The NU Blog Page

Near my home in East Texas, I once attended a spiritual retreat where one of the participation exercises revolved around pots. We were encouraged to do a “contemplative walk” around the grounds, where we would observe clay pots at three locations. Actually, they were large clay urns. We were to stop at each location and…

Why is family church participation expected of us? Because God wants it to be like the family and because relationships matter. I remember when I was on a deployment to Iraq, my wife had a crisis at home. Our front porch collapsed because it was a poorly poured slab of concrete. The water would build…

Have you ever considered how God uses broken people? I had the privilege this past week of attending an annual benefit luncheon for the Highway 80 Rescue Mission in Tyler, Texas. This organization is dedicated to caring for the homeless, the“street people” in East Texas. The keynote speaker was Elisa Morgan, who served as President…

The Rafa Crossing is in the news since hostilities have broken out again between Israel and Hamas. My family lived in Cairo, Egypt, during the late 1980s. We used some of the time to tour the area and once rode a Volkswagen tour bus across the northern Sinai and into Israel. The passengers included both…

Family devotions can unite the family like nothing else. Speaking directly to fathers on this point, if you are not leading your family in a devotion, much less leading them to church, you are wrong. You and your wife need to discuss face-to-face when this will happen and what this will look like. Discipling is…

It is now autumn in the northern hemisphere. A few years ago, my wife and I enjoyed a ten-day trip to New England, where we were able to experience the brilliance of a colorful landscape made even more so by the changing colors of the leaves. Many people travel there in the Fall just to…

What about the “little prayers” we might offer throughout the day? I often take a great deal of time composing formal prayers, prayers to begin a meeting, prayers to recognize an associate’s particular accomplishment, and prayers to recognize the passing of a devoted servant of God. It came to me this week that these “big”…

Have you ever wondered about the beauty of creation? Why a sunset on a beach is captivating, snowcapped mountains are breathtaking, and a valley filled with wildflowers is enchanting? Scripture, as a whole, teaches that God brought the universe and everything in it into existence to magnify His glory. The creation of all these things…

What is the core of the gospel, or core gospel? There is a joke in English language training about getting “the wrong emphasis on the right syllable.” Verbally it is articulated, “…the wrong EmPHAAsis on the right syLABble” (It doesn’t work as well in written form as in spoken.) Verbally, it is a bit like…

Lessons from an Unexpected Adventure Throughout history, humans have harbored an innate fear of snakes. These slithering creatures have often been depicted as symbols of malevolence and deception in various cultures. In the Bible, the snake has served as a symbol of the “evil one” or the “deceiver.” From the serpent in the Garden of…