85 results for tag: Letters to My Friends

A Cross Examination: No Christianity Without The Cross – by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from March 2022 As they attempt to fill the emptiness in their souls, many citizens of planet earth frantically run after drugs, food, sex, achievements, possessions and entertainment. It’s been said the most frenzied attempts in human history in a quest to find and secure happiness have occurred in 20th and now 21st century North America. Ironically, the more intense efforts to secure happiness become, it seems animosity, division, hatred, racism and violence increase at the same time. From the beginning of history, humans have measured and weighed success and happiness through things that can be seen, felt and ...

Love – By Law or Grace? by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from February 2016 While she was in college in the 60s, Lisa wore flowers in her hair, burned her bra, smoked a lot of pot and had sex so indiscriminately her grandfather told her it seemed to him that she was having sex “with anyone and everyone, at the drop of a hat.” Lisa attended college in Berkeley, California – ground zero of permissive and promiscuous “free” love during a time of great moral upheaval in the United States. And Lisa often did have sex with partners at the “drop of a hat” – sometimes she discovered their names later, if at all. Her anything-goes-lifestyle did not end when she ...

Religious Control Opposes God’s Grace by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from February 2022 I think good preachers should be like bad kids. They ought to be naughty enough to tiptoe up on their dozing congregations, steal their bottle of religious pills…and flush them all down the drain. The church, by and large, has drugged itself into thinking that proper human behavior is the key to its relationship with God. What preachers need to do is force it to go cold turkey with nothing but the word of the cross—and then be brave enough to stick around while [the congregation] goes through the inevitable withdrawal symptoms.—“The Foolishness of Preaching,” Robert Farrar Capon During ...

A Journey – Not a Guided Tour by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from January 2018 On or just before January 1, fresh calendars are opened with almost as much anticipation as unwrapping a Christmas present. We page through a new calendar, admiring its twelve uncluttered months and 365 unplanned days. And we experience the liberation of setting aside the year that has just ended, with all of the days and events we are all too happy to put behind us. The New Year is a time of a new beginning and a fresh start. The fresh start of a New Year reminds me of the wisdom Paul shares with us about our ongoing life in Christ, on the Jesus Way: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward ...

Poking Holes in the Darkness – Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter for January 2022 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has notovercome it.—John 1:4-5 Robert Lewis Stevenson, well-known for his adventure story Treasure Island, was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, into a well-to-do family. His father and his uncles and his maternal grandfather all designed lighthouses. During Robert’s childhood he was in poor health, suffering from severe bronchial problems, and was thus often confined to his room, particularly in cold winter months. But his creative mind was active, even at a young age, giving evidence of ...

No Christmas Without Christ – by Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter for December 2014 He is both a speechless child and He is the Word…He lies in a manger, but he holds the world in His hand; He is nourished at the breast but He feeds the angels; He is wrapped in swaddling clothes but He clothes us with immortality… He does not find room in the inn but He makes a temple for Himself in the hearts of believers. For Strength took on weakness that weakness might become strong. – Augustine, (354-430), Sermon 190. As we begin this last month of the year, we see another frenzied Christmas shopping season of excess, with retailers unleashing promotional devices and marketing ...

We’ll All Be Home for Christmas – by Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter for December 2021 1–Greg, your brother in Christ, to my dear Friends and Partners in the gospel, who are scattered all over this world (with apologies to the Apostle Paul as I borrow the style and content of his epistles, and with thanksgiving for the 1611 Authorized King James version, some of whose terminology and language I adopt and excerpt in this letter). 2–Grace be to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 3–Blessed be God, who has saved us by his grace, through his Son, who came to us, becoming one of us, as the one and only God in the flesh, and that he might self-sacrifi...

Neither Poverty Nor Riches by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from November 2014 Here in the U.S. the month of November includes a nationally mandated Day of Thanksgiving. If you are one of our Canadian Friends and Partners, you already have memories of your Thanksgiving Day observed on October 13. Thanksgiving celebrations usually center around expressions of gratitude for physical blessings. Thanksgiving observances often involve filling ourselves with physical food, but as Christfollowers we are far more thankful to God for filling us with his grace and mercy. Of course, the physical blessings we enjoy do cause us to stop and consider the plight of others in our world. ...

All Things Come of Thee – Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner letter for November 2021 “All things come of Thee, O Lord, and of Thine own have we given Thee.” All Things Come of Thee is a traditional hymn and prayer, whose message reminds us that giving thanks results, for Christ-followers, in giving. All Things Come of Thee confesses that anything and everything we give to God ultimately belongs to him for he gave it to us to begin with. Our Thanks-Giving is but a minimal return to God of his greater and supreme gifts he lavishes on us. Thanksgiving is a wonderful time to acknowledge that all we have, from the money in our pockets, to the food in our refrigerator and the ...

The Power of a Tireless Minority by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from October 2015 “It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather a tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people’s minds."– attributed to Samuel Adams, an American Founding Father (1722-1803). IT DOES NOT TAKE A MAJORITY TO PREVAIL! Throughout history, authentic Christianity seems to have thrived when it was a distinct minority. On the other hand, it seems that the pure gospel and faith taught by Jesus and proclaimed in theNew Testament was polluted and corrupted when Christendom became the official, state religion and it was enforced and institutionalized. Setting brush fires in people’s ...

Being Loved and Served and Passing It On

Friend and Partner Letter October 2021: In 1942 the United States was at war with Japan. Many citizens, and for that matter, our state and federal government, found it hard to distinguish between Japanese-American residents and citizens of the United States and the sovereign nation of Japan, who had launched the infamous surprise attack at Pearl Harbor. Something like 120,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly relocated to internment camps located primarily in the midwestern, southern and western United States. Carole Doi was born as a third generation Japanese-American while her parents were interned in one of the many camps which were ...

Counterfeit vs. Genuine Love by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from September 2013: Where is love? Does it fall from skies above? – Lyrics from “Where is Love?” from the stage musical and film “Oliver!” – based on the 1839 novel “Oliver Twist” by Charles Dickens. Ten-year old orphan Oliver Twist sings the haunting refrain “Where is Love?” after being banished to the cellar of a funeral parlor. After enduring most of his early life in a “workhouse,” Oliver is assigned as an apprentice in a funeral home, which turns out to be another slave-like exploitation, where he serves an undertaker. Just before Oliver plaintively sings about the whereabouts of ...

Christ is Our Strength Within – By Ed Dunn

Friend and Partner Letter from September 2021: Just as his insights graced our September 2020 letter, Ed Dunn returns to write our letter for September 2021. Ed is one of our key staff members, and he wears many hats. He contributes as a Board Member, a blogger, writer, and most recently, as the host of our monthly video This Month at PTM. He works with electronic and digital systems in our fulfillment center, and is one of the voices those who call 1-800-309-4466 hear. Ed is an uplifting co-worker who enriches our office team and a fellow Friend and Partner with all of you, another team member who shares this ongoing work with you. We ...

Love Thrives in Tough Times by Greg Albrecht

Friend and Partner Letter from August 2015: The popular idea of love, particularly among the young, is of a rapturous, eternal, sun-soaked, care-free day at the beach. Two young people who are head-over-heels “in love” dream of having children and a family, but give little thought to sleepless nights and dirty diapers. Smitten by infatuation, young people can only imagine the future as being picnics in the park and endless passion in their bedroom. It doesn’t take long for two people who are in love to realize that this thing called love encompasses all the days and times and moments of their lives – love shares joy and sorrow. ...

In the Name of Jesus by Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter for August 2021: ...Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.—Matthew 25:40, my emphasis At five years of age, Joseph Merrick (1862-1890) started to display strange bodily disfigurements. His head slowly became more and more swollen and contorted, as did his right arm and hand. His skin became lumpy and felt like leather—its texture and color like that of an elephant causing him to be known, later in life, as “The Elephant Man.” Merrick’s mother died when he was eleven, signaling an end for him of being loved for who he was in spite ...

Who Are You? by Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter From July 2014: Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979-1990, was the longest-serving British Prime Minister of the 20th century. While she was in office Mrs. Thatcher visited a home for seniors, the kind of place often referred to as an “old folks’ home.” As she made the rounds shaking hands, she came to one older lady who seemed to be suffering from dementia. She gave no indication that she had any idea that she was shaking hands with the Prime Minister. Mrs. Thatcher asked the woman: “Do you know who I am?” The dear lady replied, “No dear, but if you really want to know ...

Free In Christ – Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter for July 2021: July is traditionally the month when Canadians and Americans focus on and celebrate our national freedoms. At this time of the year Americans often think of George Washington, our first president, who as the commander of the ragged, ill-equipped Continental Army eventually liberated the United States from the British. When Benjamin Franklin was the ambassador to France for our newly independent United States of America he was invited to a prestigious dinner (1781). Great Britain and France remained the most powerful nations on earth and their representatives also attended this important event. ...

Bargaining with God by Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter from June 2014 The chief object of education is not to learn things; nay, the chief object of education is to unlearn things. – G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) The first serious conversation most of us ever have with God is when we realize we are in a world of hurt. Our back is against the wall – we have painted ourselves into a corner and we desire to have a heart-to-heart talk with God so he will get us out of the mess we’re in. Typically, the first time we wanted God to really listen to us was also when we offered him a bargain. Do you remember? Perhaps the first serious discussion you had with God was ...

He is Taking Us to Be With Him – Greg Albrecht

Friends and Partner Letter Dated June 2021 Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you may also be where I am (John 14:1-2, my emphasis). Where will we “go” after we die? What will happen to us? How will we “get” to heaven? If and when we arrive, will “they” let us in? How do we know if we are headed in the right direction so that we will finally arrive? Do we have a “chance” of ...

How Grace Works

Friends and Partner letter dated May 2015 Billy was just finishing some art work, so he was the last first-grader to leave the classroom for recess. Just as he stood up and got ready to run out to the playground, he looked down and was horrified to see a puddle between his feet. He could not remember when it happened nor could he imagine how it could have happened. His mind was already racing on fast forward – he visualized his humiliation when the boys and the girls came in from recess and made fun of him for wetting his pants. This was going to be the worst day of his life! Billy was petrified by fear and then, to make matters worse, ...