Rainey Prays on Some Days

The new year brings with it a renewed opportunity to set goals and do things we’ve always wanted to do but have failed to accomplish in the past. For many people, this also means renewed attempts to practice spiritual disciplines such as Bible reading and prayer. I will leave prayer for another discussion,  but I have found a particular way to read the Bible far more helpful than any other. In this post, I’d like to recommend this method: reading the Bible in chronological order. If you’ve sat down and attempted to read a Bible from beginning to end, you can certainly get a lot of it. But you are likely to also be confused and frustrated because it does not always flow in a chronological or historical sequence. The Bible, if read straight through, actually skips around quite a bit historically. The problem is that it doesn’t really tell you it’s skipping around. You just have to know, or read the introductory article if you’re using a study Bible, to get the historical background...

Idea Tenebrae, a Latin word for “darkness” or “shadows,” is a service that moves from full light in a sanctuary and ends in total darkness, signifying the death of the Light of the World—Jesus—on Good Friday. In this variation incorporating the Seven Sayings of the Cross, the platform becomes more stark and dark as participants depart and extinguish a candle. Preparation Set up seven candles on a Communion table at the center of the sanctuary. Six purple candles should encircle a single white candle in the center. A six-person worship team should serve, one being the lead vocalist, who will sing acapella alone for one stanza at the end. Seven readers should be selected to read one of the seven sayings and pray as indicated below. At opening of the service, a designated person walks down the center aisle and lights the candles. The service can be exclusively focused on tenebrae or added at the end of a more traditional service. Communion is not done in this service. ...

Commentary on Deuteronomy 30 in W. Gunther Plaut, The Torah: A Modern Commentary on page 1545: "Fools attempt to learn the Torah all at once, and when they fail they give up altogether. The wise study a little every day."  A Midrash commenting on Deuteronomy 30.

The General Idea Participants will pray together in small groups in shorter bursts of focused prayer to help them stay focused and not lose interest. When time is up or prayer begins to lag, the leader will have group’s come back together and move them to the next topic. Materials Needed PowerPoint slides or overhead project Set Up Prepare slides with a different prayer focus on each slide and instructions for the group. Instructions You will create 8-10 “prayer slides” to display for 4-6 minute prayer segments. You will divide the congregation into groups of 5-7 people, who will then remain in one location in the sanctuary/room. (This activity also helps those who are in a group together get to know each other better.) Assign a group leader for each group by selecting the person whose was born the farthest away, and then have that person choose someone else to be the leader. The group leader’s job is to make sure the group stays focused and observes time limits. When in...

Introduction Modern technology enables churches to produce bulletins much faster than in the days of typewriters and white out.  Yet I am not so sure the quality is any better.  How can churches continue to produce low-quality bulletins?  It is easy—continue to apply the seven bad habits of highly ineffective church bulletins.  Habit One:  The law of all caps USE ALL CAPS ALL OVER THE BULLETIN.  IT WILL SLOW READING SPEED BY 14-20 PERCENT AND IRRITATE FIRST-TIME VISITORS. Habit Two: The Law of the Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Font Use a small font, preferably smaller than size 10.  This will cause senior saints to shout, but they won’t be saying “Glory!”  Do this only if you intend to issue magnifying glasses with your bulletin. Habit Three: The Law of Centering Center all text. This makes the information harder to read than left-justified text.  Really, you should use centered text only for emphasis and place a box around it....

I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City yesterday with my wife and several of her colleagues from Hawthorne Christian Academy . One exhibit that stood out to me was the Ishtar Gate exhibit , a brick wall that dates to ca. 600 BC in the city of Babylon. The wall has glazed figures of lions and the prophet Daniel would have walked by the walls frequently while living in Babylon. The lions depicted on the walls were associated with the goddess Ishtar, and people could follow the lions on the walls to her temple. Daniel's escape from the lions' den seems to show the powerlessness of Babylonian gods vs. Yahweh, the god of Israel. Nice kitty!

After the lengthy cultic interruption in Exodus 25-31, the narrative resumes in Exodus 32 with the people anxious because Moses has not returned from the mountaintop. This is subtly hinted at in the text, as the Torah commentary notes the transition in Exodus from “the man, Moses” in 11:3 to “this man Moses” in 32:1. People will not wait indefinitely when there is a leadership vacuum. This is why leadership transitions are so critical. Show me a church without a pastor, and I will show you a church at risk. In the absence of viable leadership, people will go back to what they know—to old habits and notions—and in this case the polytheism of Egypt. Despite their grand experience of deliverance under Moses' leadership, his absence up on the mountain with God leaves them vulnerable. It becomes obvious in this episode too that Aaron is certainly not a suitable understudy. Despite making a golden calf, Aaron clings to the notion that the calf represents God's throne. This is the...