Sometime ago I attended a worship service where a total of one minute and 42 seconds were given to reading the Scriptures and prayer. Music and preaching are central in this particular church’s liturgy. Now I love singing and preaching but not to the virtual exclusion of listening to God’s word and talking to God. I discovered the reason this church gives so little time to reading and praying is because the leadership feels these two elements of worship lack

Over the years I’ve read several excellent guides written to help believers prepare for Sunday worship. I am persuaded we are rescued from mind-drifting and boredom and a lack of joy in worship when we come with prepared hearts. When David says, “Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise” is he not requiring us to come ready to express our gratitude and adoration? My plan in my next few posts is to write about how we sing

Are you a sluggard? Please don’t stop reading. Do you often choose to loaf? Which word best describes you: procrastinator or productive? Are you lazy when it comes to doing your work? Are you slothful when it comes to giving the time necessary to cultivating the knowledge of God? Is there a frequent sluggish impulse in you? The sluggard is one of the main characters in the book of Proverbs (see 6:9-11; 12:27; 13:4; 15:19; 18:9; 19:24; 21:25; 22:13; 26:13-16).

James Boice wrote: What can preserve us from ruin? What can empower us to say no to temptation? What can enable us to live a holy life in the midst of our most wicked surroundings? Only the Word of God, the Bible, which we must study and hide away in our hearts. You may be thinking: “I don’t have time to memorize Scripture” or “I don’t have the ability to commit to memory verbatim verses from the Bible.” In other words,

One answer is because “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2Timothy 3:16). Paul is telling us that the Old Testament is the inspired Word of God. When you read the Old Testament or hear it read – you are listening to God speak to you.  It is as though you get up very close to God and you feel the breath of his mouth on your face as he speaks to you. What the