The Voice of Hope

Mark 11:22-26 Have you ever heard of the Haystack Prayer Meeting? In 1806, Samuel Mills, a college student from Williamstown, Massachusetts, felt a burden to pray for foreign missions. Until then, mission organizations in the United States were solely dedicated to domestic work on the Western frontier and among First Nations tribes. But Mills prayed the Lord would raise men and women to take the g...

Mark 11:12-21 What’s your first response when you hear the word religion? Do your ears automatically close? Do you groan inwardly or announce the end of the conversation? If so, why? Do you think of personal faith, a formal institution, or a set of prescribed practices or behaviors? It is a word I seldom use because it carries so much cultural baggage.        Religion is not a bad word. It means s...

Mark 11:1-11 What would you give to know the future? If we could see the future, we could prepare accordingly. We’d know which roads are accident-free or how to invest for maximum gains. We might know how to avoid risk and pain in our choices. Sometimes, when someone predicts the future, we ask, “Are you a modern-day Nostradamus?” He lived in France during the 1500s, and around the middle of that...

Mark 10:46-52 Sight is one of the fantastic five senses God has given us. Some people consider it to be the greatest of the five. For those who can see, we too often take this blessing for granted. The process of sight in human development is fascinating. Newborns can only see things within 8 to 12 inches of their face and are typically colorblind. Babies are born with a preference for human faces...

Mark 10:32-45 You’re probably familiar with the musical The Sound of Music. If not, it is the story of the von Trapp family, who fled Austria in 1938 to escape the Nazi regime. When they arrived in the United States, they had only $3.50. They eventually built the elegant von Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont. One of the most treasured pieces in the lodge is a rug bearing a Latin inscription Nec...

Psalm 1 The beginning of a new year is often a time for looking ahead. What are you anticipating in 2025? The future can be exciting; it can also be scary. There’s so much you and I can’t know in the future, and sometimes the unknown is frightening. You and I have fears of bad things happening to us. Maybe there are fears of nuclear war. Or perhaps a fear of having an accident that will leave us u...

One of the things I enjoy about this season of the year is the music. Music expresses the whole range of human emotions, but especially JOY! In today’s program, we’ll celebrate the birth of the Savior with various musical selections focusing on different aspects of His coming to earth. I invite you to sit back, reflect, and worship with me as we ponder the meaning of the Incarnation afresh—the Wor...

Mark 10:17-31 An interviewer once asked Donald Trump, “What do you think about death? Do you worry about dying?” Trump said, “No. I’m fatalistic; I protect myself as well as anybody can. I prepare for things.” However, as Mr. Trump walked away, he hesitated momentarily. “No,” he said finally, “I don’t believe in reincarnation, heaven or hell–but we go someplace.” Again, he paused, “Do you know? I...

Mark 10:13-16 Many of us have heard stories about someone buying something for a few dollars at a yard sale or flea market and then learning that what they purchased was worth much more than what they had paid. The seller did not know the value of the item they were offering for sale, or they would not have allowed it to slip through their fingers.    A few of you may be familiar with the 17th-cen...

Mark 10:1-12 Last time, we began studying Mark 10:1 to 12 under the title “Maybe I Do.” This text describes Jesus’ interaction with the Pharisees regarding divorce. In this dialogue with the Pharisees and His disciples, I mentioned that Jesus HIGHLIGHTS the insufficiency of “Maybe I do” and calls us to a radical commitment to His plan and purpose for marriage. The highlights are the confrontation,...

Many people today mistakenly believe that God designed marriage to make us happy. Happiness indeed exists in marriage, but it isn’t the purpose. Instead, I believe God designed marriage to make us holy and to glorify Him in ways we can’t when we’re single. In our previous study, we looked at several highlights from Mark 10:1-12. They were confrontation, concession, and clarification. We didn’t get...

Mark 10:1-12 Do you know the secret to a lasting marriage? I’m sure there are as many answers as opinions, and some will be right. Some would say that love is the most critical component. Do you agree? I don’t. I’ll tell you why in a few minutes. In Greek mythology, Sirens were beautiful sea nymphs who lured sailors off their intended course with their beauty and enchanting songs. Many sailors who...

Mark 9:42-50 “You’re a radical!” No one wants to be called that. It’s a word that makes us uncomfortable. It suggests extremes in viewpoints, habits, beliefs, lifestyles, or institutions. Radicals are people you want to stay away from! Most people find their comfort zone somewhere in the middle rather than the extremes. In the United States, the 1960s was known as the radical decade. I know; I liv...

Mark 9:30-41 “Core values” have become somewhat of a buzzword in business. Core values include a commitment to a quality product or service and creating value for the customer in the interaction. Integrity, knowledge, innovation, and more can be core values. These underlying principles guide the relationship between the business, its employees, and its customers. Core values are not just a set of...

We are in the time of year when we pause to reflect on our blessings. Canadians have already celebrated their national Thanksgiving Day in October, and soon, it will be our turn in the US. If you’re like me, you sometimes struggle to be thankful. We have so much, yet we are so prone to complain. Today we’ll explore cultivating a genuine spirit of thankfulness for all the blessings God has given us...

Mark 9:14-29 Robert and Mary Moffat were missionaries in Bechuanland (Bek-u-An-aland), now Botswana, in the early 1800s. They demonstrated unwavering faith and perseverance. Despite not a single soul embracing their message, they served the Tswana people for a decade. Even the leaders of their mission board questioned the prudence of their mission, but the thought of abandoning their post filled t...

Mark 9:9-13 Do you remember the biblical account of Elijah confronting the children of Israel on Mount Carmel? It’s recorded in First Kings chapters 18 and 19. He asked them, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.” One true prophet of God faced off with 450 prophets of Baal. Elijah proposed a test. The prophets of Baal would p...

Mark 9:1-8 On February 12, 2018, the officially commissioned portraits of former President Obama and First Lady Michele were unveiled at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery. The portraits now hang in the Smithsonian-operated Museum, where a complete collection of previous presidential portraits also hangs. Imagine the anticipation in the room as two large portraits, shrouded in black cloth,...

Mark 8:34-38 This is the second part of my teaching on this text. In the previous episode, I stated that you and I must take several ACTIONS to accept the costs associated with discipleship. The first action was to “give up your identity.” We delved into the profound act of surrendering to Christ, choosing to follow His plans rather than our own, a necessary step in our journey of discipleship. Th...

Mark 8:34-38 When I shop for an item I need, one of the first things I do is look at the price. I have an idea of how much I’m prepared to spend. I sometimes think about how long it took me to earn the money. Is what I want to buy worth the effort needed to purchase it? If the item I want costs more than I want to pay, it stays in the store. That’s counting the cost. We need to count the cost in s...

Mark 8:27-33 Throughout history, a diverse array of perceptions about Jesus has emerged. From His birth to the present, people have attempted to shape a Jesus that resonates with them. A blog post by Kevin DeYoung provides some thought-provoking examples. He writes: “There’s the Republican Jesus—who is against tax increases and activist judges and for family values and owning firearms. “There’s De...

Mark 8:11-26 Many of us played “Blind Man’s Bluff ” as children. It works like this if you have never played it: One group member is blindfolded, and the other players disperse. Then, the blindfolded one must go and find the other players. In some versions, the first person tagged becomes “it.” In other versions, the tagged players are eliminated from the game until all are found.             This...

Mark 8:1-10             I read a story about a first-grade class where some students were recent refugees from other countries. The topic being taught in class was simple fractions.             The teacher defined halves and quarters and then asked the children to write down whether they would prefer a half or a quarter of a candy bar. As she walked around the room, she noticed some students had w...

Mark 7:31-37 Have you heard the saying, “He has the Midas touch?” The saying refers to the mythical King of Phrygia, an ancient kingdom in Asia Minor, now modern-day Türkiye.             One day, peasants in Midas’s kingdom found a foreigner asleep on the land; they bound him and brought him before their king. Midas recognized this foreigner, Silenus, as a follower of the god Dionysus. So, he trea...

Mark 7:24-30 Thomas Edison was an amazing person. It is said that “[He] was more responsible than anyone else for creating the modern world. Specifically, no one did more to shape the physical/cultural makeup of present-day civilization. Accordingly, he was the most influential figure of the last 500 years.”  Edison’s early life wouldn’t have indicated such influence. At age seven, after spending...