Life Over the Last Week

an update on my ministry and life

I’ve been listening to The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard over the last week or so. While I’ve read several quotes and excerpts from this book over the years, I had never actually read it myself, and it seemed like a good choice for my usual audiobook.

I’m glad I selected it.

There hasn’t been much “new” material for me so far, and I’m about 35% of the way through the book, but the arrangement of the material and the style of writing has been new and refreshing.

A lot of the themes are similar to what I talk about: the transformed life in Christ, moving away from the gospel of sin management, optimism that Jesus’s words really can transform the world around us, and an emphasis on the availability of the kingdom.

Early on the book, Willard cited a popular hymn entitled “O Worship the King.”

Your bountiful care, what tongue can recite?
It breathes in the air, it shines in the light;
it streams from the hills, it descends to the plain,
and sweetly distills in the dew and the rain.

Robert Grant (1833)

I don’t know about you, but this has been my experience as I’ve spent time hiking, kayaking, and just enjoying the outdoors over the summer. As the leaves change colors and the air cools, I’ll be exploring and living in these same spaces but in fresh ways.

Creation is marvelous.

This reminded me of another song:

This is my Father's world:
The birds their carols raise,
The morning light, the lily white,
Declare their Maker's praise.
This is my Father's world:
He shines in all that's fair;
In the rustling grass I hear Him pass,
He speaks to me everywhere.

Maltbie D. Babcock (1901)

This last week has been interesting. On Sunday my throat began to aggravate me a little. I thought I was struggling with acid reflux, but it turns out I was developing a sinus infection. On Tuesday, I realized what had happened, so I took a quick trip to the doctor just as a precaution.

Wednesday-Friday of this week, my daughter is out of daycare for fall break, so she’s been home with me, and she has also been sick. I’m guessing we have the same thing, but hers is showing up in different ways.

She seems to be doing better today, but I still feel pretty weak and tired from it all.

Prayer would be appreciated as we go into the weekend. I have a few things on my schedule for tonight and tomorrow I’d like to be able to do. Of course, there’s always preaching this Sunday as well!

My text this Sunday will be from Mark 10, and we’ll be talking about marriage, divorce, and remarriage which is always a fun topic—if you know, you know.

But I have faith that it will be beneficial to the church here.

Lately, I’ve been reading…

Devotions by Mary Oliver

The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard

The Apostles’ Creed by William Barclay

Posts and Classes from the Last Week

Sermon

Last Sunday I preached a sermon from Numbers 11 on how God often works outside of our expectations. Sons, daughters, young, old, rich, and poor are all invited to be ministers in the kingdom.

You Can't Put the Spirit into a Box (Or a Tent)

Minor Prophets

My class on the minor prophets class continues! This week we looked Hosea 5-7. You can get the handouts and download the audio from here:

Eschatology of John

After six introductory articles, we are finally to John chapter 1! We looked at themes introduced in John’s overture (prologue sounds boring) as well as the ministry of John the Baptist.

The Importance of John the Baptist in Eschatology

Covenant Eschatology: 2 Corinthians 3

On YouTube, I’ve been doing a series on “covenant eschatology” from 2 Corinthians 3. Since I mentioned it in my John series, I thought it would be good to do an introduction to the idea in series of shorter videos. They can be found in the playlist below.

Daniel

On Tuesday, we just did our third and last class on Daniel 2. In this lesson, we talk about the relationship between the iron and clay in Daniel 2.

You can download the audio or find a link to the YouTube playlist here: