DEVOTION//The solution to sleeplessness
The psalmist Asaph has a remedy for sleeplessness.
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MINISTRY//Translating Abram's call
Without our capable translators and interpreters, 316NOW’s ministry could not function. That’s not funny.
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NEWS//Western news is fake, China says
Chinese news media is decrying what it calls fake news about China in the Western press.
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DEVOTION//Lag and lead measures
Lag measures and lead measures. Two terms Christians should learn from business and from St. Paul.
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MINISTRY//Our kind of leader
Church leaders in China need to be well-versed in the Scriptures, just like church leaders in North America. But because they carry on their ministry under a government that is antagonistic to Christianity, they need an extra measure of courage.
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NEWS//Update: Religious Sinicization
As the Chinese Communist Party celebrates its centennial, it is strengthening its grip on the way religions operate and on their doctrines.
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DEVOTION//I’m sorry, but it’s too late
“I’m sorry, but it’s too late,” are the words a doctor has spoken to very ill covid patients who now want the vaccine. Jesus said something similar will be spoken to many good people who foolishly refused a relationship with him.
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MINISTRY//Tell and show
A student thanks one of our professors for telling and showing God’s grace.
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NEWS//Tangping - lying flat
Tangping (“lying flat”) is a movement among China’s millennials to protest their lack of access to China’s national dream of upward mobility. The government is not pleased.
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DEVOTION//Ungodly, yet God's own
Kathleen Dehmlow was 80-years-old when she passed away on May 31, 2018.
According to her obituary, her two oldest children will not miss her.
She won’t be missed
"She … will now face judgment," the obituary said. "She will not be missed by Gina and Jay [her children], and they understand that this world is a better place without her.”
What had she done that prompted her children to publish such a biting obituary? Almost 60 years before, she had an affair with their father's brother. The result was a pregnancy. She then deserted her family to live in California.
We shouldn’t be missed
Perhaps your reaction to Kathleen Dehmlow's obituary focuses on her children's lack of forgiveness.
I reacted to something else. I thought, "This is the kind of judgment I should hear from the righteous Judge of the Universe."
Week after week at worship, I give public voice to my guilt. I say, "Holy and merciful Father, I confess that I am by nature sinful and that I have disobeyed you in my thoughts, words, and actions. I have done what is evil and failed to do what is good. For this I deserve your punishment both now and in eternity."
That confession is not false humility; it's reality.
I should hear from God, "You will now face judgment. You will not be missed by me or anyone else. This world will be a better place without you.”
Yet we are God’s treasure
But that is not what I hear. Instead my Father tells me, "Christ died for the ungodly," for sinful, disobedient, evil people like you…. Consequently, "Go on rejoicing confidently in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [you] have now received this reconciliation" (Romans 5:6,11).
That promise of reconciliation belongs to you and the rest of ungodly humankind. "Christ died for the ungodly" -- every ungodly person.
That truth empowers us to be honest with ourselves and our God. We eagerly confess we are sinners who deserve God's judgment. But we also rejoice that, in place of God's judgment, we have forgiveness, adoption, and heaven.
So say it with me, "Holy and merciful Father, I confess that I am by nature sinful…."