Timothy's Thoughts

W hy did God destroy Sodom? That seems like a simple question to answer. The Lord himself said in Genesis 18:20, “because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous.” Then in the next chapter, we see some of that sin when the men of the city come to Lot’s house, intent on raping the messengers of the Lord. Many people would answer the question by saying that it was because of the sin of the city and especially the sin of homosexuality. Now another question, why didn’t God destroy Nineveh? Again, the Lord gave us the reason why he should destroy the city when he said in Jonah 1:2, “for their wickedness has come up before me.” Nineveh was very much like Sodom and I expect you would’ve seen some of the same sins in both cities. But the path of the two cities took went in opposite directions. The Lord sent Jonah with a warning for the city of Nineveh and in Jonah 3:10, we see why they weren’t destroyed. “And God saw their works, that they turned from the...

A pple CEO Tim Cook will go down in history as having said, "I'm proud to be gay, and I consider being gay among the greatest gifts God has given me." For those of us who have studied the Bible, that statement raises our hackles. How dare he say such a thing? Clearly, the Bible says that God is opposed to homosexuality and God doesn’t disagree with his word, so it can’t be a gift from God. When we look a little closer at what Tim Cook is saying, he says that his experience as a practicing homosexual has given him a better understanding of the experience that minorities have had. I think we all can agree that being able to see things from the perspective of other people is a good thing. I expect that the good Tim Cook has gotten from his experiences, mixed with his belief that he was born homosexual, is why he is attributing this as a gift from God. (We need not debate whether he was born with same sex attraction or not because the truth is complicated and in the grand sch...

D isturbing is the only word I have for it. I stumbled across an article written by an atheist who is a former Methodist minister. It listed several things that the author says your pastor won’t tell you about the Bible. Things like “Unlike Luke and Matthew, Paul didn’t believe in the virgin birth of Jesus.” Really?! Where did this guy get that? He gets it from Romans 1:3-4. The rest were of a similar nature, so let’s look at this one and not waste our time on the rest. Consider what Paul is saying in Romans 1:3-4. “Declared to be the Son of God…by the resurrection of the dead.” Amazing! You tell me; which more clearly reveals that Jesus is the Son of God, that he was born to a woman who knew no man or that he rose from the dead? That fact that the resurrection of the dead is mentioned here is not evidence that Paul didn’t believe in the virgin birth. If Paul didn’t, then why did Luke? Luke was one of Paul’s closest friends and traveling companions. Based on what we know of Paul, if Lu...

" H ath not the LORD God of Israel commanded…?” Barak gets a bad rap. For one thing, people tend to forget who he is and what he did. (Admittedly, he did bring that on himself.) People are more likely to remember Deborah than Barak, and they certainly can’t forget the actions of Jael when she killed Barak’s enemy, Sisera. We tend to think of Barak as the judge with weak faith, if we remember he was a judge at all, since he wouldn’t go into battle unless Deborah went with him. But when we look at the Hall of Faith in Hebrews 11:32, it is Barak (not Deborah, not Jael) who is held up as our example of faithfulness. It makes me think that we should look a little closer at Barak. In reading Judges 4:4-7, it appears that the Lord had already spoken to Barak, in some way, before Deborah called for him. It doesn’t tell us how the Lord spoke. It may have been through a prophet or an angel, it may have been that the Lord spoke directly to Barak, but the Lord had spoken and Barak knew the wi...

W hen you see one, you see several. And since I’m on a committee that is the first line of defense against creating a similar situation at our church, I’m paying even closer attention than I normally would. I find it both disturbing and bothersome as I think about what we need to do to prevent it from happening to us. Two days ago, Travis Reed was convicted of fondling a boy. As if that isn’t disturbing enough, Travis Reed was one of the youth workers at his church. About a day earlier, Derek Hutter, a youth minister at another church was arrested on charges of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl. I’ll leave it to the courts to decide whether he actually did it or not. (I actually find it just as disturbing that it is possible for a youth worker to be falsely accused.) But I think we can say that we’ve seen enough of these situations to realize that it is possible that he is guilty. What I really want to know is, how can we avoid hiring people like this? There are some similarities ...

W ithout a doubt, this woman will become the lastest poster child for what is wrong with abortion. This woman won’t tell you why she believes abortion is wrong. Instead, she makes the claim, “I am not ashamed.” She demands, “don’t put murder on me.” And the basis of her argument, “this is my body.” If you don’t watch this video and feel sorry for this woman, something is wrong with you. While I can’t agree with her choices or her argument, she gives us a clear view of a world that is wandering around in the darkness of sin. Jesus died for her, she just doesn’t know it. The first thing I have to ask is, if she is not ashamed, why does she make such a big point of telling us that she isn’t ashamed. Clearly, she doesn’t want to be ashamed, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t. She doesn’t want this thing that she has done called murder. Somehow, the message has gotten through to her that she has killed a living human being. The government isn’t calling it murder, but she knows it to be so. An...

P eople are concerned about the new Facebook Messenger app. The fear is that Facebook is trying to use our personal and private information in ways we never intended. Imagine being in the restroom and the camera on your phone taking a picture without you realizing it. That is something to give consideration to, but what is really going on with Facebook? To begin with, people’s concerns are not really over the possibility that Facebook might turn on the camera without their knowledge, but rather that Facebook asked permission to turn on their camera, use their location, access their contacts lists, etc. It happened when the app installed. Facebook asks for permission and people began to question, “What do they intend to use this information for?” If Facebook hadn’t asked, people wouldn’t have given it any thought that the app would be using stuff like that. I’ll prove my point by saying that you probably have a flashlight app on your phone. If it is like mine, it turns on the focus ligh...

T here are several videos that show someone inside a restaurant asking the patrons for some of their food. After they refuse, the scene changes to a street where a homeless man is sitting. Someone gives the homeless man some food, such as pizza or a couple of hamburgers and walks away. A few minutes later, the person who was asking for food before comes by and asks the homeless man for food. The homeless man gives the person food. Then the video ends with “Sometimes, those with less give more.” There is some truth to that. People who have been doing without have a better understanding of the difficulties that causes. I’m reminded of the woman Jesus told of who gave all she had while the rich religious leaders were just making a big show of giving. But the videos are flawed. The way the guy approaches those in the restaurant and how he approaches the homeless guy are very different. In the restaurant, he ambushes people. “Can I have a slice?” How do you expect people to act in a resta...

T here is a concept among Christians to “pray on the full armor of God.” Every morning when they wake up, some people will say a prayer like the following: Lord, as I wake up this morning, I put on the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness to guard my heart. I put on the sandals of the gospel of peace to protect my walk with you today. I take up the shield of faith to protect me from whatever Satan my throw at me. I place the helmet of salvation on my head and take hold of the sword of the Spirit of God. Strengthen me for the battles I’ll face today. Amen. The typical version is much longer than the one I’ve shown here and many of them start with the helmet of salvation rather than the order they are in the Bible. I’m not sure if that’s because they want to go from head to toe or maybe they’re thinking that salvation should come first since that’s what we think of as the first event in the Christian walk. Paul probably put these in the order he did because he’d watched Rom...

I stood I the foyer as kids and parents walked through the main entrance of the church. The kids stopped off the VBS check-in table where they answered a few questions and then made their way into the auditorium. The parents stood in the foyer with me for a short time, watching to see that their kids got to where they needed to be. They talked with a few of the other people in the foyer. But then, they turned, walked back through the crowd gathered around the check-in table and out the door. They would return a couple hours later to collect their kids. Missed Opportunities Time and time again I saw this scene repeated with family after family. This is the age group that we’re not reaching. When you look at our church attendance and when you look at the professions of faith in our church, you see a gap between the young and the old. It isn’t that we don’t people in this age group, but the numbers are down in comparison to other age groups. Some people say that young adults just aren’t ...

T he Annie E. Casey Foundation ranks Texas as 47 of 50 when it comes to the quality of family and community for children. One of the driving factors in that is the percentage of kids who live in a single parent home, which contributes to the education level of the head of the home, the wealth of the bread winner, the education level, etc. In Texas, 36% of children live in a single parent home. Of the four factors Annie E. Casey looked at, Texas could use improvement on all of them, but Family and Community is the one that hurt our ranking the most. This got me to thinking. I see a lot on Facebook about how terrible the government is and how Obama needs to be impeached and all of that, but you can’t blame Obama or any other government leader for two and a half million kids living in single parent homes. There isn’t much the government can do about that and it isn’t their responsibility. So, whose responsibility is it? The kids parents, obviously, but only if you look at individual fami...

A friend of mine quoted the following statistic, “85% of the people saved in the United States are under 17.” Okay, but what do we do with that? Often, we hear things like that when someone wants to encourage people to work in youth ministry. I see nothing wrong with that. I work with kids in Awana and I can say that I’ve seen far more of them accept Christ than the adults I’ve taught in Sunday school. What I don’t like is when people take that statistic and say, “If we don’t reach them when they are kids, we’ll never reach them.” Is that really what we should take from this statistic? To answer that, let me ask you, what percentage of the people saved would we expect to be kids? Someone might mention that 18% of the population is between 5 and 17, while 76% of the population is adults, so anything over 18% is pretty good. But is it? Let’s use easy math and say we have an average church with 100 people in attendance. There are 6 children under age five. We’ll assume they aren’t saved...

P aul, in his writings, gives us this picture of a church in which the Lord has placed many people with different abilities, each doing their own thing, but together accomplishing the purposes of God. While I see this all the time, nowhere has it been more clear than on Mission Trip. At the time of this writing, we've seen eight souls saved. We had a couple of gifted soul winners on this trip and the Lord put their gift to use. But they wouldn't have been able to do that without other members of the team identifying people for them to talk to, and that was made possible by members of the team gaining the trust of these people by helping them with home repairs. Of course, all of this was made so much easier because of a gifted administrator leading the team. As we near the end of our trip, there is talk of "Why do we do this on mission trip but not at home? We need to continue this back in Fort Worth." While I understand the sentiment, I think we tend to encapsulate th...

C hurches used to call the Wednesday evening service “Prayer Meeting.” The church I attended when I was young didn’t have a “Prayer Meeting.” So, when I asked my mother about other churches who listed “Prayer Meeting” on their church sign, I got an image in my head that is very different from what I see in our church. In our church, we sing a song, and then we go over the prayer list. Someone prays a short prayer and then someone gets up and lectures for the remaining time. As a child, I pictured people gathering in a room and spending an hour or more doing nothing but praying. I couldn’t grasp how anyone would willingly spend an hour or more doing nothing but praying. What a shock it was when I attended my first “Prayer Meeting.” And yet, I wonder why churches don’t spend more time in prayer at a “Prayer Meeting.” But I see things wrong with both the idea I had as a child and the way we handle prayer meetings now. If all you do is have everyone pray the prayer they’ve memorized to pra...

W hen I was a kid, I remember learning about the Christian martyrs—people who were burned, or torn apart, or stoned—and I remember thinking, “It would be cool to die a death like that.” I’ve since lost some of my desire for that kind of death, but I remember having these thought of standing before someone (in my mind it was always a king) and being asked if I believed in Jesus. To live, all I would have to say is, “No,” but I would answer that yes, I do believe in Jesus Christ and I will not deny my faith in him. For that cause, I would die a martyr’s death. I remember talking to my mother about this and her saying, “We could face something like that one day.” The persecution that I imagined as a child was nothing more than a fantasy. And yet, the executioners are at our doorstep. A discussion we had at church on Sunday made me realize that we are already being asked to deny Christ in exchange for our lives, but it isn’t by a king in the king’s court. What will our response be? On Sun...

W hy does one person pick one worship song while someone else picks another? On Sunday, we were asked to turn in a list of our favorite hymns. My list is likely to be very different from some of the other lists that are turned in. Why? The worship wars have been going on for a long time. Back in the 80’s and 90’s, I remember people debating the value of traditional hymns versus contemporary choruses. Today, people are still complaining about contemporary choruses, even though very few of the contemporary hymns sung in churches fall in the category of choruses. All I can tell you is that when I chose the songs to list, they were songs that had special meaning to me at the time that I was making the list. If I were making the list at this moment I might pick other songs. I would probably pick Jesus Is In This House because that happens to be the song I’m listening to at the moment. But when I consider the songs I did list, some of them are on a CD that helped me when I was going through...

1. Every motion requires a second While most motions require a second, when a member of a committee makes a motion on the behalf of the committee, no second is required. Also, in a small committee, motions do not require a second. 2. The chair isn’t supposed to vote As long as the chair is a member, the chair retains the right to vote. 3. The chair can break a tie vote Because the chair must maintain an appearance of impartiality, it is advisable for the chair to refrain from voting. The exception is when his vote matters, such as when there is a tie vote. But he isn’t really breaking a tie. When the vote is even, there isn’t a majority, so the motion would fail if the chair doesn’t vote. If he votes in favor of the motion, a majority is achieved and the motion passes. But likewise, if the vote has one more in favor than against, the chair can exercise his right to vote against the motion, thereby creating a tie and causing the motion to fail. 4. A motion is required to adjourn ...

R aising your voice is one of the worst things you can do when you are trying to persuade someone. We often see situations in which a company or someone in government does something that someone doesn’t like. Hoping they will reverse the decision, the person goes to them to state their case in a public forum. As they begin to talk, their emotions overwhelm them and they begin to yell. The natural reaction is to view this as a challenge. Consider a situation in which the decision maker made the decision without looking at all sides of the issue. The decision maker may not be attached to the decision he made. When presented with a well stated reason to reverse the decision, he might be easily persuaded. But suppose someone comes to him and says, “How could you be so stupid?” His natural reaction is to grasp for things that will support his original decision. Faced with a challenge, it becomes mentally painful for him to change his decision. To side with the challenger is equivalent to h...

N ot many years ago, I began hearing people say, “The word separation isn’t in the First Amendment.” They would then go on to explain how they believed the concept of a separation of church and state is the work of the Devil to keep churches out of politics. Christians have been shooting themselves in the foot by defining Separation of Church & State as something it is not. We see the words “separation between Church & State” in an 1802 letter. If you go back and read the letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to the committee of the Danbury Baptist Association, you’ll see that it says more than just that the First Amendment builds “a wall of separation between Church & State.” He also makes the statement, “religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God.” Thomas Jefferson goes on to define the powers of government with the statement, “the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions.” In Thomas Jefferson’s way of thinking, what a man beli...

A n recent poll asked the question, “What a quality do you value most in a leader?” The possible answers were: Builds effective relationships Delivers results Energizes the team Models personal excellence, integrity and accountability Shapes the future The results (from least to greatest) were: Shapes the future - 4% Delivers results - 8% Energizes the team - 14% Builds effective relationships - 23% Models personal excellence, integrity and accountability - 51% What fascinates me about these results is that the things the leadership gurus push the most are the things that are the lowest on the list. But a majority view integrity as the most important. And building personal relationships also is significant. That doesn’t mean we can say that the others aren’t important, but modeling personal excellence, integrity and accountability is just so important that most people favor it over all the others. Too often, we see leaders who want results, no matter what. Even if it costs them their i...

T he book Heaven is for Real came out a few years ago. Now, there is a movie based on the book. I won’t be watching it. If you read the review of Heaven is for Real , you’ll see why. In brief, I saw nothing in the book that I couldn’t attribute to the imagination of a four year old, and too much that was inconsistent with what God said about heaven. I’ve seen the trailer for the movie, and even if I’d liked the book, I don’t think I could stand sitting through the movie. But a lot of people have purchased the book and it is likely that a lot of people will watch the movie. In this age when so-called scientists are promoting the religion of evolution as proof that heaven isn’t real, people are looking for evidence of its existence. People are looking for the smoking gun that they can point to and say, “Look, we have proof that heaven exists.” That is why they turn to stories about people who have visited heaven and came back. Haven’t you ever asked, “what if?” What if we could look up ...

“Delight thyself in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” (Psalm 37:4) I don’t suppose there’s anyone who has looked at that verse who didn’t wonder why God hasn’t given them the desires of their heart. All of us have had something that we wanted more than anything else and though we prayed long hours with tears streaming down our faces, it didn’t come. Where was the Lord? Why didn’t he answer? Did we somehow fail to delight ourselves in him? How does one delight himself in the Lord anyway? If you read the rest of Psalm 37, you’ll see that even as he was writing this song, David was struggling with some of the same thoughts. Look at verses 1 and 2. Do you think he would’ve said something like that if he’d never questioned why evil people appeared to prosper, even as the just suffered at their hand? (Psalm 37:12) The saints of David’s day were facing the same problems as the saints of today. When we begin to look at it in context, we being to realize that the pr...

Y ou may have heard that Mark Driscoll is having problems right now. Without going into the details, his book marketing strategy has been seen as unethical, and perhaps, illegal. I’ll let others sort that out. Now, a letter of apology has been making its way around the Internet. I’ll let you read the letter, if you like. But what I find more interesting than the letter is the response that some people have given it. While my doctrinal views don’t completely align with those of Mark Driscoll, I felt the letter was very appropriate for the situation. Others did not agree. One person suggested that Mark Driscoll make himself accountable to someone outside his own congregation. While there may be people outside his congregation that deserve and apology and an apology doesn’t remove any legal obligations that might exist, you’ll be hard pressed to find anything in scripture that says a pastor must be accountable to anyone other than the church and the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the head of ...

A few decades ago, Baptists were known for their hellfire and brimstone preachers who spoke of the evils of drinking, dancing, and going to the movies. People were excluded from the church frequently “for heresy” and many eventually apologized to the church and were welcomed back into the fellowship (though some did not). But today, the world is a different place. No longer do the Baptists who drink hide it, just in case the preacher comes around, they post pictures of it on Facebook. And many have lost sight of why dancing was considered wrong. Many people have the idea that as long as the dancing doesn’t happen in the church building, it is okay. If you read Psalm 149:3 and Psalm 150:4, it seems like that if there is anywhere that dancing is okay, it ought to be “in the congregation of the saints” (Psalm 149:1). And as for movies, now churches bring them in and show them on the big screen in the auditorium. It’s a kinder, gentler church environment, but are we better off for it? I’...

W hen I was a kid, I used to play in the dirt. I had a few favorite places. I had a spot on the hillside. I had a hole in the chicken yard. Sometimes I would go over to the neighbor’s house and play in the pigpen. It’s a wonder I’m still alive. As you get older, you begin to realize that dirt is something people avoid. People who make lots of money don’t have to play in the dirt. They pay other people to do the dirty jobs. A few will play in the dirt, just for the fun of it, but having money and respect means you get the choose when you get dirty. The boss never gets dirty. That’s for the common worker. We know that Jesus, who is God, chose to humble himself as the lowest human being he could be. (Philippians 2:5-11) We also know that God sent his Son because he loved the world. (John 3:16) But why did God create man in the first place? And what does that have to do with dirt? Some people will tell you that God’s creation of man had something to do with God’s glory. Though God is glori...

O ur church is planning a short-term mission trip this summer and my intention is to go. I’m excited because we’re going with the intent of helping a BMAA church planter. The BMAA is where much of our church’s mission money goes, so helping a BMAA church planter with a project is one way to multiply the effectiveness of the money we’re already sending. I’ve helped church planters and churches before, but not with quite the level of organization it appears we’ll have for this trip. This will be a new experience for me, because when I’ve helped church planters in the past, I’ve just shown up with tools and work clothes. I don’t remember there ever being a T-shirt, and there wasn’t a fund-raiser because you paid your own bills. For this trip, the cost is expected to be $400 per person. The handout we were given says that participants are expected to pay only $200 of that and the rest will come from fund raisers and existing funds. If I go, I intend to pay my own way. I realize there’s som...

A blessing is like a package. Someone tells about something good in their life and others say, “What a blessing that is!” Or someone will ask how a person is doing and that person will say, “I’m blessed.” We throw the word around, but what does it really mean to be blessed? And what does it mean to bless God? Jesus said, “Bless them that curse you.” This was in the sermon on the mount and a few verses earlier he had named off the blessed—the poor in spirit, those that mourn, the meek… And then he had talked about the need for us to live in such a way that we are a stark contrast with the sin that is going on in the world. One way we do that is to bless the people that curse us, but what does that mean. A blessing is the opposite of a curse. An example of a curse is, “I hope he wakes up and can’t talk.” Someone might say that after learning that the lead in a play went to someone else. A similar example of a blessing would be, “I know he’ll do a good job.” You may be thinking, if that’...

T he article is titled Why English Majors Make Lousy Fundamentalists and is written by Morgan Guyton. Morgan is a Methodist preacher. He begins by saying that is personality type is INFP in the Myers-Briggs system and so doesn’t “like to deal with hard facts and logic” and doesn’t “understand or believe in the validity of impersonal judgment.” He also equates this with an English major. He then lists and comments on seven instincts of English majors when reading the Bible. Unsubtle communication is bad writing Narrators are supposed to have agenda It’s all about the metaphors We make analogies We expect characters to be complicated Poetry trumps grammar and history Every text has multiple voices I’ll leave it to you to read his comments concerning each one. I think you will find that there is some truth to what he says. Large portions of the Bible are written as poetry. So, if we’re going to understand the Bible, we’re going to have to put our poetry hat on. And when you look a...

T he Oscars were last night. I didn’t watch it, and it appears I didn’t miss much. If the reports on the new are anything to go by, the highlight of the evening was that a bunch of actors huddled up for a group “selfie.” The Oscars, like all awards shows, are about people in the industry congratulating other people within the industry for how well they did. Why would they do something like that? Ultimately, it encourages people working within the industry to do a better job. But for the rest of us, it is a reminder of how much influence Hollywood has. It is understandable that the people in the motion picture industry are interested in who won what, but why should anyone else care? By the time The Oscars happen, people have already spent the money they’re going to spend on the movies that have been nominated. You can attribute it to hero worship, glamour, fancy clothing or several other things, but the fact remains that Hollywood has influence. Sadly, Hollywood has significant influenc...