For the past two decades, the North Carolina native has served the Turkish people as a church leader in Izmir. But on Oct. 7, 2016, Brunson was arrested and held for over a year before finally being charged with having connections to Kurdish militants and the Islamic Gulen movement that the government accuses of staging... Continue Reading

All preaching requires skill in rhetoric and oratory, but perhaps the best and most influential preacher in biblical times was reputed to lack them. Indeed, by his own admission, Paul tells the Corinthians he did not come with the kind of speaking gifts and philosophical panache that was so admired in their day (1Co 2.1-5).... Continue Reading

Cosmopolitanism is the view that all humanity belongs to a single community. People belong to a world community more than to a local community.  “The nebulous core shared by all cosmopolitan views is the idea that all human beings, regardless of their political affiliation, are (or can and should be) citizens in a single community.”... Continue Reading

Evangelism is the great exercise of our trust in God – a truth we easily ignore, because we constantly fall prey to the lie that evangelism is what we do for God. We slide back into performance-driven obedience. We are not the catalyst for evangelism; the Spirit is. I feel there are probably more like me who struggle to... Continue Reading

Here is a short sketch of several names of God in the Bible that reveal God’s nature. The names described here specifically reveal how the Father and Son relate to one another and how God is eternally beneficent and always shares of himself.   One of the paradoxes of our faith is that God both... Continue Reading

Should we not make every effort to prevent misunderstanding by clarity in our own words? And yet shouldn’t we also be very generous (or at the very least patient!) in how we read other people’s actions and words? Yet we live today in a society that tends to encourage people to put the onus of... Continue Reading

According to recent research, we need to rediscover the power of meaning. We find meaning when we view our lives as significant: when we can make sense of them, and when we are driven by a sense of purpose.  At times, meaning and happiness can be at odds, but a sense of meaning gives us... Continue Reading

As He approached Jerusalem and the sufferings that He was about to endure there, Jesus told His disciples: “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go... Continue Reading

A great deal of time and energy is spent by the administration and faculty on trying to read the minds of the accreditors. What exactly do they want? What will cause them to cite the college or university with one or more demerits (which then have to be cleared up)? Based on my many years... Continue Reading

The primary consideration in the description of biblical guilt, is not that we feel subjectively guilty (whether the accusation is false, unproven or confirmed), but that, in the eyes of the LORD we are ACTUALLY, objectively and legally guilty before the Law. Absence or presence of feelings at this point are irrelevant. Sin, as an... Continue Reading