One Sunday morning while Vickie and I were children's pastors in South Florida, we had an incredible time of praise and worship with our children. God's presence was evident and the children were responding. At the conclusion of the time of worship, I stepped onto the platform to segue into the next part of the service and turned to Vickie and said these words, "Vickie, I see the day coming where we will have to force the boys and girls to stop worshiping God." I then turned my attention back to the segue and afterwards left the platform. If the story ended right there, it would be a great...

In a day when what can be shaken is being shaken and it is so evident that we are not fighting against flesh and blood, but " ... against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places" (Ephesians 6:12), I have great news for you. God has not left you defenseless. For those of you in the heat of the battle in your personal life or family or ministry or job and it seems as though all of hell has broken loose, let me remind you about your weapons. We have been given the Name that is above every name. At the mention...

I find that sometimes, or more accurately, often, I need to be reminded about things that I already know. The information isn't something that I need to learn all over again. It is just that I haven't thought about it in a while and I need a reminder to bring the information to the forefront of my mind. In all likelihood, what I am about to share with you isn't anything new. Many of this blog's readership have known these truths forever. But, I believe that bringing these thoughts to the forefront of your mind and spirit will allow the Holy Spirit to do a fresh work in you. Here we go. While...

In reading A.W. Tozer's The Counselor yesterday, I found this powerful statement ... "There are churches so completely out of the hands of God that if the Holy Spirit withdrew from them, they wouldn't find it out for many months." ~ A.W. Tozer It is an honest assessment, isn't it. Sadly, it is true, painfully true. It is easy for churches to become such a well-oiled machine that they have absolutely no need for the Helper to do His job.  Total reliance upon formulas and current trends can cause pastors to ignore His presence and directives. But wait. I can take Tozer's statement one step...

Can I please use you to vent to for two to three minutes? It happened to me some eight hours ago and I am still shaking my head in disbelief. Here's what happened ... someone messaged me and, in mentioning the Holy Spirit, they typed the word "it". I couldn't believe what I had just read. They referred to the Holy Spirit as an "it". Were they kidding me? If I could have reached my hands through my computer screen and used the internet to get to this person, I would have put a few holy slaps all over their face. (I'm just kidding about the slaps ... or kinda' kidding.) So what's the problem?...