If God is loving, why does he allow so much evil in the world? This is an old question, a classic objection to Biblical Christianity, and it’s one that we have talked about on Sunday mornings before today. It’s the kind of question that keeps coming up. The questions of evil and suffering are, of…
Why all the killing in the Old Testament?
In Deuteronomy chapter 7 God orders the Israelites to completely destroy the 7 nations of Canaan, without mercy, and so the conquest of Canaan began at Jericho, with the killing of every man, woman and child in the city. In 1 Samuel 15, God orders King Saul to kill every man, woman, child and even…
Why is God silent?
A man told my father-in-law his story: An accountant with a PhD, he and his wife were immigrants from China some years ago. Invited to church, they became involved with the congregation. Shortly after, though, his wife was diagnosed with cancer. She affirmed faith in Christ and was baptized. A few weeks later, she died. …
Easter, 2006
What a great day Easter is! It’s a very big deal, the greatest day for Christians. Today we proclaim and celebrate that Jesus of Nazareth – who was crucified, died and was buried – has been raised to life by the power of God, that he is declared with power to be the Son of…
Easter, 2005
Two weeks ago, Canada mourned the deaths of four Mounted police murdered while on duty in Alberta. Thousands gathered at the funeral of the officers. Thousands more watched the service on television. In that service the father of one of the officers gave the eulogy for his son, and in that eulogy he read these…
Easter, 2004
Today is Easter Sunday. Across the world, millions of Christians have celebrated and are celebrating the resurrection from the dead of Jesus of Nazareth, the carpenter and itinerant rabbi who was nailed to a Roman cross outside Jerusalem 2000 years ago. It is the high point of celebration in the church calendar. We say to…
Acts 2:1-13 Pentecost
My kids have recently discovered the old Looney Tunes cartoons. Many of you will remember those cartoons, and their characters: Bugs Bunny, Tweety Bird, Sylvester, Elmer Fudd, the Roadrunner and Wile E. Coyote, etc. Though there were always different episodes, and if you remember those old shows, you know that there was essentially one storyline…
Acts 1:12-26 Prayer and choosing a twelfth apostle
Praying and Choosing Matthias Last week we began our study of the Book of Acts, which is the historical account of the early church. In this time when we as a church are very deliberately fixing our attention on the person of Jesus, Acts shows us what happens when a community of people is fired…
Acts 1:1-11 Prologue
Today, we are starting a series in Acts. The timing is right. As a church, we are re-centering ourselves on the person of Jesus Christ, and in the book of Acts we see what happens when a community of people is also centered upon Jesus. As I’ve studied in Acts, I am struck again and…
God the Son: Who He is – The Deity of Jesus
There are lots of differing thoughts concerning Jesus of Nazareth. Some say there was no such person. Robert M. Price of the Jesus Seminar, says, “It is quite likely that the central figure of the gospels is not based on any historical individual… If you could travel back through time to first century Nazareth, you…