When I was a kid I was fascinated by fire. This prompted me to do some stupid things, like taking little green army men and lighting their plastic rifles on fire so I could watch them melt into little green puddles. Once, however, I was doing this on a piece of newspaper, which also caught on fire. So I grabbed the newspaper with the burning green army men and threw it all into a wastebasket. The wastebasket, unfortunately, was made of bamboo and it, too, was set ablaze. Thankfully I was able to put out the fire. That is how sin works. It starts small, and then it grows out of control. That i ..read more

The poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow said, “Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending.” And Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, wrote, “The end of a thing is better than its beginning” (Ecclesiastes 7:8 NKJV). Samson had a great beginning. He had superhuman qualities. Physically, there was no one stronger. He was a one-man army. On one occasion he killed 30 Philistines (the enemies of the Israelites) to settle a bet. On another occasion, he killed 1,000 Philistine warriors on the battlefield with a bone that he picked up off the ground. He once ripped a lion apart wi ..read more

There’s a time to wait, and there’s a time to move. When the Israelites found themselves between Pharaoh’s army and the Red Sea, God said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the people to get moving! Pick up your staff and raise your hand over the sea. Divide the water so the Israelites can walk through the middle of the sea on dry ground” (Exodus 14:15–16 NLT). There can come a point in life when we don’t need to pray about something anymore. Yes, we should always pray. But there’s a time to pray, and there’s a time to move. Let’s say a couple is having troubles in their marriage ..read more

At the time of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, there was no mightier army on the face of the earth than Pharaoh’s army. Imagine what it must have been like for the Israelites to see that army pursuing them with chariots and horses, with shields and swords and spears. If it were happening today, it would have been tanks and hummers and aircraft coming at them all at the same time. The Israelites thought they were dead. So what did Moses tell them to do? He said, “Don’t be afraid. Just stand still and watch the Lord rescue you today. The Egyptians you see today will never be seen again. The Lord hi ..read more

Some people can sleep through anything. I’m not one of them. If I hear one little noise, I’m awake. If a bird chirps, I’m awake. I’m a light sleeper. Luke’s Gospel tells us that as the disciples battled a violent storm on the Sea of Galilee, Jesus was sound asleep. Water was coming into the boat as it pitched back and forth. The terrified disciples woke up Jesus, crying, “Master, Master, we’re going to drown!” (Luke 8:24 NLT). Yes, they panicked. But they also prayed. They cried out to the Lord. When we are in trouble, that’s what we need to do. Faith and worry cannot coexist. One chases out ..read more

It must have been very exciting when the Israelites walked through the middle of the Red Sea on dry ground. Maybe they saw fish cruising by in the walls of water on each side, like the best aquarium ever. But they had to walk for hours and hours. It took all night. That is the Christian life. It’s just a walk with the Lord. Sometimes there’s a lot of excitement in the beginning of the Christian life when we realize what God has done for us. But as time passes, we might start taking things for granted. And we might find ourselves becoming apathetic. If that describes you, then you need to plo ..read more

It took God one night to get Israel out of Egypt. But it took forty years to get Egypt out of Israel. The Israelites were always looking back. Some Christians are that way. They’re always looking back. They say, “Remember the good old days—you know, before I was a Christian? Man, we would party! We had so much fun!” Really? Were they, in fact, the good old days? Were they as good as they thought they were? Or is their memory a little distorted? Have they forgotten the emptiness? Have they forgotten the despondency? Have they forgotten the repercussions of the things they did? Have they forgo ..read more

Every now and then, it seems that my GPS has a mind of its own. I’ll be driving on the freeway, going to a destination where I’ve never been before, and all of a sudden it tells me to turn right at the next off-ramp. It doesn’t make sense, but I turn right. Then it tells me to turn left, so I turn left. Then it brings me back to the freeway. What was that all about? It makes no sense at all. The Lord gave the Israelites an amazing GPS system: a fire by night and a cloud by day. It was very simple. When the cloud moved, they moved. When the cloud stopped, they stopped. At night when the fire m ..read more

Have you ever been in a situation in which the only way out was God? Maybe it was a report from a doctor that gave no real hope. Maybe it was a financial catastrophe where you were on the brink of collapse. Maybe it was a marriage that was completely unraveling. Maybe it was a family conflict that was impossible to resolve. You didn’t think you possibly could survive such a thing. In Exodus 14 that’s the very scenario the Israelites were facing. They were caught between an unconquerable army and an impassable sea. They were between the impossible and the more impossible. But what they were ab ..read more

Our culture has come up with new words for sin so we don’t feel so bad. Instead of someone saying they committed the sin of adultery, they say there has been “a moral failure.” Instead of someone saying they lied, they claim they “misspoke” or offered “alternative facts.” And instead of someone saying they’ve sinned, they say, “Well, I’m not perfect. I made a mistake.” But there’s a difference between a mistake and a sin. According to Merriam-Webster, a mistake is “a wrong judgment: misunderstanding” or “a wrong action or statement proceeding from faulty judgment, inadequate knowledge, or ina ..read more