Putting those words together in a blog title is part of my bold sense of humor.  As an unofficial reformed Baptist who would not baptize infants, I am including these two together at the connecting point of church growth. ReCAST Church has continued to grow.  It has grown in size as well as in depth.…

Last week my wife spent a few days near the Florida-Alabama border with several others ladies from the church.  The event was for women and was called Bible at the Beach with Nanny G (Nancy Guthrie for normal people). And while I missed my wife, I was glad for the time she was able to…

Every time another church is attacked I go deep into what ‘ifs’. As a pastor of a flock, I am called to care for my flock.  But the metaphor gets cloudy.  Am I supposed to wrestle with bears and lions?  Am I called in any sense to physically preserve my sheep and protect them from…

She forgave him!?  I saw it live on TV.  I heard it through speakers piped into my living room.  Others were in the room who could verify what she had just said.  I’ve gone back and watched the clip a dozen times.  And it still amazes me.  It still shocks me.  Forgiveness will never be…

I used the word ‘worldview’ in my title instead of ideology, because worldview strikes me as more comprehensive. And that is the point. I do not imagine that there are many people (though I tremble at the thought that there are some) who set out to embrace death, who hope to some day plunge off…

I have been a pastor for 20 years and am closing in on 100 weddings that I’ve officiated. And there a couple of trends I have seen in the past several years that I think are worthy of note.

Most weddings are now outdoors. I don’t have a STRONG opinion about this, but just an opinion. A church building is meant to evoke thoughts about the presence of God. I will be the first to admit that He is NOT any more present in a church than He is in a vineyard, or on a farm, or at an outdoor wedding venue . . .

The whole nation seemed to be united behind one thing for the past week or so . . . Two people in a spotlight at a Coldplay concert. Now I have a confession . . . I like Coldplay.

I am preaching my way through 2 Timothy and I encountered this verse this week in my deeper dive for my sermon.
2 Timothy 3:9

Long before ReCAST Church ever had a Sunday gathering in Mattawan, we had spent hours and hours praying for the community. I began to work from a coffee shop there and I began to get to know people and even invited people to join us. Our goal was to be a church in a community that needed one.

One of the largest task of any leader is to clarify the answer to the question “why!?” I have been listening to the book “Extreme Ownership” by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. Leif participated in many of the missions to regain the Iraqi city of Ramadi.

The Christian who believes the Bible is true, knows that this world is NOT the way it was supposed to be. We know we are frail. We know disease is real. We know we are dying. I start in this place, regarding the topic of holistic health, simply to set the field of play for this discussion.

I went through a yo-yo phase. I could walk the dog, I could rock the baby, and do the elevator. All of these are fairly entry level tricks, but I thought I was cool . . . If yo-yos could be called ‘cool’.

War is a a huge concept found in a tiny word. If words carried the gravity of their meaning, the word for the concept of ‘war’ ought to be something like 17 syllables. But this is English so “infinitesimal” means really small and “big” means large. I woke up thinking about war this morning, because…