The grief journey is a significant time in someone’s life when they need people to support them and provide love, care, and encouragement. As a believer, when we speak to a grieving person, it is important to speak with love, humility, and compassion.

Believers are members of God’s household, or God’s family. The phrase “church family” captures the depth of life that people share when they attend the same church. Believers who go to the same church do not just sit in the same building on Sunday mornings; church members go through life together much like a family.

The world is constantly changing, but God remains the same. His truth has endured the history of humanity and is still true and valid. The Bible says that Jesus is the truth, and that truth is found in who God is, the ways of God, and the rhythms of the world around us which declare the glory of God.

An important part of Paul’s ministry was to keep in touch with Christians and churches, to encourage them in their faith and to help them avoid heresy or get persuaded to believe anything other than the true Gospel message that was preached to them. He did this by visiting and writing letters.

Baptism is an important event in the life of the believer. It signifies rebirth into one's faith and a commitment to the Lord. But Jesus lived a perfect sinless life, and is one part of the Trinity. So why did he ask to be baptized? Did Jesus really need to commit this act? 

We must do everything in love because it is an act of obedience to God, keeps our motives right, and guides us to be more like Jesus.

Jesus offered wise and beneficial teachings about judging others when He walked this earth. From Scripture we learn that we are not to judge others based on appearances or to cause quarrels within the body of Christ. Judging others by anything other than God’s word is wrong and is behavior that we should avoid. Yet believers can and should judge sinfulness from righteousness. Jesus instructed His followers to judge correctly.

“Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly” (John 7:24).

Only God can see the whole picture and truly know the heart, motive, and intent of a person, however, believers can judge situations and actions by God’s word so that we know sin from righteousness, truth from deceit, and believers from false teachers. To judge by appearances is sin, but to judge correctly is what Jesus taught.

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The powerful message of this verse means that Jesus, who lives in each believer, is more powerful than the enemy who is in the world. What an amazing guarantee that God is greater than anything followers of Jesus will endure or face in the world!

Scripture places the Sadducees at immense odds with the Good News of Jesus Christ. Sadducees were Jewish, religious, wealthy, and held power. Many were high priests or noblemen. It is likely that along with the Pharisees and elders they plotted to have Jesus arrested and sentenced to death.

The life of Ishmael is tragic and confusing in some ways, but we find that God took care of Ishmael and his mother, Hagar. In Ishmael’s life, we see evidence of a loving God who is faithful and good.

It was a highly significant blessing given from God then, and it is still an imperative blessing today. We can continue using this as a blessing for all God’s beloved followers. The entire blessing demonstrates the great love that God has for his children and his desire for us to have goodness and peace in our hearts and lives.

Passing along the Christian faith and teaching children about God is an essential responsibility of parents. The Bible teaches that parents should train their children up in the way they should go (see Proverbs 22:6). Prayer is a beautiful and life-giving spiritual practice to teach a child, because prayer is how we learn to talk to God and develop a relationship with Him.

As an encouragement to parents, when we teach children to pray, we don’t need to be lofty or eloquent in the words we use. We can show children how to simply come before God and talk to Him as their friend. When your child learns to pray, they will be equipped for whatever comes their way in life because they will know how to turn to God. Creating a routine around prayer is a great way to help your child establish this spiritual practice in their life. Below are 12 prayers you can say with your child at bedtime.

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The crown of thorns that was being used as a way to hurt and mock Jesus and his claims of being a king has instead become a powerful reminder of exactly who Jesus is and what he went through to save the world.

In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul referred to the church as the body of Christ. He used this metaphor to relay significant truths about the church and to help believers better understand the value of diversity within the church.

Paul wrote this to the church of Corinth: “Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many” (1 Corinthians 12:12-14).

The church is called the body of Christ because Christ is the head of the church and we are called to do the work of Christ, each like members of a body. We have different skills, purposes, and spiritual gifts, yet every believer is equally important to the full functioning, mission, and efficacy of the church.

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