Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

For all of you who sent me emails or left me comments telling you missed reading my blog last week, thank you. I honestly didn't expect anyone to care or notice that I was on vacation. Michael and I went to the Resolved conference in Palm Springs for four days, and once we came home I spent a few days doing fun stuff like relaxing at my neighborhood water park with friends and barbecuing with family. I realize I skipped the weekly recap of the James study, but enough of you had told me you were behind that I didn't think you would mind the extra week to catch up. On Wednesday I will resume blogging about that.


In the meantime, let me tell you about what I've been thinking about lately. The theme of the Resolved conference was heaven and hell, and I highly recommend that you visit the website and download the free audio. Over four days, Michael and I took in twelve expository sermons from some of America's finest preachers. There is no way I can expound on everything I heard. So let me hit the highlights:

1) CJ Mahaney preached one night on the doctrine of adoption. I absolutely loved it when he said, "If you have ever wondered if God loves you, the fact that you love God is proof that God loves you. Apart from His enabling you to love Him, you wouldn't be capable of loving Him. So, if you love God you can be certain that God loves you." Wrap your mind around that thought. It will help you survive your darkest days.


2) John Piper preached one night on sin. He had us examine disease, death and all of the horrible things we see on the news. Then he pointed out that all of those things are a direct result of the fall of man. Those things are all a direct result of sin entering the world. "They exist," Piper said, "to remind us of the magnitude of sin and the greatness of the glory of God. God would have you look at the sin in your own life and want to get rid of it as badly as you would want to get rid of cancer." Whoa. Never in a million years would I have made that correlation on my own. But, it's so true. I pray that I (and my loved ones) never get cancer, but I don't pray for God to remove the sin from our lives with the same fervor. Now, it's apparant, that I desperately need to reshape my prayer life.


3) Randy Alcorn opened my eyes to some very biblical truths about heaven that I would have never dreamed of in my wildest imagination. What he said was so shocking to me that I immediately purchased his book Heaven and have been tearing through it ever since. In all honesty, the thought of heaven has always made me a little nervous. So little is ever really said about it. But Randy's thorough study of it can prove to be enlightening to all of us. Have you ever considered that our current bodies will be the bodies we have in heaven--only they will be in a glorified and resurected state? Has the thought ever crossed your mind that the current heaven where saints of old now reside is not the permanent heaven that will exist when Christ comes back from the dead? Randy unpacks these topics and many more (Can those in heaven see what's happening on earth? etc...) in his book, and I've found it to be a gripping and life-changing read. It's sound biblical teaching at it's finest.


This blog post fails miserably as a recap of the conference. So, I highly encourage you to visit the website and check out the free audio for yourself. Prepare to have your mind blown. Yes, it's that good!