Ken Winter

You may recall the account recorded in the Book of Exodus about the day the people of Israel came to Aaron demanding that he make them a god made of gold, while at that very moment Moses was up on Mount Sinai receiving the stone tablets from God Himself. The tablets contained the terms of the Covenant between God and His people etched by His own finger. On a day that their attitudes and actions sh...

At critical junctures along the pathway of our lives, we encounter doors that are either open or closed. We tend to perceive the open doors as an invitation or acknowledgement to proceed, and we often walk through them with excitement and expectation. However, we tend to look at closed doors quite differently. Those closed doors often represent to us something we really wanted to do or experience,...

i invite you to listen to the portion of his story you may already know … and the rest that could have been. Though some of the other characters and details contained in the story are fictional, you will find the truth conveyed about the One who brings hope to the hopeless is very REAL! My prayer is that you will allow this story to be a personal reminder that the One who brought him hope is capab...

You will recognize the main character in this story as the one who is often referred to as the woman with the issue of blood. i invite you to listen to the portion of her story you may already know … and the rest that could have been. Though some of the other characters and details contained in the story are fictional, you will find the truth conveyed about the One who brings hope to the hopeless...

If there was ever a day we needed to be reminded of the message of hope to be found in Jesus, it is today. This is the first of three short stories i am posting about men and women who experienced that message of hope at the moment of their greatest desperation.   My prayer is that you will allow these stories to be a reminder that the One who brought each of them hope is capable of bringing...

In his letters to the churches in Galatia and Philippi, Paul wrote that he was “ crucified with Christ. I myself no longer live, but Christ lives in me. For me to live is Christ .” Paul’s identity was in Christ and he was writing the churches to remind them that as followers of Jesus, their identity was to be in Him as well. The same is true for us … or at least it is supposed to be. It is easy in...

Eyes of fear will always look up at the obstacles from man’s perspective; eyes of faith will always look down at the obstacles from God’s perspective. Eyes of fear will always gaze out from under the circumstances; eyes of faith will always look over the circumstances in light of God’s promises. Eyes of fear will always be blinded by the visible; eyes of faith will always be illuminated by the uns...

The Israelites had lived in Egypt for 430 years. As a matter of fact, it had been 430 years to the day. Now, the Lord was leading His people to embark on a journey to the land that He had promised their patriarch Abraham; a journey that would lead through the wilderness.

Because early Christians truly believed God is worthy, there was a conspicuous transformation that occurred in their lives. It changed the way they thought about everything – themselves, their priorities, their relationships, their time, and their possessions. They immediately recognized something that appears to be more difficult for us today.

There is a journey each of us take most every day. It is a journey to a “well” where we go to meet a need in our lives. Its purpose may be to fill an emotional emptiness, provide mental stimulation, meet a spiritual need, or satisfy a physical hunger. The needs we feel may vary and the places we go to appease them may look different, but we all have a “well” to which we go.

In those days, the people repeatedly chose to turn away from God and do evil in His sight. Their actions led to their enslavement and oppression by wicked kings. The people cried out in their distress, and God in His mercy raised up a man, or in one case a woman, who He chose to use to rescue them from their distress. They enjoyed a period of peace … until they again began to seek their own way. S...

Have you ever found yourself being weighed down by a burden of leadership? It could have been as you led your family, your co-workers, a group from within your church, or a group of friends. Whatever the group was, God had ordered your steps to be in a position of leadership with the group.

The day Moses stood before the burning bush, God gave him a promise. He promised that after Moses had brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, he would return to that very same mountain to worship God. God didn’t tell Moses all that he was going to encounter along the way, and that is often true for us as well.

God’s primary purpose for creating us was for us to worship Him … with all of our being … including our language. i am therefore convinced that the spoken word was given to us by our Creator for that primary purpose – to worship Him. Yes, it was given to us so we might communicate with one another … but that is its secondary purpose. And i believe that sin is what caused our view of the order of p...

The work of Christ’s redemption is finished. There is nothing more to be done. We follow a Living Savior who rose from the grave. Let’s allow that powerful truth to permeate our every thought and every action every day … not only on Easter.

This is the last of four short stories i am posting about people who encountered Jesus during the months leading up to His crucifixion and resurrection. You will find each of these individuals in the Gospel accounts, however i have added fictional elements to each of their stories so that we might see each one … as they journeyed through their lives leading up to their encounter … and as they cont...

This is the third of four short stories i am posting about people who encountered Jesus during the months leading up to His crucifixion and resurrection. You will find each of these individuals in the Gospel accounts, however i have added fictional elements to each of their stories so that we might see each one … as they journeyed through their lives leading up to their encounter … and as they con...

This is the second of four short stories i am posting about people who encountered Jesus during the months leading up to His crucifixion and resurrection. You will find each of these individuals in the Gospel accounts, however i have added fictional elements to each of their stories so that we might see each one … as they journeyed through their lives leading up to their encounter … and as they co...

This is the first of four short stories i am posting about people who encountered Jesus during the months leading up to His crucifixion and resurrection. You will find each of these individuals in the Gospel accounts, however i have added fictional elements to their stories so that we might see each one … as they journeyed through their lives leading up to their encounter … and as they continued t...

Have you ever done something that you knew you weren’t supposed to do? But you rationalized it was okay because no one was ever going to know what you had done. And then you took great effort to cover up what you had done just to make sure that no one would ever know. The answer to that question for all of us is “yes”. How do i know? Because we are all sinners … and we all have the proclivity to s...

Rather than choosing to honestly seek Jesus and receive His truth, many in the first century opted to harden their hearts and vilify Him. But there is one man who stands out to me from their midst. He wasn’t the only one … but his story in particular has made a great impression on me. In a day when most religious leaders were known for their efforts to discredit the ministry of Jesus, there came o...

Unholy ambition is easy to spot in others. It can manifest itself in a lot of ways. The whole world is currently watching as one man’s unholy ambition has led him to direct his armed forces to invade the territory and lives of another sovereign nation. The resulting destruction is a reminder to all of us of just how evil our world can be, left to its own desires.

Some interruptions in our lives are simply unplanned delays. Like i said in last week’s episode, God can use His divine delays in our journey to bring us into alignment with His perfect timing. He slows us down in order to accomplish His perfect plan in the midst of our journey. But some interruptions are far more than a delay. They are moments, events and/or circumstances He uses in our lives to...

Most of us, if not all of us, have experienced a delay in a journey. Most certainly, we have all experienced a simple travel delay caused by circumstances outside of our control. But the type of delay i’m referring to is related to our life journey. We set out on a path that we believed God had set our feet upon only to encounter an unexpected delay that either went on – or is still going on – for...

Sometimes we can be doing things the wrong way for so long that we no longer see anything wrong with what we are doing. In some ways, our errant practices become the norm – and sometimes, they become our new traditions. That can be true in places of worship – as well as in our own lives. Such was the case in first century Jerusalem. The temple was to be a place of worship and prayer. And yet it ha...