The Parables of Christ: Day One
The Parables of Christ A Musical Study through Christ’s Famous Stories. Click here to listen now. In Mark 4:10-12, Jesus says that the purpose of the Parables is to teach truth to those that seek, and to hide it from those who will not. Jesus often hid principles one at a time in his stories, and other times he would string a variety of them together to make one BIG point. Join us in our 7-Day journey through the Parables and...
Who Keeps Us From Stumbling?
What is Doxology and Why Jude? At Garden City and The Doxology Project(TDP) we believe in living doxologically. Are you thinking, “Doxology? That’s a fancy word and probably too complicated for me.” It’s not! Let me explain. In other posts I’ve shared how the word “doxology” comes from the Greek word δοξολογία, from δόξα (doxa), meaning glory, and λογία (logia), meaning logic or saying. To capture the...
Getting Out of Hate
The discussion of loving one another continues here as we move into the third chapter of 1 John. Loving one another does a great deal in the struggle against idolatry. The struggle of idolatry is alive and real for the people that John is writing to, and because of this, John addresses the continual practice of idolatry and sin. He tells us that anyone who makes a practice of sinning has not been born of God. In fact, people who do...
Art and Reason
Baumgarten, in the middle of the 18th century, working from a mind set based in the thinking of those in the Enlightenment and Renaissance, wrote a book called Aesthetics in which he differentiated between things in the world that come from clear knowledge and those that come from feelings. This work introduced a divide into how we think about art and reason. What subtly formed from Baumgarten’s work forward is what philosophers like...
Love One Another
After realizing that we need to be walking in confession in order to avoid idolatry, John reminds us that Christ is our advocate. He also reminds us that Christ is the payment for our sins. In doing this, John begins to point out the ways that we can avoid various types of idols by expressing that we can have confidence that we know Him if we keep his commandments. His command is simple: that we love God and that we love others, which...
Preparation To Lead Praise & Worship (A Guide)
Hello, I thought I should post helpful tips on how a growing worship leader can prepare to lead a praise & worship session for a church service/event. Here is me writing from how the Holy Spirit has helped me, time and again. I wasn’t really taught all of these things, but I picked them up as the Holy Spirit helped me. Fundamentally, your offering of praise & worship to God must be given your best efforts at all times....
Confessing in the Light
John was a man who was known as the disciple of love. When John would say something as simple as “Jesus loves you,” it would basically embody an entire sermon. John is known as simple man that said simple yet very profound things. The way that John communicates is similar to drinking a perfect cup of coffee. When we only think of coffee as something that’s good to drink, we don’t realize how much work is behind just one cup. When we...
MultiCultural Worship Builds Community
I at one point had the privilege of speaking to 400 students about the concept of multicultural worship. First of all, I am encouraged by the fact that students in a Christian high school want to know more about multicultural worship (it was their idea to invite me to come!) A few days after the chapel, I got the chance to speak with one of the international students at the school. He said, “chapel was good this week.” I smiled and...
Marriage | A Work of Art
Marriage is a creative work! Creativity is a marriage! I’ve been pondering this a lot lately in regard to what God has to say about the Art of Marriage in the Scriptures. Our artist, Yahweh, and our Lord God, in the opening scene of Scripture, bursts into darkness to create light; land and sky; and all creatures and creepy things. This includes us, and all of our creepy neighbors who live next door. All of creation originated in the...
Embodying Grace
I call upon you, for you will answer me, O God; Wondrously show your steadfast love, O Savior of those who seek refuge from their adversaries at your right hand. As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness. Psalm 17:6a, 7 & 15 (ESV) When it comes to personal evangelism, feelings of obligation, guilt, and duty have never been effective motivators for me. On the...
1 John 3:16–Hallow Men
This is the way we know love is This is the way we lovers give This is the way we know love is Not with a bang but a giver This is the way we know love gives This is the way, no other is This is the way the world begins He who was slain played the giver. We are today, We know love is Our lives we lay, we also give Brothers repay, but we must end Not with a bang but a...
One of our aims at The Doxology Project is to provide helpful articles that aid in shaping a holistic and biblical worldview. We desire to help people see everything in the world as theological (making statements about God). Every slogan, from Burger King’s “have it your way” campaign, to Nike’s iconic “Just Do it” tagline, and every created product from the iPhone to the Droid makes promises of what it will take to apprehend the...
1 John 3:10-15
Don’t do right? Don’t be of God. More than ever If wronging your brother Who does right? Told from all-start To another Love, love, love Don’t be Cain of Evil One, Killing brother– To what point and purpose? Why Abel? Why kill brothers? Cain lived, ill works (Right Abel’s right) Don’t startle When Cains hate you. (We know we’ve bypassed Death unto living) We love brothers– (That’s...
Why Imagination is Key in Evangelism
A person will not believe what they can’t imagine. So, evangelism has to involve imagination. We have to use our “imaginal intelligence” (imagination) to help the unconverted imagine the reality of GOD, the goodness and love of GOD, the reality of Christ’s payment for our sin, and the benefits of confessing their sin and surrendering their life to HIM. That’s a big order. In fact, for evangelism to happen, a person MUST find their...
1 John 3:7-10
Little kids, be artless, be not naive Listen not to the scoffer’s deceiving tongue. Only right-doers are right, For he who is righteous never does wrong See only wrong-doers are wrong For he known as devil can’t sing our new song From the get-go he sinned, and ever will sin For this God’s Son was unmasked in God’s Play Destroying the works of the devilish one. Those begotten of God never “will sin”...
Art in Christian Missions
Jesus Makes… In Matthew 4:19 Jesus called his disciples to follow and promised them that He would “make them fishers of men.” The Greek word for make, poieō, has some interesting implications. This word can refer to authorship, production, construction, formation, fashion, commerce, and even performance. In the same way that John the Baptist “prepared”—poieō the way for the Lord, so was Jesus planning to prepare these seemingly earthy...