Scriptureriver

Jesus prayed for unity the night before he died. That fact alone should settle any debate about whether church unity is important. In John 17:21, with the cross hours away, Jesus asked the Father that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you. He did not pray … Read more

The servant’s heart in Scripture does not look the way most people imagine it. The picture people carry is often of a naturally selfless person, someone whose personality makes serving others easy, someone who does not struggle with the impulse to be recognized or thanked. Scripture describes something different. The people the Bible holds up … Read more

The question bearing fruit raises is not what you are doing but what you are connected to. Jesus made this point with an image that his agricultural audience understood immediately. A branch does not produce fruit through effort. It produces fruit through connection. The vine feeds the branch, the branch holds the fruit, and the … Read more

Fruit does not lie. A tree can look healthy from a distance. The trunk can be solid, the branches can be full, the leaves can be green and convincing. But when the season for fruit arrives, the tree reveals what it actually is. You cannot fake that. The fruit is the honest report on what … Read more

Some arguments are worth having. Most are not. The distinction matters, and Scripture is remarkably direct about it. Second Timothy 2:23 encourages us to have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies because they produce quarrels. The word translated foolish there is the Greek word moros, from which English derives the word moronic. Paul is … Read more

The church in the New Testament bears very little resemblance to what most people picture when they hear the word. No buildings. No designated clergy in the modern sense. No Sunday morning service with a program. What the early church had was people who had encountered the risen Christ, who sold what they owned to … Read more

The Great Commission was not given to professionals. Matthew 28:19 records Jesus saying Go therefore and make disciples of all nations. He was speaking to eleven people standing on a hillside in Galilee. Fishermen, a former tax collector, people whose primary qualification was that they had spent three years following Jesus around. No formal theological … Read more

Judge not is the verse everyone knows, and almost everyone misquotes. Matthew 7:1 is pulled out constantly as the biblical argument against any form of evaluation, assessment, or moral discernment. What it actually says, in context, is stop judging hypocritically, because the standard you apply to others will be applied to you. The verses that … Read more

Storms do not care about your plans. They arrive on their own schedule, disrupt whatever was in progress, and leave behind damage that takes far longer to repair than the storm itself lasted. Whether the storm is literal, the kind that floods a basement and takes down power lines, or the kind that arrives as … Read more

Snow silences things. Anyone who has stood outside after a heavy snowfall knows the particular quiet that descends with it. The familiar landscape becomes unrecognizable. Sound travels differently. The ordinary world is covered so completely that what was there before can no longer be seen, only trusted to still be present underneath. Scripture borrows this … Read more