my life?”—here is one thing you never have to pray about again. God...

 “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.” — Matthew 13:31–32 (ESV) We live in an age obsessed with size, metrics, and visibility. Mega-churches boast attendance numbers in the tens of thousands. Influencers measure success by followers, likes, and viral clips. Meanwhile, the little country church with cracked pews and thirty faithful souls on a Sunday morning is dismissed as irrelevant, dying, or “not doing enough for the kingdom.” Jesus begs to differ . Three times — in Matthew, Mark, and Luke — the Lord tells the same parable. The Holy Spirit thought it important enough to record it thrice. This is not a cute illustration about “having big faith.” This is a divine prophecy about how God’s kingdom actually advances: through what the world counts ...

 Brethren, the more we gaze upon these Separatist saints, the more we see the Word of God leaping off the page into real history. Their story is not merely “inspiring”—it is a divine typology. God wrote their voyage into the margins of our Bibles as a fresh exhibition of ancient truths. Here are more unbreakable parallels that ought to make every Bible-believing Christian fall on his face in wonder. 6. They were Abrahams, obeying the call to leave kin and country for a land they had never seen.    “By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went” (Heb. 11:8).      These Pilgrims forsook houses, lands, fathers, mothers, and the graves of their ancestors because Christ was more precious to them than England itself. They did not wait for a comfortable retirement package. They stepped onto the Mayflower with nothing but the promises of God in ...

 Brethren, when we speak of the Pilgrims , let us strip away the schoolhouse myths , the cartoons with buckles on hats , and the secularized fairy tale of “ friendship with Indians .” Those things happened, but they are not WHY the Pilgrims matter to blood-bought, Bible-believing Christians in 2025. The Pilgrims mattered because they were unashamed, uncompromising, separatist, Bible-saturated saints who counted everything rubbish for the excellency of knowing Christ Jesus their Lord. They were closer to us than most modern evangelicals will ever be. Consider who they really were. 1. They were biblical separatists — not “ tolerant reformers .”       They saw the Church of England as a false church, steeped in Roman Catholic remnants , ruled by a king who called himself head of the church instead of Christ. They believed the Scripture taught that a true church was a gathered company of visible saints , baptized upon profession of faith, walking in covenant tog...

In the blackest midnight of Judah’s story—when the temple lay in ashes, when mothers ate their own children in the siege, when Jeremiah sat weeping on the ruins with a heart shattered into a thousand altars—God did something utterly outrageous. He made a promise that still sets the heavens ringing. Not a patch.   Not a reform.   Not a stricter law with better enforcement. A **new** covenant. Jeremiah 31:31–34 (the verses that burned through the prophet’s tears like dawn through prison bars): > “Behold, the days come, saith the LORD,   > that I will make a **new covenant**   > with the house of Israel , and with the house of Judah:   > Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers   > in the day that I took them by the hand   > to bring them out of the land of Egypt ;   > which my covenant they brake,   > although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:...

He stands alone on the scorched hills above Jerusalem , cloak torn by thorns and kings alike, eyes already red from forty years of unshed tears. The city beneath him is a smoking skeleton—golden temple melted into slag, walls breached like a shattered ribcage, the air thick with the stench of burning cedar and unburied dead. And Jeremiah weeps. Not the polite glistening of a funeral. Not the dignified single tear of a priest. He weeps like a man whose very bones have turned to salt water. “Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain daughter of my people!” He means it literally. He wants to bleed tears until the valleys flood, until the Kidron runs crimson with grief, until there is no more dryness left in him—because only then might the horror finally be enough. For four decades he walked those streets with a heart flayed open. Barefoot in the palace courts. Neck in the stocks while children pelted him with dung. Lowe...

We don’t read Lamentations much anymore. It’s too raw. Too uncomfortable. Too much like looking in a mirror we’ve spent decades trying to avoid. But chapter 5 is not poetry for the faint of heart. It is a naked, desperate prayer from a people who finally realized the party was over and the bill had come due. Jerusalem lies in ashes. The temple is gone. Children are starving in the streets. Princes hang from enemy gallows. Women are violated in the holy city itself. And the survivors—those who once boasted of their heritage, their covenant, their “blessings”—now lift trembling voices and say: “Remember, O LORD, what has come upon us;   look, and see our disgrace!” (Lam 5:1) They are not whining. They are confessing.   They are not blaming Babylon . They are blaming themselves. And if that doesn’t terrify Bible-believing Christians in America today , nothing will. Because everything they describe is here.   Everything. Our inheritance has been handed over t...

  “Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it.” – Psalm 127:1 Today we walked through brand-new doors to us, sat in brand-new chairs, and lifted our voices under a roof and in an auditorium that still smells like fresh paint and answered prayer. After years of someone else's sound system, folding tables and chairs, baptizing folks in borrowed horse troughs and ponds, God has given us a permanent place to call home. But let’s be crystal-clear from day one: this building is not the church. You are. I am. The blood-bought, born-again believers gathered around the Word and the Table —that’s the church Jesus is building. The bricks are just a tool in His hand. 1. A Monument to God’s Faithfulness    Some of you sold hay bales, held yard sales, skipped vacations, and gave when the offering plate looked empty felt heavier than when it was full. Some of you prayed until your knees left permanent dents in the carpet. Some of you lost sleep over permits an...

In a world filled with distractions, where everything from social media notifications to career ambitions vies for our attention, it's easy to lose sight of what's truly important. But as believers grounded in the unchanging truth of Scripture, we know there's only one rightful occupant for the throne of our hearts: the Lord God Almighty. This blog post expands on a recent homily inspired by Exodus 20:1-3 , reminding us of the foundational command that shapes our faith and lives. Let's dive deeper into why God must be first—and what happens when He's not. The Divine Declaration: Who God Is Exodus 20:1-3 thunders from the pages of the Bible: "And God spake all these words, saying, I am the LORD thy God , which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me." This isn't just ancient history; it's a living mandate for every Christian today. God isn't introducing Himself as one optio...

 The figure of Melchizedek , a mysterious priest-king from the Old Testament , serves as a profound typological foreshadowing of Jesus Christ in the Epistle to the Hebrews , particularly in chapter 7. Typology in biblical interpretation involves seeing earlier persons, events, or institutions as patterns or "types" that anticipate greater realities (antitypes) in the New Testament . In this case, Melchizedek is not merely a historical curiosity but a divinely inspired analogy designed to illustrate the superiority and eternity of Christ's priesthood over the Levitical system established under the Mosaic Law . The author of Hebrews draws from Genesis 14:18-20 —where Melchizedek blesses Abraham after his victory over the kings—and Psalm 110:4 , which declares, "You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek." This typology addresses a key concern for the original Jewish-Christian audience: how Jesus, from the tribe of Judah rather than Levi, could le...

I’m coming up on three years since my kidneys failed and my life shifted to the rhythm of dialysis . For most of that time I’ve tried—really tried—to stay positive, to do everything asked of me, to keep myself transplant -ready. I’ve smiled through the needles, followed every rule, and held onto the hope that a kidney would come soon. Last year, during my annual transplant evaluation , I was told I needed to lose a significant amount of weight to remain eligible. I took it seriously. I increased my exercise as much as this tired body allows. I slashed calories. I tracked everything. And still… nothing. The scale refuses to move. I don’t know what else to do. There was another hurdle too: my bladder has shrunk and become rigid over these years of kidney failure . Without a urostomy , a new kidney wouldn’t have anywhere to drain. I met with the surgeon, everything seemed set—we were looking at surgery either late this year or early next—and then… silence. I’ve called and left messages. N...