Franz Kafka wrote a story entitled “The Hunger Artist.” Professional fasting was a respected, lucrative, and celebrated art. The Hunger Artist was the main attraction. He sat in a cage for forty days without eating or drinking. When the fast ended, his manager made a speech. The band played. A woman led the weakened but triumphant hunger artist out of the cage. But the day came when fasting was no longer understood or appreciated. The hunger artist lost everything and joined the circus to survive. His cage was placed with the animals. He became depressed. No one paid him any attention. One fast went past forty days because his attendants neglected to count the days....

You start reading through Genesis. In Genesis 1, you read how God created the heavens and the earth. In Genesis 2, you read how God created Adam and Eve and placed them in the Garden of Eden. In Genesis 3, you read about the Fall, when Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden tree. In Genesis 4, you read how Cain killed his brother Abel. After breezing through these historical narratives, you hit a speed bump at the genealogy in Genesis 5.  The temptation is to skip over this biblical ancestry.com record. That would be a mistake. Nothing in scripture is meaningless, unnecessary, or superfluous. 2 Timothy 3:16 asserts: “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” After Cain killed Abel, Eve gave birth to a son named Seth....

You have heard of a “one-hit wonder” in music. Have you heard of a “one-scene wonder” in movies? The term refers to a moving or memorable cameo appearance, even though it is not central to the plot. There are many “one-scene wonders” in the story of Jesus. None stand out as much as Simon of Cyrene. He is only mentioned in three verses in the Bible: Matthew 27:32, Mark 15:21, and Luke 23:26. All three verses record the same incident.  Simon enters the story out of nowhere.  His screentime is minimal with no callbacks.  Yet you can’t forget him as the story moves on without him.  It was Good Friday. The Jewish religious establishment and the Roman political machine condemned Jesus...

Charles Wesley wrote his brother, John, to report what a doctor told him: “Most people die for fear of dying, but I never met with such people as yours. None of them are afraid to die, but are calm, and patient, and resigned to the last.” John Wesley wore that statement as a badge of honor. When asked what set Methodists apart from other Christians, Wesley remarked, “Our people die well.”  We talk a lot about the Christian lifestyle.  We don’t talk about the Christian death style. Warren Wiersbe wrote: “We are not really prepared to live unless we are prepared to...

Acts 2 records the birthday of the church on the day of Pentecost. Pentecost was a holy feast observed fifty days after Passover. During Passover, Jesus was betrayed, condemned, and crucified. The pilgrims left Jerusalem with rumors swirling that his body was missing. Pentecost was the next time Jerusalem was filled with worshipers. There were now credible claims that Jesus had risen from the dead.  On the day of Pentecost, the sound of a hurricane rocked the city. Crowds gathered at the epicenter of the sound, where 120 disciples of Jesus had been in prayer. This international crowd was amazed when these Galileans started praising God in languages they had never learned. Without a reasonable explanation for what they saw and heard, they concluded the disciples were drunk. Then Peter addressed the crowd.  Peter was the most devoted, courageous, and outspoken disciple...

There is a sense in which the first three beatitudes are about humility.  Poverty in spirit is humility toward God.  Mourning is humility toward self.  Meekness is humility toward others.  These opening beatitudes present the foundational aspects of the humility that characterize the blessed. Yet these beatitudes build on one another. To be poor in spirit is to mourn. To mourn is to be meek. These beatitudes also build on one another in the opposite direction. Meekness comes naturally to those who are poor in spirit and mourn their sin. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, “The man who is truly meek is the man who is amazed that God and man can think of him as well as they do and treat him as well as...

There was a time when churches held weeklong revival services. An evangelist preached sermons to save the lost and sanctify the church. Church members invited the unsaved, unchurched, and unrepentant to the revival. They even had special seating: The Mourners’ Bench. The mourner’s bench was created by John Wesley, the father of Methodism. There are biblical reasons to reject Wesley’s theology and methodology. But his premise was right: contrition is the key to conversion.  The second beatitude clarifies two misunderstandings about the Christian life.  Being a Christian is not about being sad. Matthew 6:16 says, “And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites.” The hypocrite looked gloomy, assuming this is what it meant...

Matthew 21 begins the account of the final week of the earthly life of Jesus. It is called Holy Week or Passion Week, as it culminates with the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. It begins on Palm Sunday, so called because the crowds placed garments and branches in the path as Jesus rode into Jerusalem. John 12:13 says they were palm branches.  The Triumphal Entry is the first and last time Jesus travels to Jerusalem in Matthew. Jesus was born in Bethlehem. His parents fled to Egypt after his birth. He was raised in Nazareth. His ministry took place in Galilee. The Gospels tell us that Jesus traveled to Jerusalem on several occasions to observe the holy feasts. The events of Holy Week took place during the feast...

The public ministry of Jesus was in its early stages. Large crowds gathered to hear his teachings and see his miracles. But Jesus was not caught up in his fast-growing popularity. He would not let the multitudes distract him from his Father’s business. And he did not want his new disciples to be seduced by the crowds. Matthew 5:1-2 reports: “Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.” What follows is the greatest sermon ever preached. It is the first recorded discourse of Jesus – the Sermon on the Mount. In Matthew 5-7, Jesus explains the righteous standard for citizenship in the...

In Mark 14:53-65, a religious court condemned Jesus for blasphemy.  In Mark 15:1-15, a civil court condemned Jesus for sedition.  The Sanhedrin unanimously voted that Jesus was worthy of death. But only the occupying powers of Rome could authorize capital punishment. Their charges against Jesus would have to matter to the Roman governor. Pilate would not care if Jesus committed blasphemy. So the religious leaders accused Jesus of claiming to be a king A self-proclaimed king was a potential threat to Caesar, which would matter to Pilate.  “The King of the Jews” is the dominating theme of Mark 15. In verse 2, Pilate asks Jesus, “Are you the king of the Jews?” In verse 9, Pilate asks, “Do you want me to release for you the...

In the church I grew up in, Deacon Heart and his team would go down the aisles with hole punchers before Communion. Each congregant was given a membership card. It was the size of a business card with boxes for each month of the year at the bottom. Before Communion started, the deacons went through the congregation and punched a hole in the box for that month.  If your box was hole-punched, it indicated that you were permitted to receive the bread and cup. If it wasn’t, you were not to take the Lord’s Supper that day. I did not...

At first glance, the tenth commandment seems anticlimactic. The Decalogue begins with commands about how to love the Lord God. No other gods. No carved images. Reverence God’s name. Remember the Sabbath. The Decalogue ends with commands about how to love our neighbor. Honor your parents. No murder. No adultery. No stealing. No bearing false witness. Then the Decalogue ends in Exodus 20:17: “You shall not covet.”  It may feel like this tenth commandment does not have the same gravity as the previous commandments. One may be tempted to think this Tenth Word should have been tucked earlier in the Ten Commandments to conceal its obscurity. Or maybe a more critical...