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Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 15:38 “But God gives it a body as he has chosen.” It is difficult for us to know what New Testament writers mean by saying we’ll become like Christ in his glorious body. On this subject, we do well to stick to the wording of Scripture. Paul wrote, "so is it with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable; what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body; it is raised...

A Lexington man was arrested on multiple charges, including attempted murder and committing sex crimes against a girl, the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office said Thursday. Steven Dwayne Bethea was sexually abusing a child — between 11 and 14 years old — and fired a gun at the girl’s father who found the 29-year-old Lexington resident with the minor, the sheriff’s office said in a news release. On multiple occasions, between Oct. 1-14 and again on Nov. 28 while at Mayrant Road, Bethea engaged in sexual battery with the child, according to the release. Bethea also encouraged the girl to leave...

Today’s Scripture: 2 Corinthians 8:3 “They gave . . . beyond their means.” When Paul wanted to challenge the Corinthian Christians to give generously toward the need of poorer believers in Jerusalem, he held up as an example the Macedonian churches: "We want you to know, brothers, about the grace of God that has been given among the churches of Macedonia, for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their...

Today’s Scripture: Matthew 26:41 “Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation.” If we’re going to watch against temptation, we need to be aware of its sources and behavior. To again use an analogy from warfare—and we are indeed engaged in spiritual warfare—we need some intelligence information about the enemy. The Bible speaks of three different sources of temptation waging war against the children of God: the world, the flesh, and the devil. We need to know how they operate and how they tempt us. The world, or the sinful society in which we live, is characterized by...

Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 15:53 “This mortal body must put on immortality.” As glorious as will be our "homecoming" at death, there will be an even more glorious time at the resurrection when our perfected spirits are united with our resurrection bodies. John refered to this in 1 John 3:2: "When he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is" (NIV). At the resurrection we’ll be like Jesus not only in spirit, but also in body. Paul told us, "The Lord Jesus Christ . . . will transform our lowly body to be like...

Today’s Scripture: Isaiah 41:14-15 “Fear not, you worm Jacob. Behold, I make of you a threshing sledge.” Years ago when God opened up for me a wider Bible teaching and writing ministry, I felt drawn to Isaiah 41:14-15. Though the promise was given to Israel, I sensed God allowing me to make a personal application—that he would indeed make me into a threshing sledge, a harvesting instrument in his hand. I also sensed that God required, as a condition of the promise, that I accept the description of "worm Jacob," not in a denigrating sense, but as a realization of...

(Origianl language is German. I used Google translate and did some editing for readability) The Bremen district court has convicted the pastor of the St. Martini Protestant congregation in the Hanseatic city, Olaf Latzel, of sedition. The presiding judge Ellen Best said on Wednesday that the 53-year-old theologian had incited hatred against homosexuals in a "marriage seminar" posted on YouTube. She joined the public prosecutor's request and imposed a four-month prison sentence, converted to a fine of 90 euros a day for 90 days. The defense had pleaded for acquittal. (AZ: 96 Ds 225 Js 26577/20) The punishment is in...

Today’s Scripture: 2 Corinthians 6:17-18 “I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, . . . says the Lord Almighty.” What will it be like when we enter the presence of the Lord? The apostle Peter gave us an inspired perspective on this in 2 Peter 1:11, where he said, "There will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ." This is a picture of a grand and glorious homecoming. At the end of World War II thousands of servicemen returned home from Europe and the...

Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 15:10 “By the grace of God I am what I am.” Paul was conscious throughout his entire ministry of his utter unworthiness to be a servant of Christ. We see him expressing it again to the Corinthians: "For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace...

A woman walking a Florida beach thought she had come across a decapitated body. Thankfully, it just turned out to be the type of figure you’d see showing off clothing from a store window. The headless mannequin spotted on Perdido Key near A volunteer for an environmental nonprofit in Florida discovered what she thought was a dead body while cleaning up a beach in the state — but the corpse turned out to just be a store mannequin. Ocean Hour, a Florida based nonprofit that organizes beach cleanups across the state, shared news of what happened on Facebook on Monday....

Today’s Scripture: Psalm 16:11 “In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” The period between our death and the still-future resurrection of our bodies is usually called the intermediate state. The Bible actually tells us little about this period, but what it does say is very encouraging. In 2 Corinthians 5:8 Paul said that he "would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord" (NIV), and in Philippians 1:23 he said, "My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better." Taking Paul’s statements...

Today’s Scripture: Hebrews 12:22-23 “You have come . . . to the spirits of the righteous made perfect.” Although the Spirit is at work in us to transform us, our sinful nature opposes him every step of the way. We find we still struggle with indwelling sin. "For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the spirit, and the spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want" (Galatians 5:17, NIV). A continuous conflict wages between two opposing forces in our hearts. When we...

Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:4 “I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus.” In his comments on 1 Corinthians 1:4, Dr. Gordon Fee has helpful insight on the connection of grace and gifts: "The specific basis of Paul’s thanksgiving in their case is God’s ‘grace given you in Christ Jesus.’ Commonly this is viewed as a thanksgiving for grace as such, i.e., the gracious outpouring of God’s mercy in Christ toward the undeserving. However, for Paul charis (?race’) very often is closely associated with charisma/ charismata...

When Others Abuse Today’s Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:5 “[Love] . . . is not easily angered.” I certainly don’t advocate "doormat" Christianity, letting people continually run over us or abuse us. There are times when we must stand up for what is right and just. But we should not sin in the process. We must face the fact that much, if not most, of our anger is sinful, even though it may arise from the sinful actions of others. In emphasizing our sin of anger, I do not mean to minimize the sin of those other people. But there’s an...

Today’s Scripture: Romans 2:4 “God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance.” As we begin to mortify a particular sin, we’ll often fail more than we succeed. Then we must realize that we stand before God on the basis of his grace rather than our performance. I realize there’s a fine line between using grace as an excuse for our sin and using grace as a remedy for it. John Owen had keen insight on this: "here then is where the deceit of sin intervenes. It persuades us to dwell upon the notion of grace and diverts our attention...

Today’s Scripture: Ephesians 3:8 “To me, though I am the very least of all the saints . . . grace was given.” Paul freely acknowledged that he received his apostleship purely as a result of God’s undeserved favor. God used Paul’s testimony to encourage me at a time when I most keenly felt my complete unworthiness to write on the subject of personal holiness. So is all ministry—whether teaching a children’s Sunday school class, witnessing to inmates at the local prison, or preaching to thousands of people each Sunday—performed by the grace of God by people who are unworthy to...

Today’s Scripture: 1 John 4:7 “Whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.” The apostle John gave us yet another indicator of the Spirit’s work within us in 1 John 3:14: "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers." Do you love other believers? Do you enjoy gathering with them to worship God? I once became baffled while seeking to help another believer struggling with assurance. Nothing I suggested seemed to work. Then one day he told me his struggle was over. He’d come across 1 John 3:14. As he...

Today’s Scripture: 1 John 3:9 “No one born of God makes a practice of sinning.” The apostle John gave us another indicator for knowing we have eternal life: "you may be sure that everyone who practices righteousness has been born of him" (1 John 2:29). This test can be a tricky one. We might understand John to say that only those who always do what is right are born of God. Though that’s certainly God’s standard for us, obviously none of us measures up to it. Even John himself said, "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves...

HORRY COUNTY, S.C. (WMBF) – A deputy coroner with Horry County was taken into custody Wednesday morning and charged with murder in connection with a missing persons case, according to authorities. Online records from the J. Reuben Long Detention Center state 37-year-old Chris Allen Dontell was booked at 9:43 a.m. Wednesday and charged with murder. Additionally, 35-year-old Meagan Marie Jackson was also booked on a charge of murder. Authorities said the charges stemmed from the death of missing man Gregory Vincent Rice. He was reported missing on Oct. 5, 2020. At that time, Rice was believed to have been heard...

Today’s Scripture: 2 Corinthians 12:10 “When I am weak, then I am strong.” Paul’s attitude toward his weakness was vastly different from our usual response. We abhor weakness and glory in self-sufficiency and manmade accomplishments. Even Christians flock to hear a testimony from the sports superstar or the popular entertainer simply because of that person’s fame and status. How many of us would make any effort to hear a man who said, "I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses. I am content with weaknesses. When I am weak, then I am strong" (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)? I think...