Month: May 2017

Luke 23:42,43 “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” Calamity has a way of readjusting one’s perspective.  In times of success we have the debilitating luxury of being distracted by the temporal and unimportant.  When…
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Luke 23:34 Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Jesus had been beaten, mocked and hung naked on a cross. He was condemned to die with two common criminals, one of whom openly taunted him.  As his killers fought over his clothing, He somehow, asked the father to forgive them all. Though…
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Luke 22:61,62 Peter remembered the saying of the Lord, how he had said to him, “Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly. As my life came crashing down and the consequences of my addiction piled up, so did my guilt and shame.  I had…
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Luke 22:44 Being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. As I finished my workout yesterday, I noticed that both of my shins were bleeding.  Though they looked dramatic, they were just painless abrasions, so I wiped them off and moved on. …
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Luke 22:40  Pray that you may not enter into temptation. I once told someone that I went to a Christian drug treatment program to which she sarcastically replied, Is that where they teach you all you need to do is pray?  The implication was that Christians deny the reality of addiction and ignorantly rely on the…
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Luke 22:19 And he took bread… and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” I am what I eat and frankly, I eat too much junk.  It is not that I do not know what I am supposed to eat.  I just…
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Luke 21:34 But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life… I did not set out twenty years ago to become an addict.  I had no intention of abusing my power and privilege as a physician to obtain those pills.  If you had asked me ten years…
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Luke 21:3,4 I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on. I have always considered myself to be somewhat generous with money.  My wife and I grew up…
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Luke 18:22,23 “Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor… and come, follow me.”  But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. I sometimes think that all those with wealth are evil.  The cutoff for how much money makes one evil is above me, of course.  I…
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Luke 18:11-13 The Pharisee prayed… “God, I thank you that I am not like other men… like this tax collector.”… But the tax collector beat his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” I love the tax collector’s prayer.  It was the honest prayer of a humble man who knew exactly what he…
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