Snow Hill News Blog

Psalm for the Week - and include James too

Our Psalms for the week are Psalm 45 and Psalm 15.

Include in your reading this week, James 1:17-27. Plenty of people are telling the Church religion is worthless. James has something to say about worthless religion.

Psalm for the Week

One of our Psalms for this week is Psalm 84. Pastor Todd recalls hearing a message from Psalm 84 which focused on the phrase "from strength to strength. The preacher suggested the "to" is the place where we are formed from our strength by his strength to give witness to transformation.

What are  your thoughts on this Psalm?

Psalm for the Week

Let's spend this week with two readings from the Psalms.

Psalm 111 and Psalm 34:9-14.

In the first we might consider just what is meant by "fear of the Lord" as the "beginning of Wisdom."

In the second we might consider the place of Wisdom as in living our our lives.

Meet the Skaggs

Sunday, August 9, we will "Meet the Skaggs." Recently Shawn and Kacie adopted four children - 2,3,4,6. We want to encourage and support them. We will host a shower in their honor at 3 p.m. this Sunday. They are registered at Target and Walmart.

Shaping Us Toward Sunday

Last Sunday, Nathan read a piece he had found related to the Scriptures for last Sunday. The writer noted a sociological shift in our culture. In a bygone day the culture tended to carry the faith. You remember when little leagues sports did not have games on "church days." Maybe you recall when the school calendar also deferred to events going on in the life of the church - summer camps, sporting events, etc. This is what the writer of the piece Nathan read meant by "carry the faith."

We have all witnessed the changes for the last couple of decades. Increasingly the encroachment caused us to question not why do we have these events, but why go to a church building with any regularity. No one questions the sports teams when they contend young athletes need time together, practicing, working on their game. Everyone questions why we need to meet with any regularity at church. After all we already have our ticket punched.

The matter may lay in what Dallas Willard regularly contends. Simply saying we "have it" does not indeed mean we have it. What we "have" is born out in what we do not what we say. Carrying the way of Jesus into a world necessitates thinking through just what that looks like and how we may do that in loving ways together. We find a small verse nestled in the rich text of Hebrews. The writer understood the needs of a faith community living in a culture where the culture did not carry the faith.