Roger

This will be my last blog for 2017.   As we enter a new year, I find myself a bit melancholy, asking the Lord to help me discern His thoughts and to communicate them to those I lead and love.   While reading Acts 27, the Lord gave me three thoughts to share with you regarding the New Year.   I’m not a prophet, but like you, I experience the gentle nudge of the Holy Spirit and know the Lord is speaking definitively into my spirit.   As a pastor, it brings me joy to pass these insights along to you. I believe the Lord is asking us to simplify our lives.   “Busy-ness” tends to produce unnecessary stress.   Acts 27 records the story of a shipwreck.   The Apostle Paul is aboard a tattered and sinking vessel.   Two hundred and seventy-six (276) men fear for their lives, but Paul assures them that all will be spared.   Then he does something very significant.   He tells the fear-filled men to throw aboard anything that’s not necessary for their...

Often my thoughts return to Psalm 34:3, “O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His Name together.” The word, “magnify” captures my interest each time I recall this verse.   I memorized Psalm 34:1-4 while a freshman at Evangel University in Springfield, Missouri in 1974.   Let me give some background.   I grew up in Jefferson and for the most part never journeyed far from home during my first 18 years.   So to attend college in another state presented quite a challenge.   I was terribly homesick, feeling lonely and not sure I could remain in Missouri. One evening I went to the college chapel and in a dark corner of the room cried out to the Lord for comfort and direction.   Inadvertently, I began reading Psalm 34 and experienced one of those life-changing encounters that so often accompany times of deep spiritual contemplation. The Lord met me in a powerful way and the rest is history.   I, of course, remained at the college, met my future wife a...

It goes without saying that the entire Bible is wonderful.   Not all 66 letters are easy to understand but it remains on the “best-selling list” and when faith is applied in the heart of the reader, it still transforms lives. Other books inform, but only God’s book, the Bible, transforms! In recent years, I have been intrigued by one verse that God is using to rearrange my thinking. This pivotal verse has helped me glean a broader understanding of God’s grace. “For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people.   It teaches us to say, ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope –the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ…” (Titus 2:11-13).      You have to understand, I spent many years of my Christian life trying to weave law-based information into grace teaching; and let me tell you, it doesn’t work.   It...

The late David Wilkerson wrote a book in 1973 entitled, “The Vision.”   I believe Wilkerson was a prophetic voice to our nation, as many of the things he wrote about in his bestseller have come to pass.   Rev. Wilkerson covered many subjects, but perhaps none more poignant than a “spirit of perversion” that would be loosed upon America in the years ahead.   Since the writing of his book, national morals have plummeted to an all-time low. The recent dismissal of NBC’s Today co-host, Matt Lauer, has shaken our collective conscience.   Other sexual improprieties have also come to light, as politicians, Hollywood actors and other media gurus have been exposed on television newscasts.   Surely we are living in a day where “those things done in the dark (secret) are being brought out into the light.” I would like to address especially men in this blog.   Gentlemen, the enemy of our soul has targeted us to fail morally.   An onslaught of sexually charged stim...