503 results for tag: blog

Grace at Church – by Greg Albrecht

KEYNOTE SCRIPTURE:  To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: "God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.   But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, "God, have mercy on me, a sinner."  I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home ...

Law Enforcement or Healing? – by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from February 2023 Let’s start with a quiz:  If you had to choose between two images of Jesus which would it be:  1) someone who serves in the law enforcement profession, such as a police officer or judge, or 2) someone who serves in the healing profession, such as a doctor or a nurse?  When those two images are compared and contrasted, a doctor or nurse is the Christ-centered, healing answer.  BUT – why does the vast majority of Christendom lean toward a depiction of Jesus as an agent of law and order?  More than that, WHY do so many within Christendom feel that any picture of ...

God Really LIKES You! – by Greg Albrecht

"We desire to connect with God; we desire to know God and be known by God. God has created us with a desire for connectivity." - Greg Albrecht Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There ...

Get Comfortable with the Questions – by Ed Dunn

Once a year, usually around a long weekend, we’d all pile into our old family station-wagon and head out from our home in western Pennsylvania for the woods of central Connecticut. We were off and traveling to see our Grammy and Grampy Reeves, grandparents on my mother’s side of the family. It was hard to contain the excitement of five eager children. Our visits were a cherished treat, and both the trip and the time together were treasures we truly looked forward to. Grammy and Grampy Reeves split most years living in two places; the school years in New York City and the summers in upstate Connecticut. As the lead chaplain at New York’s ...

How Sorry Are We? – Greg Albrecht

A SIGN OF WEAKNESS? Were we to take our cues from Hollywood on the topic of being sorry, apologizing and seeking forgiveness, we might remember the message from a 1949 Western movie titled “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon” in which John Wayne’s character says, “Never apologize and never explain—it’s a sign of weakness.” Or, if we persist in consulting movie “wisdom,” we might remember the line, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry,” from the classic 1970 tale “Love Story.” With “apologies” to John Wayne, the gospel of Jesus Christ teaches us that making amends is incredibly important. As Christ-followers ...

The Commands of God and the Traditions of Men – by Greg Albrecht

So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, "Why don't your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?" He replied, "Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: "'These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.' You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions." —Mark 7:5-8 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, widely regarded as a 20th century martyr, put to death by the Nazis just before the end of World War 2 because of his faith in ...

Timeless Treasures from the Psalms – Greg Albrecht

  It's just a little pocket Bible, small enough so my father could carry it with him as he served in the U.S. Navy during World War 2. My father was killed when I was only fifteen months old, and while I don't have memories of him, I do have mementos that have been given to me. I have some faded photographs, his old cigarette lighter, the flag that draped his casket when he was buried, some copies of the newspaper describing the tragedy of his death—and I have that little New Testament Bible, which also includes the Old Testament book of Psalms.     I don't know how much he read that little pocket Bible, but when ...

When Your Dreams Wind Up in the Pit – by Greg Albrecht

Keynote Scripture: GENESIS 37:19-36 "Here comes that dreamer!" they said to each other. "Come now, let's kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we'll see what comes of his dreams."  The background to our story involves a 17-year-old boy named Joseph. He lived with his father Jacob and his ten brothers in the land of Canaan. Joseph was Jacob's favorite son. Showing favoritism to one child is a huge mistake for any parent, but it is the stuff of real life, is it not? The ongoing story of the family of Abraham given to us in the book of Genesis reads like a soap opera. This specific ...

Son of a Preacher Man – by Greg Albrecht

Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?" —Matthew 16:24-26  The passage in Matthew that forms the basis of our message talks about losing your life so that you might gain it. At first it may seem to you that Jesus' assertion amounts to little more than theological double-talk. But this teaching begins to make profound spiritual sense ...

Chaos or Community? by Greg Albrecht

Martin Luther King Jr. set out to redeem the soul of America from the triple evils of racism, war and poverty. MLK Jr. loved Isaiah 40:4-5: Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. And the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all mankind will see it. Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community? (published in 1967), was the fourth and last book written by Martin Luther King Jr. before his assassination in 1968. In Chaos or Community? Dr. King pleaded for an end to violence, because violence always gives birth to the chaos of more violence—he ...

The Pearl of Great Value – by Greg Albrecht

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.—Matthew 13:45-46 We turn our attention to one of Jesus' parables about the kingdom of heaven. In the Authorized King James Version the parable is called The Pearl of Great Price. As I normally use the New International Version, we'll refer to it by the title given to it in that translation, The Pearl of Great Value. Here's the widely accepted Christian interpretation of this parable: The merchant is you or me. We decide to look for Christ, and finally, after much effort, we find ...

Stop Trying To Get Saved -Greg Albrecht

Are you saved, brother?” the earnest young man asked me. He continued, “If you’re not saved, you need to get saved.” I responded to him, “Before I reply, may I ask you what it is you believe I need to be saved from?” The young man didn’t miss a beat (as I suspected he wouldn’t) and immediately rattled off the stock answer he’d been taught. The young evangelist wanted me to get saved so he could save another soul from the eternal torment of the fires of hell. He told me I needed to get saved from my sins so I would not go to hell. So I asked, “Let me get this straight. I need to get saved from my sins so I won’t go to ...

The Gate of the New Year – by Greg Albrecht

On Christmas Eve 1939, King George VI of England gave a BBC radio broadcast to the British Empire heard around the world. During his message, he quoted the preamble to a poem given to him by his daughter, Princess Elizabeth, written by Minnie Louise Haskins (1875-1957). Then titled “God Knows,” the poem later became known as “The Gate of the Year.”  Upon the death of King George VI in 1952, Princess Elizabeth became Queen of England – she was the longest living monarch in the world. She had “The Gate of the Year” engraved on brass plaques at Windsor Castle, where her father is interred. In 2002, when her mother, the Queen ...

God and Jonah: Ships Passing in the Night – by Greg Albrecht

Many, even those unfamiliar with the Bible, have heard of Jonah. Most remember the story of Jonah as it is depicted in children's books—a man named Jonah who was swallowed by a big fish and lived to tell the tale. As we go a little deeper into the story (deeper even than the whale went with Jonah) we see that Jonah is yet another biblical example of how humans can completely misunderstand God. We can misunderstand God as Jonah did, and in terms of our relationship with God, be, as he was, like two Ships that Pass in the Night.    The book of Jonah begins with God telling Jonah to go to Nineveh, the capital city of the Assyrian ...

New Creation in Christ – by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from January 2023: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation is come:  The old has gone, the new is here!  2 Corinthians 5:17 This New Year of 2023 is a great time to remember that we, as Christ-followers, and CWR/PTM Friends and partners, are friends of Jesus and we are, by God’s grace, New Creations! God creates us as new creations out of what we were. He makes us “something” in terms of our spiritual worth when before we were, by comparison, “nothing.” He finds us and we discover him, in the process we lose “the old” and we gain, by his grace, “the new”! We become new, ...

Great Exchanges – by Greg Albrecht

Your first thought at this time of the year might be those frenzied crowds in shopping malls and department stores on the days immediately following Christmas. People exchanging and returning gifts they received that were the wrong size, wrong color—or just plain wrong! But there's another exchange we need to keep in mind. This great exchange is the reality of the cross of Christ. Jesus Christ took our sin and died for it, paying the debt that we could not pay. In exchange, God, because of his grace, gives us eternal life. Our sin for eternal life! The great spiritual exchange. Great exchanges characterize the month of December for Christians ...

Christmas Presence – by Laura Urista

We’ve celebrated many memorable Christmases over the years. Sometimes it was a special trip or a special meal with all the family gathered in one place which made the day so memorable. But the one Christmas that stands out in my mind as the most memorable was not a very merry one. It is so memorable to me because I learned a valuable lesson. It was December “1990-something” and our daughter, Tawny, wanted a new bike for Christmas. After much searching, my husband and I found a bike that was the perfect size and in her favorite color—purple. With smiles of anticipation, we beamed with pride and joy as our wide-eyed little girl opened ...

What If God Was One of Us? – by Greg Albrecht

"Stop Acting Like God. Start Acting Like Jesus." The message, on a poster being waved during a rally in support of a minority group, confronted and challenged me. It seemed to be directed at me and my fellow Christians.  If they really knew Jesus, I thought, they would know that he is God and he was God in the flesh!  I continued to ponder the poster until a free translation of its intended meaning occurred to me: "Jesus, save us from your followers who seem to be acting like our stereotype of the Old Testament God."  It was obvious they had a vague notion that Jesus didn't hurt people, that Jesus didn't abuse people, and that Jesus ...

The Little Stranger in the Manger – by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from December 2016 Come down to the manger, see the little stranger  Wrapped in swaddling clothes, the prince of peace. – “Christmas Must be Tonight,” The Band The invitation come down to the manger, see the little stranger announces the arrival of the God who cares, the God who comes near and the God who becomes one of us.  The invitation come down to the manger, see the little stranger proclaims God’s love being born into our story.  Come down to the manger, see the little stranger bids us to come receive the unconditional love of God who holds us near and dear.  When ...

The Gift of Time – by Greg Albrecht

Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near.—Isaiah 55:6 Time is the enemy of teachers, speakers and preachers—we are always battling with the clock. In the context of formal church services, this battle goes back to the so-called olden days when preachers walked up and took their place behind the pulpit. At the beginning of the sermon an hour glass of sand was turned on its end. The passing of time was determined as small quantities of sand passed from the upper chamber, which at the beginning of the hour was full, to the lower chamber.  When the last grains of sand filtered through the hour glass into the lower ...