Category Archives: Faith

The Walking Dead vs. The Living God (Ephesians 2:1-7)

Posted on November 4, 2026 by salooper57

Now here’s the thing: people (and animals) can be dead to one kind of stimuli and alive to another. A mouse can be alive to the cookie it finds lying on an abandoned math book, but dead to the calculus within. (So can a high school student.) Continue reading →

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Finding Your Frequency: Hearing God in a Noisy World

Posted on October 31, 2026 by salooper57

This alignment with God that I’m calling coherence enables a person to obey God and hold out against temptation. When a person is in a state of incoherence (out of alignment with God), temptation seems too good to refuse, for sin makes sense and feels right (or maybe just inevitable). Continue reading →

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Never Stop Trusting God: James 1:1-8 and the Purpose of Life’s Trials

Posted on October 28, 2026 by salooper57

If, in the Spring of 1941, England had given in, what might the world look like today? If today you or I give in – to temptation or despair, or to the promise of ease at the cost of integrity – what will our lives look like tomorrow? Continue reading →

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When Worlds Go Out of Phase: Physics, Faith, and the Fall

Posted on October 24, 2026 by salooper57

Of course, I am using the “phase” terminology metaphorically, but that does not mean it is merely an illustration. Something similar to phase differences in the natural order has occurred in the spiritual order. Its effects have been deleterious, inhibiting humans from hearing God and seeing him even when he came among them in the person of Jesus Christ. Continue reading →

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The Fruitful Disciple (John 5:1-8)

Posted on October 20, 2026 by salooper57

A fruitless disciple is a contradiction, an unfulfillment, a broken promise. If the life of Jesus is not producing fruit in us, something is not right. If we belong to Jesus, we should be fruitful. Continue reading →

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“Help My Unbelief”: How Great Figures in Faith Navigated Doubt

Posted on October 17, 2026 by salooper57

What most people don’t know is that a year after his Aldersgate experience, Wesley wrote in his journal, “I know that I am not a Christian. I know it because I do not feel that I love God and his Son Jesus Christ as my Savior.” Continue reading →

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Was Paul Really “Compelled by the Spirit”? Questions for Acts 20–21

Posted on October 10, 2026 by salooper57

As I have already written, I am not criticizing the great apostle, but I am questioning whether the NIV is right to translate “compelled by the Spirit,” implying it was God’s will that Paul be beaten, arrested, and imprisoned. Continue reading →

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Peeling the Onion of Fear: How Christ Reclaims the Human Heart

Posted on October 3, 2026 by salooper57

I am still peeling the onion of my fears. I’ve been at it for a lifetime, and I expect it will take a little longer than that. Currently, I am trying to peel away the layer called claustrophobia. (I had a small victory: I got into an MRI machine, which is something I swore I would never do!) Continue reading →

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I Am the True Vine (John 15:1-8)

Posted on September 30, 2026 by salooper57

…it seems to me the church has made precisely the opposite mistake. We have not reached back into old covenant concepts, teachings, sayings, and narratives nearly enough. We’ve reached back to the evangelical trailblazers of the 19th and 20th centuries. Continue reading →

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The God Who Isn’t Finished: Hope for Those Who Think It’s Too Late

Posted on September 26, 2026 by salooper57

I saw B in a Walmart a few months after her mother died. I turned down an aisle and caught a glimpse of her at the other end. I thought that I should go and speak to her, but I chickened out and slinked into a different aisle. Continue reading →

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