I love big cities! There is something about the hustle and bustle of city life that energizes me. I attended a conference for Pastors in Chicago this past week, and if I am honest, I was more excited about being in Chicago than I was about attending the conference. But God met me on His…
DetailsThis week will be my 42nd and final sermon in the book of Romans. I have been committed to preaching through books of the Bible since I began my role as the church-planter and lead pastor of ReCAST Church over 10 years ago. Since the start, we have been through the books of Genesis, Joshua,…
DetailsI have been reading a lot in preparation for my new sermon series “The Rest of the Week”. I am attempting to encourage the dignity of everyday work through the teaching of Scripture. It has been pretty rare in my experience to have the church talk about the work that takes up the majority of…
DetailsTen years ago when ReCAST church was just a baby church, we started with a pretty low view of membership. In my idealistic and poorly informed view of church membership, I brashly stated to many people that church membership is not something that we see in the Bible. And so it was de-emphasized for the…
DetailsI knew from the very beginning of ReCAST Church that I wanted there to be a plurality of leadership. More than just a generalized desire for plurality of leadership in the church, I was convinced from the Scriptures that having more than one person leading a church was what God desires. For this reason, we…
DetailsI have been out on vacation for the past couple of weeks and in that time chaos broke out around the country. I am not suggesting that I was somehow holding things together, but it seems like quirky timing. So while I have been gone I had plenty of chances to read, pray, and contemplate…
DetailsI am preaching the very difficult passage of 2 Samuel 11 this week. David and Bathsheba is a super shocking passage in context. Everything is going great in David’s life and then *WHAM* he’s raping one of his soldier’s wives and murdering her husband as a cover up! And the text is starkly unemotional about…
DetailsReCAST Church was started 12 years ago, and it was right at the rise of the smartphone craze. I had my first iPhone around the start of the church, and I barely knew what to do with it. The App Store was new and amazing, and there were plenty of games to be found to…
DetailsI think I have noticed a trend. Maybe it’s just in my local context, which I can speak to quite well. But I imagine that what I am experiencing is likely happening in the broader context of other churches as well. First of all, I think many people cannot define what a pastor exists to…
DetailsIt seems like a few weeks ago that Linda and I were closing on our home in Mattawan and we were just days away from having our first services for ReCAST church. But that was 6 years ago today! April 19th marks the 6th birthday of ReCAST church and April 1st marks my 10th…
DetailsI think it is impossible to fathom the level of evil that lies dormant in every single human heart. Hitler was made of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen . . . Blood, flesh and bone. And yet he stands as a man who converted a whole lot of potential evil into kinetic evil. The human heart…
DetailsI believe that we are an increasingly pragamatic culture. That means that we believe that the value of something is only according to how well it works to produce a desired outcome. This comes out in business models that seek to get results by whatever means work. We value productivity. We value efficiency. And…
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