Hey Life Point family, Last Sunday, we launched our new church app, Church Center! We are excited to use it as a tool to better helps us serve one another, stay informed about ministries of our church, as well as give to our church ministries. Overview of the app: Home: basic church info Directory: access member info such as profile picture, phone number, email, home address, etc. Give: online giving through the app Groups: way for ministries to share event info, resources, and send messages in a small group setting. Look for more info on Groups in the near future. Calendar: access our church ..read more

In Part 1 of this post, I described two inadequate responses to spiritual dryness and practical crisis. First, many turn to worldly methods of addressing their problems or of drowning their sorrows. Second and more importantly for my purposes, many submit to the tyranny of the urgent. Their Christian life is defined by urgent concerns and finding answers to them (i.e., felt needs). I argued that neither approach yields the deep-seated maturity God desires and that best sustains us through the highs and lows of life. Therefore, we should embrace a third approach where we are disciplined by fait ..read more

Most Christians know the feeling. You sit down to read the Bible and pray, wanting to enjoy a passionate experience of God, but,…crickets. You struggle to focus on the text, and what you grasp seems irrelevant to your pressing concerns. Your prayer time is dry, and your burdens don’t feel any lighter afterwards. You wonder, “What was the point? Did I just waste 30 minutes of my life?” You’ve probably walked away from a church service with the same feeling. You entered the service carrying a heavy burden expecting God to lift it. Or you came with a pressing practical concern about parenting, fi ..read more

My sermon text a couple weeks ago was, “We urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with everyone” (1 Thess 5:14). It’s a highly practical verse for local church ministry, and it teaches that appropriate spiritual care varies from situation to situation. Some people need direct, strong confrontation while others need gentle compassion. We must evaluate people, and we must tailor ministry to the need of the moment. Otherwise, we may do more harm than good. The concept is easy to grasp, but actually applying it in real life situations is ofte ..read more

I am currently preaching through Ezra, and my text last Sunday was Ezra 4. It’s the most challenging section of Ezra to follow because the story begins in 536 B.C., jumps to ca. 480 B.C., then to ca. 450 B.C., and finally returns to 536 B.C. It’s such a unique chapter that liberal scholars dismiss it as evidence that the narrator was confused and did a poor job compiling the book. However, the narrator clearly marks each chronological jump, and if you pay attention to the timestamps, the chapter is fairly easy to follow. But this post is not an argument for inerrancy. Rather, I want to conside ..read more

The first time I visited Life Point and met with the pulpit committee, someone asked me what Bible translation I would use if I were called to be Life Point’s senior pastor. I answered that at least initially I would continue to use the current pulpit version—the New King James. I assumed the church had chosen this version carefully, believing it was best for Life Point’s context; therefore, it would be presumptuous to make a change with no understanding of the church. However, I also clearly stated that at some point, I may want to make a change. As a result, I have been preaching from the NK ..read more

This week, I came across a fascinating article entitled, “The U.S. Birthrate Has Dropped Again. The Pandemic May Be Accelerating the Decline.” There are a variety of reasons why it’s significant that the birth rate continues to drop. Practically speaking, it will have drastic economic and sociological effects in years to come. But as a pastor, I am especially interested in what this article says about the changing values of our society and about how Christians should respond to these changes. Since Mother’s Day is this weekend, it’s an especially appropriate time to consider these issues. I mu ..read more

1 Corinthians 9:19–23 sets an important example for effective evangelism and discipleship. “For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win the more; and to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might win those who are under the law; to those who are without law, as without law (not being without law toward God, but under law toward Christ), that I might win those who are without law; to the weak I became as weak, that I might win the ..read more

I will never forget Wednesday, March 11, 2020. I assumed that COVID-19 was going to affect society, but I never imagined what was coming. But that Wednesday, our country began aggressively shutting down. The next day, Governor Newsome issued his first executive order, and we all realized that life was about to change drastically. The next 11 weeks were probably the most draining season of ministry I have ever experienced. By Wednesday, May 27, when we published our plans for restarting services, I felt as worn down as I have in a long time. The world is far from being “back to normal,” but now ..read more

One of the most frustrating aspects of the current political moment is its efforts to push us into false dichotomies. Either you support people of color, or you support law enforcement. Either you defend the President no matter what he says or does, or you like the destruction of private property and attacks on religious liberty. Either you are a communist or a fascist. But perhaps the most basic false dichotomy I see today is the one that forces me to choose between authority and justice. As a Christian, I refuse to accept that dilemma because God values both. Justice One important aspect of ..read more