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Talking To Kids About Movies: Iron Man 3

May 16, 2013 by Mark Woodward

IronmanIf you haven’t seen Iron Man 3, you are among the few! Much of the world has already seen it.  The film premiered in Paris in early April, then worldwide to record setting opening audiences in late April, and finally on May 3 in the U.S.

Not only are Robert Downey, Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, and Tony Cheadle back to head the good-guy team, but well-known and greatly admired actors like Ben Kingsley and Guy Pearce appear on the dark side to create a dynamic contrast.  I like Rebecca Hall, but her character did not bring much to the film.

The plot itself has an occasional twist, but not enough to keep it from being as predictable as comic books usually are.  One new character, eight-year-old Harley (Ty Simpkins) becomes Tony Stark’s younger counterpart and even rescues Stark during one of the more interesting fight sequences, but, unfortunately for the film, this young sidekick is virtually abandoned for the rest of the film.

Iron Man 3 is rated PG-13, and rightly so! The audience comes expecting the comic-book action, but some of the violence borders on being up-close torture.  Trying to roast people alive is pretty disturbing; even the self-repairing bodies appear to be burning. Limbs are severed and people are blown up—all in tolerable ways for teens perhaps, but pretty rough for younger children.

In addition, though subtle, there are some sexual references you probably wish your kids didn’t have to hear.

But since lots of kids are going to see Iron Man 3, let’s talk about a few ideas that you can bring up in the car on the way home.

  • Many ideas start out as good ideas, but then are turned into bad things! Self-repairing bodies would be a good thing, wouldn’t it!   If this were real science, we’d be glad!  Can you think of other areas of science today that might be good, but could be turned toward evil if misused?  (Some answers:  cloning, genetic engineering, nuclear power, new drugs—really almost anything.  In fact, in God’s creation, everything was created good!  So what went wrong?)
  • “We create our own demons” – Tony Stark (Iron Man).  (You might want to point out that he is talking about evil, not literal demons.) What went wrong with God’s good creation is that people made bad choices and took His good things and used them for bad purposes.  Show them James 1:14,15 – “But people are tempted when their own evil desire leads them away and traps them. 15 This desire leads to sin, and then the sin grows and brings death.”
  • Tony Stark actually started this chain of events:  he lied to the young Alldrich Killian about meeting him on the roof, when he had no intentions of doing it.  Being kind and honest all the time can prevent lots of bad things from happening.
  • Being the good guy (even the Superhero) does not mean you are going to win every battle.  The good guys had to learn how to be defeated, then to come back and try again.  Learning to bounce back from defeat or failure is a very important lesson for our children to learn. You don’t always deserve a trophy.

Well, you probably don’t live that far away from the theater, so maybe that’s enough to get you home.

Remember two things if you talk with the kids about movies:  first, you are just planting seeds, so don’t dig too deep and don’t over water.  Secondly, you don’t have to get to agreement. They absorb a lot more than they want us to believe!

And it is just a comic-book movie after all!

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Downton Abbey and the Old Campbell Street Church!

May 14, 2013 by Mark Woodward

maggie-smith-downtown-abbey-tIf you are not a Downton Abbey viewer, then you have some explaining to do! Sherrylee and I just finished Season 3, but now, days later, I find myself still thinking about some of the drama—sure, some of the melodrama also—and I do miss the Dowager Countess of Grantham, Lady Violet Crawley, played amazingly by the great Maggie Smith.

Downton Abbey has been broadcast in 200 countries worldwide and has had at least 120 million viewers!  I’ve been asking myself this morning what is it about this very British, very Edwardian period piece, that speaks to the whole world?

One of the ways to analyze narrative, whether TV, film, or literature, is to find the points of dramatic conflict or tension.  For instance, in Downton Abbey, the following points of tension are fairly obvious:

  • Tradition versus Change  -  The house and estate themselves represent ancient values and the fact that they are hardly financially viable—one of the main tensions running through the series—is because the world outside is changing in previously unimaginable ways.  WWI is (and was) the dramatic end of the old era—but not everyone at Downton knows that!
  • Upstairs versus Downstairs – The downstairs world of those in service, though intricately connected to the upstairs world of the lords and ladies, operates its own systems and personalities in both dramatic contrast but also a surprising degree of similarity to their superiors.
  • Dominance of men versus equality of women – The very first dramatic moment of the series occurs when the Crawley family with only daughters cannot continue at Downton because of a tragedy unless one of the daughters marries the heir-apparent, since only men can inherit titles.
  • Privileged social class versus democratic middle-class values – The new male heir-apparent to Downton is a distant relative who has grown up middle class. As another example in later episodes, the Crawley’s youngest daughter marries the chauffeur, creating still further class tensions in the family.
  • Inherited wealth versus mercantile values – The idea of the estate turning a profit is beneath the Earl of Grantham, but not the heir-apparent who later becomes co-owner of the estate.

I do not intend to allegorize Downton Abbey, but I can’t help but observe some obvious similarities to our yet-to-be serialized melodrama in churches today!

I wonder if a series called Old Campbell Street Church would go as viral as Downton Abbey?   Do you think we could develop the theme of Tradition vs. Change? What about the role of men and women?  And I have a pretty good idea we could do inherited values vs. current values!

The first episode might be something like this:  The Campbell family has been the wealthiest, most influential family in the Old Campbell Street Church for seven generations. The oldest male Campbell has always presided over the eldership, but the current Campbell family only has daughters, so the question of continuity of power is acute!

To make matters worse, the oldest and prettiest daughter has fallen in love with the youth minister, a talented but uncredentialed young man who did not even attend one of the big Christian universities!  The fear in the Campbell family is that if these two were to marry, the Campbell daughter would be doomed to a life of youth rallies and summer camps and that her husband, in an abuse of his family connection with them, might try to introduce new songs into the traditional worship.

The tensions increase further when the youngest Campbell daughter runs off with a Young Democrat!  Will she ever be allowed to return to the Old Campbell Street Church after having shamed the family?  And how will their children be raised?

Ridiculous, isn’t it!

Let’s just pray that God never has to watch this channel!

 

Posted in Christian Culture, Other | Tagged , , | 2 Comments »

God Speaks In a Whirlwind!

May 10, 2013 by Mark Woodward

Paul writingThe last ten weeks have been a whirlwind. Having lived in Texas and Oklahoma for most of my life, I know that we are in tornado season, so perhaps acknowledging a whirlwind season is really a poor lead—but it is the truth.

I suspect even mentioning the whirlwind is more of an apology—at least a confession—to you for a lengthy season of spotty writing.  I actually love writing these posts and to have been as irregular as I have been during this season makes me feel rather undisciplined.

Two essentials—at least for me—have been scarce: reading and two hours.  Writing is an outpouring, but necessary to outpouring is inpouring. I often wonder as I write if the biblical writers knew they were writing Scripture–with a capital S?  Do you think the Apostle John thought: “Well, the Bible needs at least one really short, simple book to balance that theological tome that Paul wrote to the Romans, so I’ll just write a 3 John.”

Or did he really just sit down early one morning—like I’m doing right now—make himself a cup of coffee and think, “I better write to Gaius. I’ll be going there shortly and I need to begin setting the agenda of what I want to do during our visit”?

I’m pretty convinced John’s letter was a simple letter, perhaps only one of several that he wrote that day—his day of catching up on correspondence.  Was it inspired? Of course it was!  But wasn’t the promise that Jesus made to them that the Spirit would give them words of truth? Peter expressed it this way, “If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God” (2Peter 4:11). Doesn’t that expand inspiration beyond just the Twelve?

Do you really think that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John suddenly had a tingly feeling or their quill started glowing when they were writing holy Words?  I don’t think so.  I think whenever they wrote—even their daily correspondence—they were writing as people who were always filled with the Spirit of God, who were always living their lives in His service, and who always found their words and chose to speak as those who speak the very words of God.

And shouldn’t we who are Christians do the same!  We have the same Spirit, we have the same commission, and we have the same task: “we believe, therefore, we speak” (2 Corinthians 4:13).

OK, so there went my first excuse!  I take it back. God has not been slack in pouring into any of us enough Spirit or words to share with others.

It takes me approximately two hours to write and publish each of these posts.  In a perfect world, these are two uninterrupted hours!  I often steal these hours early in the morning before I go to the LST office and start the day.  When we are traveling a lot, as we have been the last ten weeks, I will go to the hotel lobby to write while Sherrylee is getting dressed.

I don’t like to squeeze writing into too tight a confine, and I don’t like to write in bits and pieces. It’s hard to come back to some thought with the same passion or tone.

(I wonder if that explains why Romans is so easily divided into very different sections:  Paul had to take breaks and go visit some synagogue in Corinth or settle some dispute among the Christians, and when he came back, his mind had moved to a different place.)

Some dear friends collected the series of posts I wrote on “Raising Kids With A Heart For Missions” and published them in a little book.  I was very honored that they thought so highly, but I found myself in an awkward position of receiving a lot of credit that I didn’t deserve.

First and foremost, most of the ideas in the little book were first spoken or conceived by Sherrylee sometime early or during the child-rearing years of  our marriage.  Of course, we talked and shared them—and they were a gift to me and to our children—but she was my teacher!

Secondly, our marriage and our children—are all gifts of God, so whatever I have learned and all that I have experienced are not mine. I am not the originator, the creator, even the first recipient.

All of my insights, all of my experiences–all the words I have to say are His first: “In Him we live, and move, and have our being” (Acts 17:28).

. . . I feel better now. I’ve confessed my undisciplined negligence, I’ve admitted my plagiarism, and I’ve pointed any of you who are still reading back to God our Father, Jesus His Son, and the Holy Spirit, our Giver of Words.

That’s a good start for this day.

 

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What’s Needed for Missions in Churches of Christ!

May 4, 2013 by Mark Woodward

missions2If you are committed to evangelism—you’ll notice I did not use the word missions for fear of being redefined—and if you believe that the mission of members of the Kingdom of God is apostolic (bearers of a message) not just diaconic (servants), then you are a little concerned about the trend lines that I have suggested in the two previous posts.

If you believe that faith comes from hearing the Word of God and that people have trouble hearing the Word without someone to preach it—as Paul argued in Romans 10:14—then you are also concerned that being salt and light in the world is our mission as Christians, but if those seekers who discover the salt and see the light don’t know what to use it on or where the light is leading them, then they could remain hopelessly lost.

No one can come to the Father except through the Son, and no one has found the Son without knowing that Jesus is the Son of God and that He is raised from the dead. They have to hear the Gospel story.  No amount of good that they receive in the neighborhood will communicate the Good News unless those who serve also share the Story.  “We believe, therefore, we speak” (2 Corinthians 4:13)!

The projections of the last post based on the trends and tendencies in my first post could be taken as discouraging—but only if there were no hope!  Trends and tendencies, however, are not prescriptions!  Our God is victorious, so any defeats are just momentary. Even a valley of dry bones can be resurrected to life—and we are not dry bones yet, so there is much we can do to reverse what might seem to some as inevitable.

We need to relentlessly pursue holistic missions! Jesus went about preaching and healing (Matt. 4:23;9:35). We should do the same.

What would happen in our churches if those proposing every evangelistic effort were asked to show how they were going to tangibly show love and compassion to their audience? No evangelism without a compassion ministry component.

What would happen in our churches if those who planned and/or executed every service project, benevolent work, and every relief effort were asked to prayerfully consider and propose an appropriate time and means for introducing the Message to those benefited by their service?  No demonstration ministry without a plan for proclamation.

There is no competition between social justice and evangelism; it should be one and the same.

We need to find our urgency of mission.  Out of almost 7 billion people in the world,  2 billion claim to be Christians.  If we don’t believe in judgment, if we don’t believe in Satan, if we don’t believe in Eternal darkness, if we don’t believe that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life—then we can relax because there is no urgency.

If we believe that Jesus came “to seek and save the lost”(Luke 19:10),  then we can’t relax any more than Jesus did. We have to work—while it is still Day (John 9:4). The Night is coming!

We need to raise up an Army of Youth to fight for the Lord of Hosts! This may require intervention—because our young church leaders/ministers are of the same generation as our children and grandchildren as far as evangelism goes.  This may be a great time for elders to shepherd their youngest sheep!

I would like to see young children learning the heroic and inspirational stories of great Christian saints, then in middle school we should intentionally work with them on sharing their faith—verbally. What do they tell their friends who ask them why they believe in God or why they believe Jesus is the only way.  Group evangelism is especially appropriate for these young teens.

By high school then, having learned and practiced their mission at home, they would be ready for going other places, experiencing perhaps real poverty of both wealth and faith.

During college, they would then want to continue speaking the Name and doing Good in the world, and some—many more—would want to do internships and apprenticeships after college. And those who do not feel called to make it their life, would go into their marriages and their careers with a completely different framework—a missional framework—for every day of their lives.

We need churches who can imagine that God can use their resources to do things they can’t even imagine! 

  • Which churches among us will pick up the list of unevangelized countries and build their mission strategy around that information?
  • Which churches are ready to take on the Muslim world?
  • Which churches have the capacity and endurance to commit to work in the highly industrialized, yet predominantly secular countries?
  • Which churches will choose the nations where it is time for seed-sowing, not for harvesting?
  • Which churches will use the wealth of their congregations in places of extreme poverty, serving and proclaiming, at the expense of their own comfort?

And finally, we need courageous mission efforts! Let’s ban any sentence that starts with

  • “I’m afraid, if we do that . . . .”
  • “I’m afraid we don’t have the . . . .”
  • “I’m afraid our members won’t want to . . . .”
  • “I’m afraid it would take away from . . . .”
  • “I’m afraid someone might think that  . . . .”
  • “I’m afraid that’s bigger than we can . . . . “

The Revelation is clear that the “cowardly” are not at the banquet of the Lamb (21:8).  The  Witnesses are!

Conclusion

 One brother who attended this class at the Pepperdine Bible Lectures raised his hand and said, “Mark, you’ve been too negative. Give us something positive we can feel good about.”

I replied, “If you hear this as negative, then I’ve failed to communicate. While there are trends and attitudes that concern me, I have no fear for the Kingdom of God and great hope for Churches of Christ.

Our churches are living, dynamic expressions of the body of Christ and filled with His Spirit. We are human, therefore flawed, but not without His grace and His blessing, so where we are weak, He can make us strong.

And I’m certainly 100% positive that the Kingdom of God will prevail against the Gates of Hell.  Led by our Redeemer on a white horse, we will continue to attack the fortress of Evil until the final battle is accomplished.  The Victory is won!

I really want to win my little portion of the Great Battle for the glory and honor of Jesus. Don’t you?

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What’s Next in Missions among Churches of Christ?

May 2, 2013 by Mark Woodward

missions2Yesterday, I suggested the following about the current state of foreign missions in Churches of Christ:

  • Greater tolerance has produced less urgency for evangelism.
  • Missions are being redefined as social justice activities at the expense of evangelization.
  • Churches are turning toward more domestic mission projects
  • Churches are depending on missionary organizations more.
  • More older Christians and fewer younger Christians are involved in foreign missions.
  • Churches are opting for safe and successful missions.

If you believe that the above statements are true—even mostly true—then what does the near future look like for missions from American Churches of Christ?

These churches will do less and less evangelistic work, both in the U.S. and especially in foreign countries.  Why?

  • Historically, most of our mission force has come from recent college graduates and young families.  Since this demographic is now the product of greater tolerance (less urgency) and has replaced  evangelism with social justice, fewer will have the motivation for foreign missions.
  • Those who do go overseas will more likely be involved in humanitarian activities than church planting.

As older church leaders become less able to travel themselves and because fewer younger people are evangelistic, churches will outsource their foreign missions and evangelistic work even more. This suggests that independent ministries will continue to grow until the older church leaders give up their leadership to a younger generation of leaders.

If present trends continue, the independent relief organizations and ministries focusing on social justice will increase both in number and scope, and as younger Christians grow in influence and wealth, more funds will flow from evangelistic missions to these serving ministries.

 

One of the difficulties of even discussing this is trying to avoid posturing evangelism against social justice—or vice versa!  Jesus went around preaching and healing—and we should too.  Unfortunately, however, in our humanity we are much more likely to swing with the pendulum than to look for harmony.

That’s what I want to do tomorrow.  In the next post, let’s talk about not about what is, or what is likely, but what is needed and how things could be with regards to missions in Churches of Christ.

 

 

Posted in Christian Missions | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment »

What is the State of Missions in Churches of Christ?

May 1, 2013 by Mark Woodward

missions2Today, I’m teaching a class at the Pepperdine Bible Lectures entitled “What’s New and What’s Needed in 21st Century Missions”  The things I want to say will be something that you will be interested in also, so I want to share them with you. My plan is to divide the hour-long class into three written parts for you and publish them all this week.

Introduction

As most of you know, Sherrylee and I have been involved in foreign missions in Churches of Christ since 1968, with my first survey trip to Europe, trying to determine where God wanted us to work. This led to our spending eight years in Germany, working with two other couples, planting a new church.

Upon our return to the States (which had been God’s idea, not ours!), we began the Let’s Start Talking ministry, which now 33 years later has taken us to 70 countries where we have visited and worked beside literally hundreds of missionaries and national evangelists and seen as many mission churches from our fellowship.

Our work has also given us two other fairly unique touch points which allow us a sense of the pulse of our fellowship.

First, recruiting workers and raising resources among Churches of Christ has given us opportunities to speak to many of our churches—most often with the mission committees and/or mission elders/deacons in those churches.  Many of our impressions and insights come from these conversations.

Second, almost all long-term American missionaries from our movement have a short-term mission as the experience that launches them on their life’s path. Both our work in recruiting, training, and sending thousands of students as well as our association, often partnership, with other short-term mission groups, and having had this vantage point for over thirty years, allows us to speak from firsthand experience about what has changed or not changed in our lifetime.

So, for today’s conversation just remember that I’m speaking from experience not research and that I’m speaking from the context of American Churches of Christ and our foreign mission efforts, not broader Christendom and not global churches.

What’s Now?

Churches of Christ are more tolerant. Most of our churches no longer preach and act like we are the only ones going to heaven!  We have discovered God’s graciousness and admitted our own infallibility, but it has made us a little unsure of who we are or why we should try to persuade others of anything.  We are less urgent about evangelizing because many of those we “evangelized” years ago, we are less sure that they really need it.  Our earlier evangelism had been persuading someone that they didn’t really know what they were doing when they were baptized, so their previous baptism was invalid.  We probably still disagree with them on the biblical teaching about baptism, but we are no longer willing to deny fellowship to someone whom God has offered His gracious forgiveness of their errors as He continues to forgive ours.

The meaning of mission among Churches of Christ is being redefined. Again, this was a needed correction. It was always a mistake to think that the mission of God was always somewhere else—probably overseas—accomplished only by special people. We now talk about missional churches¸by which we mean churches who encourage all members to live their daily lives, confessing Christ in word and deed. But in making this adjustment, a whole generation in our churches now thinks that missions is painting houses, building church buildings, serving the poor, playing with orphans, or any act of what is most often called social justice ministry.

Of course, missions ARE all of the above—but it is also telling the story of Jesus to those who don’t know Him, bringing the Word and the Light to people in ignorance and darkness.  While many have gone on mission trips, very few in our churches under 40 years old have actually shared the Word and told someone the Good News.

Church leaders are looking for mission work that allows greater involvement by their members.  For this reason and others, our churches seem to be looking for more domestic mission sites. Cost, oversight issues, and maintaining relationships all are more difficult with foreign mission points—and don’t we have growing unbelief in the States anyway!

More older Christians and Boomers are involved in foreign missions, through supporting it, but also in going on short-term missions projects. This is a terrific development, occurring mostly because of the changing demographic in our churches. These people are old enough to still be evangelistic, and now they have the funds to do what they have always wanted to do.

One interesting corollary of this is that many, perhaps most of our missionaries are finding their financial support from wealthier individuals instead of from our churches.  Churches are considered too bureaucratic, too self-centered, and too capricious. Getting support from an ardent supporter is considered vastly superior than to run the daunting and often fruitless gauntlet of trying to find supporting churches.

Churches are relying more on independent ministries for missions.  You may see this as either a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your own ideas, but I think it is a good thing to admit, at least.  Notice this list:

  • Great Cities   – Latin American missions
  • Eastern European Missions  -    Bibles, literature. and resources for Eastern Europe
  • China Now/China Vision   -placing Christian teachers in Chinese universities
  • Mission Alive    - Church Planting
  • Kairos  -  Church Planting
  • World Bible School/World English School   -  Correspondence courses
  • Let’s Start Talking    –   Short-term missions,
  • FriendSpeak  -   English Outreach in the United States
  • Sunset  International Bible Institute  - training of missionaries and mission internships
  • Missions Resource Network  -   missionary care, missions education, center for                                                                      missions information

Churches are only interested in successful missions.  And why should anyone support unsuccessful missions!  But successful is a tricky word. What most of our churches mean is that the mission is

  • Affordable
  • Accessible
  • Quantifiably impressive and motivating for the local church
  • Safe

So, taking this picture of missions in today’s churches of Christ, what do you see happening in the near future?  That’s tomorrow’s blog—and it won’t be this long, I promise!

Posted in Christian Missions | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments »

Does Boston Make You Afraid?

April 25, 2013 by Mark Woodward

Boston Marathon bombingThis weekend at least 25 major marathons will be run across the United States. Some have funny names like “Hurt the Dirt” marathon in Rockford, Michigan, or “Jailbreak” marathon in Wautoma, Wisconsin. Other marathons remind of us terrible times: Gettysburg North-South Marathon or Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon.

On April 15, the Boston Marathon moved from being one of the most prestigious marathons to one of the most terrifying.  At 2:49pm, two bombs killed two women and a little boy and injured 260+ people—physically!  The bombings also wounded the souls of all of us!

Random acts of violence are among the most heinous because they almost always target people who woke up on any given morning, got dressed, brushed their teeth, kissed their loved ones goodbye, and walked out their doors into Normalcy—whatever that is.

They were not the President who is reminded of the target on his back on a daily basis by the team of Secret Service agents who surround him. They were not the CEO in some South American country who signed the check for Kidnapping insurance or rides in a bulletproof limousine. They threatened no one, they were just . . . you and me.

What makes the wounds of random violence penetrate to our souls—whether it is the work of organized terrorists or of a single mentally-ill person with a backseat full of guns—is fear!

Almost twelve years after 9/11, two million people each day empty their pockets and walk through metal detectors and are reminded of that day of terror. Richard Reid tries to detonate his shoe full of explosives, so now we take our shoes off to be screened. Our belts come off because of the underwear bomber in 2009. Our laptops come out because of the Lockerbie bombings in 1988.  You cannot enter any federal building without walking through a metal detector because of the Oklahoma City bombing.

In fact, just the potential threat against any event has meant screening and major security tactics at major league baseball games, music concerts, at museums, and certainly any political events.

Unless you are almost 60, you can’t remember when the president rode in an open limousine!

So in the Nashville Country Music Marathon, the police have announced  “the deployment of hundreds of law enforcement and security personnel” who will be “very visible” along the 26.2 mile route.  More elementary school teachers will have guns, more movie theaters will guard their rear doors.

More mothers will not let their kids play in the front yard. More kids will carry mobile phones, mostly because their parents want to know where they are. And more preachers will be watched by bodyguards while their congregants sing and pray.

Random violence—the fear of dying–makes us afraid! As a boy, I slept in an unlocked house just seven minutes from where I live today. Now we not only lock the house, but we also set the alarm. Our cars have alarms, our keys chains have panic buttons

—and still random violence can kill our children on the streets of Boston, Oklahoma City, Sandy Hook, Aurora, and the list goes on much too long!

No amount of fear can protect you from deadly random violence.  Just like no amount of exercise or healthy eating can keep you from getting cancer or having a heart attack or getting hit by a bus!

Sure, we look both ways before we cross the street and we put on our seat belts in the car and we eat less red meat and  . . . .the list goes on, growing daily, of what we do to be safe and secure.

—and still we are afraid.  And still we are willing to spend more money and endure greater restriction in the hope of being safe and secure.

—and still we are afraid of those who can kill us anyway!

Here’s the word from God today for you and me:

Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death.

 Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.(Hebrews 2:14-15 NLT)

“Slaves to the fear of dying,” that’s the phrase that convicts me.

If you want security and safety so that you will never die and no one you love will ever die—then you will always be afraid! And you will still die.

If you want to live free from the slavery of the fear of dying, then you can have that freedom through the One who promised: “Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die” (John 11:25-26).

Then you can run your race without fear.

Posted in Christian Culture | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment »

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