I Am With You Always When was the last time you got alone with God and really mediated on the Words of Christ in Matthew 28:20? "I am with you always." You see, in context, Jesus is both commissioning His eleven disciples[1] to bring the Good News out into the world and, yet, He is also affirming that He will be with them as they go. The application for us is much more...

Planting in a pandemic In 2016, while still living in Australia, my wife and I felt an overwhelming burden to follow God's call into church planting. For both of us, there never really was any opposition to the call except for the where: St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada. Let me just paint a picture before going any further. Not only did we both feel the call to church pl...

Let’s face it, everyone is a critic. Everyone has something to say and everyone has an opinion. And if you, personally, don’t have an opinion on something, then you can be rest assured that someone will give you their opinion for not having an opinion....

I don't do well with death. I hate it. In my 38 years, I've been to one wake and three funerals. I've said goodbye to a dear friend who died tragically on Cougar Flight 491 and I've said good-bye to two of my wife's grandparents; last night was her third. Despite not having any living grandparents myself, I've never buried anyone in my immediate family. Neither parents, ...

This week has been an interesting week. For the first time, I think, I now see why people might perceive certain aspects of faith as sheer lunacy. More on that shortly. But first, let's consider Abram. In Genesis 12 we get a front row seat into an amazing conversation between Yahweh and Abram. In Genesis 12:1 we see the calling and in Genesis 4 we see the response. God sai...

I think I would be hard pressed to find someone who hasn't heard the phrase 'familiarity breeds contempt' This is quite a negative phrase to be honest. You would say this when you gain so much knowledge or experience of someone or something that you begin to lose respect for that person or that thing. What if I were to say that we, as disciples of Christ, are not impervio...

Last week I spent some time reading through the Gospel of John. During my reading of John 11:7-16 I read something that caused me to pause and reflect on something we all too easily face in our walk with Christ. Here's John 11:7-16: 6So when he heard that he [Lazarus] was sick, he stayed two more days in the place where he was. 7Then after that, he said to the disciples...

DEATH ISN'T NORMAL Let's just call a spade a spade for a moment: death isn't normal. Death is a by-product of a sin-soaked world and something that we all must face. But to say that it's normal would be the farthest thing from the truth. Each one of us is one heartbeat away from dying. Every one of us is one step away from opening that proverbial door into eternity. Th...

"So Abram went" (Genesis 12:4) Have you stopped to consider those three words? Ask any biblically literate Christian to recite a verse that is three words or less and, they'll most likely quote John 11:35: "Jesus wept." Two short words that carry a lot of punch. As I was reading through Genesis earlier today, I came across three words that caused me to stop: Genesis 12:4...

The Weight of Snow I love how God allows us to see gospel messages in nature, and how He reminds us of His great power through natural phenomenon and weather. I'm no stranger to natural disasters. Back in January '98, I lived through one of the worst natural disasters in Canadian history. At the time, nearly 100mm of freezing rain fell over parts of eastern Ontario and ...

Every year the theme of Advent never changes. In a lot of ways, it can be summed up as 'expectant waiting.' From Genesis to Revelation, we are given a front row seat to see the beginning, middle and end of the world. And this creates a tension because we know how the story ends, but here we are, still waiting. There's always been this 'expectant waiting' throughout salv...

1 Corinthians 3:7-9 7So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 8The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. 9For we are co-workers in God's service; you are God's field, God's building. The truth of the matter is this: it is God wh...

Last weekend my wife and I found ourselves without our two children. In our newfound freedom, we went to a movie together, had supper together, and did some shopping together. It was a breath of fresh air. Before we decided to go home, however, we decided to make a quick stop into Toys-R-Us. And so, after a bit of browsing, I decided to head on over to where the board gam...

One of Paul's final exhortations to the Philippian church is to not "worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." In the lead up to June 26th, this exhortation came alive to me in ways that it never has before (not that it's never alive and applicable but the situation made it all the more real). Ph...

WHEN I WAS A YOUNG BOY When I was in Grade 6 my teacher asked the entire class if anyone wanted to participate in a public speaking event being held at the school. Whomever participated would be required to research, memorize and recite their findings for the entire student body. Unsurprisingly no one volunteered. For whatever reason, myself and my friend were voluntol...

Then the Lord said to Moses, "What is in your hand?" When it comes to the idea of church planting, I, in a lot of ways, feel like Moses. I haven't yet planted a church. In fact, it's still very, very early days in the process. My walk down this path is still young, and I have a lot to learn. But the weight of what I'm doing and what I could be doing in the future, lays...

We've all had this experience before in some way or another: you're talking with a fellow disciple and they say something along the lines of 'so, I was praying last night, and I told God that I wasn't going to do'. When we hear of such prayers, our initial reaction is one of dismay knowing exactly how such a prayer typically ends. That was me 16 years ago. I did just ...