Even after all this time it always surprises me when people tell me they listen to our church services on the radio. I suppose about once or twice a month someone will tell me that they listen, or a church member will tell me of a friend or neighbor or co-worker who listens to our broadcast. Many people have told me that they listen to part of our church service on the way to or from their own church.

I was kind of intimidated all those years ago when the deacons told me that the morning worship service was broadcast live on a local radio station. This was about three days before I preached in the morning service for the first time. I did my best to forget about the radio broadcast. I wanted to focus on the church service, and just let people listen in.

I’m glad we broadcast it live, “warts and all”. I have no interest in delaying it a week or two so we can edit it and make it “slick” and polished. When I have the rare opportunity to listen to a Sunday morning church program, I’m much more interested in live broadcasts than in the ones that are “produced”. No offense to those who go to the effort to edit; I just think hearing a live church service on the radio (or watching one on television) is much more compelling. Even with mistakes, or the occasional few moments of “dead air”, or the “holy hubbub” that’s heard when we greet one another (or when listeners can hear how off-beat we are when we clap to songs!), I still think its best. We are who we are, and we do what we do. Of course we want to try to be our best and to do better, but this isn’t a sales presentation. It’s a worship service. And I’m glad that people want to listen in. Read More »

I love Easter. We’ve just come through what for pastors is the most wonderful and exhausting time of the year (along with Christmas). But I love it. I love sunrise services, shared breakfasts, and the increased crowds on Easter Sunday. But most of all I love the Truth that Easter celebrates.

I don’t love the view of Easter that equates it with springtime, the yearly cycle of birth-death-and rebirth, and some vague sentiment of “what Easter means to us all”. I especially don’t love the claim that Jesus’ resurrection was a myth.

I’m with the Apostle Paul: if Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead, “we are of all people most to be pitied.” (1 Cor. 15:19) If I didn’t really believe that Jesus rose from the dead, I’d quit the ministry and go get an honest job.

There are what are called “minimal facts” about the death of Jesus and what happened next. That means that even disbelieving, skeptical scholars admit the following: Read More »

I have always loved being in a band.

Well, let me amend that: most of the time I have loved being in a band.

The idea has appealed to me ever since one fateful night in the fall of 1966. My father came in the room to change the channels on the television, saying, “Hey, Dave, there’s a new show on I think you might like. It’s supposed to be funny.” He switched it over to the The Monkees, and I was hooked.  The show was funny, but for me it connected on a whole other level. It made me want to play guitar. And not just play guitar: it made me want to play guitar in a band.

There is much to be said for one person playing solo guitar, accompanying themselves as they sing. I like the singer-songwriter genre, and there are a handful of artists who play and sing solo that I have listened to over the years. I enjoy singing and playing by myself, too. But there’s only so much you can do with one voice, six strings and ten fingers. Read More »

A pastor friend of mine told me that once after a Sunday morning worship service a couple of his deacons approached him. They mentioned a particular story he’d told that morning, and then chided him by saying, “You’ve used that illustration before.” As if they were the modern equivalent of the Apostle Paul’s Athenian audience: “For all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new.” (Acts 17:21)

I was in disbelief. This pastor had faithfully served that congregation for nearly ten years. In all that time you’re bound to repeat something. The Lord Jesus only ministered publicly for about three years, but there is plenty of evidence in the Gospels to show that He repeated Himself often. Read More »