Suffering: But wouldn’t a loving God always please us?

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Some guy in Alabama ticked me off.

I was driving back to New Orleans from two weeks of ministry in Tennessee and Kentucky when I bought a Birmingham (AL) News in Tuscaloosa. At a rest stop in Mississippi, I scanned it and was snagged by a letter to the editor written by an outspoken agnostic.

After reading it and steaming a little, I tossed the paper in the trash. Later, wished I’d kept it just for reference here. So I’m going by memory.

The writer wanted the world to know that the tornadoes Alabama had just experienced proves beyond doubt either that there is no God or if there is, He is a tyrant who delights in doing cruel things.

He was clearly proud of his great letter. Betcha he clipped it and is displaying it somewhere prominently in his house.

I’m wondering now if anyone responded to the editor and answered the letter. Probably not. The Bible cautions against answering fools, and this guy surely belongs in that category.

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Signs the pastor is not interested in reaching people

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(This is most unusual for me.  When I visit a church, I come to worship, not to sit in judgement, not to pick the sermon apart, not to criticize.  But this experience left me so cold, I came home and wrote the following.  Btw, this was not recent, in case I’ve been in your church in recent days.  Smiley-face here pls.)

I sat in your church and heard you preach. You did not know I was in the congregation because we never had the opportunity to meet.

Now, I was visiting in your part of the state, and the next day moved on to the next city where I’m ministering. So, had we met you would not have greeted a prospective member and probably would not have remembered it the next day. That’s fine and I understand.

What concerns me is that I was with some friends who have moved to your city and was hoping they would make some kind of connection with your church. That did not happen.

Watching what you did and failed to do concerns me. One reason it has persisted in my thoughts is that I’m certain at various times in my six pastorates, I made the same mistakes as you.  I could wish someone had loved me enough to call my hand on it.

Now, since we do not know each other, I’m assuming you will not read this. So this is not for you exactly. Rather, we post it on this website in the hope that other pastors will look at their own Sunday ministries in view of the newcomer sitting in the pews.

Here is what you did.

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Why there must be a hell

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But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.  (Revelation 21:8)

The best-selling religious books these days are about heaven.

But there must be a hell.

Write a book about how you died for a few minutes and experienced a momentary jolt of unimaginable nirvana and publishers will line up to print it. They know the book-buying public is eager to get a glimpse through that scary curtain of death…so long as what’s shown agrees with their preconceptions and supports their hopes.

Ross Douthat is a columnist for the New York Times. In a column titled “Hell’s grip on religious imagination weakens,” he writes, Even in our supposedly disenchanted age, large majorities of Americans believe in God and heaven, miracles and prayer. But belief in hell lags well behind, and the fear of damnation seems to have evaporated.

Near-death stores are quick to sell. “The Boy Who Came Back from Heaven” tells of a child’s return from paradise. However, you’ll search in vain for “The Investment Banker Who Came Back From Hell.” (Note: A comment from a pastor friend indicates there are a number of such been-to-hell books on the market these days.)

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Preparing for your one moment in the world’s spotlight

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“Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks a reason for the hope that you have.” (I Peter 3:15)

Sometimes you know when your moment is coming but most times you don’t.

One morning ten years ago, I was to be interviewed on a national hookup for Moody Radio. Early that morning, I sat at my breakfast table and thought about doing such things…

For the last week, I’ve had a post-it note beside my computer: Monday. Interview. Moody Radio. 10 am. A reminder to pray for the Father’s presence in this and a prompting to be near the home phone at that time.

It’s not like this is the first time I’ve been interviewed, so it’s not about my having the jitters.

What this is about is the need for a follower of the Lord Jesus to be prepared for that moment when the microphone is poked in his face and he is asked to account for something important.

I recall reading where a consultant was prepping politicians and Fortune 500 big-shots for their moment in the spotlight, for good or ill. Some of his points have lingered with me to this day.

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The overwhelming evidence of man’s lostness

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One great evidence of the lostness of mankind is that people rarely look up from their daily lives to ask, “Where is all this headed? What is out there? Where are we going?”

I sit on my deck and watch the birds swarm around my feeders.  I keep them stocked and am delighted the birds love what I provide.  But never once has a bird looked up to indicate an appreciation for my efforts.  They are so like people it’s not funny.  We take everything for granted.

In a 1965 sermon, Billy Graham tells of the time when Robert Ingersoll, well-known atheist of the 19th century, was addressing an audience in a small town in New York. The orator forcefully laid out his doubts concerning a future judgement and the reality of hell.

At the conclusion, a drunk stood up in the back of the room, and said through slurred speech, “I sure hope you’re right, Brother Bob. I’m counting on that!”

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I love old books–especially when they speak to today.

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As a pastor, when I use a story found while reading a book 50 years or more older, the one thing I am dead sure of is that no one else is using it.  That’s just one of a dozen reasons I love old books.  Following is something I wrote in 2010 after reading one such book.

I confess. I am a bookaholic, what’s called a bibliophile. New books, old books, it doesn’t matter. Turn me loose in a convention hall where the public library is selling off their excess and I’m in heaven for two hours.

I particularly love the older books.

In Cincinnati, I discovered a used bookstore that filled several floors of an ancient downtown building. I could have moved in.

I know where to find the best used bookstore in Jackson, Mississippi, and in Birmingham, Alabama, and never pass either city without a brief stop-in.

But there is reason to this madness. And it’s far more than a nostalgia kick. (There is that too, but it’s not the major thing.)

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Seven things pastors cannot do in the pulpit

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“…so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God….” (I Timothy 3:15).

You can’t chew gum in the pulpit, smoke a cigarette, or bring your coffee in with you. You can’t preach in your pajamas or lead a worship service in your swimsuit.

But you knew that.

However, some pastors do things every bit as silly as this, and as counter-productive, we must say.

Now, in one sense, a pastor can do anything from the pulpit. Once.

But we’re talking about things no right-thinking, mature and responsible pastor should attempt to do from the Lord’s sacred place of leadership in His church.

1. He cannot recommend a book which has questionable material in it nor condemn a book he has not read.

Okay. He can, but he shouldn’t.

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What one new pastor told his church about misbehavior

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“(I ask) that they may all be one….that the world may believe that Thou didst send me” (John 17:21,23).

No one wants your church to be unified more than the Lord.

According to Scripture, almost everything depends on unity.

A few years ago, my friend Charles stood before his congregation, ready to lead his first monthly business session.

Before they got underway with reports and motions and votes, however, Charles had something to say which they needed to hear. His little speech would affect the course of that church for years to come.

The new pastor wanted them to know how their business meetings were going to be conducted.

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How one pastor dealt with those anonymous letters

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We’ve all heard of the pastor–seems like it was Henry Ward Beecher–who received an anonymous letter with only one word: Fool.  Next Sunday, the preacher shared that with the church. He said, “I’ve received many an unsigned letter in my time. But this was the first time I’ve ever had someone sign his name and fail to write the letter.”

If you want to devastate a writer, that would do it.  But I suspect most of us don’t want to do that.

We just want it to stop.

Every pastor gets them.  In my last church, my assistant and I worked out an arrangement that if a letter had no return address, she opened it. She read it and then decided whether I should or not.  If it was negative and ugly, she destroyed it without my ever seeing it.  Once in a while, the anonymous letter was good and refreshing.  But that was rare.

Every pastor wonders what to do with such letters.  Here is the best answer ever.

Don Wilton, pastor of Spartanburg’s First Baptist Church, tells how he handled the anonymous letters in his book, See You at the Finish Line. 

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Leadership in crisis: That’s how you get to be a hero!

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I wrote this in April 2007, as New Orleans was in the second year of digging out and rebuilding from the devastating Hurricane Katrina.  The people described here are the kind we need today, people who step up and get it done even when others say it cannot happen. See what you think….


Doris Voitier is about to receive one of this country’s premier awards, the JFK Profile in Courage Award, given to only one or two persons a year for showing courage in the face of overwhelming odds.

Doris Voitier is the superintendent of the St. Bernard School System, in the parish just below New Orleans.  (Note: As of 2020, she is still in this position and also an at-large member of the State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.)  This parish was completely flooded in Katrina and 90 percent of the homes were either damaged or ruined.

A few weeks after Katrina, when everyone was saying St. Bernard Parish was destroyed and most leaders were still shaking their heads and wondering what to do, Doris Voitier decided if St. Bernard were to get on its feet, the schools would have to be operating. Problem is, they were all flooded and ruined, every last one of them. So, she had a little talk with the FEMA people, found out they weren’t going to do anything, and took matters into her own hands.

She took out a loan for $17 million and ordered 22 portable classrooms and 107 travel trailers for school employees, all of whom had lost their homes. Then she announced that school would reopen only 11 weeks after Katrina. Incidentally, she spent $22,000 for each trailer in contrast with the $60,000 which FEMA would eventually pay.

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