“But if not…” says that if God, for reasons of his own that we cannot see and may never understand, chooses not to intervene in the way we hope, we still won’t bow. The obedience is not contingent on the outcome. The loyalty is not conditional on the rescue. We serve him because he is God, not because he has agreed in advance to protect us from all consequences.

This little stone — humble, subversive, seemingly insignificant — strikes the statue at its feet. Not at the head. Not where it looks strong. At the feet. And the whole thing collapses. Gold, silver, bronze, iron, clay — "they became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, so that not a trace of them could be found." (2:35) And then the stone — the stone! — grows. It becomes a mountain. And the mountain fills the whole earth.

The Book of Revelation, the great companion volume to Daniel, knows this moment. In chapter 11, after the seventh angel sounds his trumpet, the elders in heaven fall on their faces and sing: "The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever." That is Daniel 2 reaching its conclusion. The stone has become the mountain. The mountain has filled the earth.

If we are exiles, resident aliens here while being citizens of the heavenly city, then the most practical book in the Old Testament for this moment is the one we open in this series: the Book of Daniel.

These are the two pillars no Christian can live without: God is sovereign over where we are. God is faithful to meet us with his grace. The exile is within his purpose. The calling comes with provision. The same God who placed Daniel in Babylon gave Daniel everything he needed to serve there for the rest of his life.

Daniel was an exile. He did not comply. But neither did he withdraw, rage, or despair. He received grace to maintain his faith and grace to love and serve even those who hated him. He learned Babylon's language. He served in the government. He contributed to its flourishing. And he prayed three times a day, with his windows open toward home. That posture — present in Babylon without becoming Babylonian, engaged without being absorbed, hopeful without being naive — is the posture this series is about.

At least 1.5 million Jews perished in Auschwitz and its neighboring camp, Birkenau. The evidence indicates many more than that died. Hundreds of thousands of others were murdered under the terrifying efficiency of these Nazi death and labor camps. This is the brief story of one of those others, and the difference that one life offered up in love made in the life of another.

The Church has never been a gathering of the already-perfected. It has always been, and will always be on this side of eternity, a hospital for sinners, a ragged collection of people who sometimes betray and sometimes deny, who struggle with pride and cowardice and all manner of ordinary human failure. If you have spent any time in a church — including this one — you already know this. It is not news.

But here is what is news. Here is what cuts against the darkness of that room like a lamp in a window.

Jesus, knowing all of it — the betrayal already in motion, the denial already forming in Peter's chest, the scattering that was only hours away — Jesus gave them the mandate anyway. Love one another as I have loved you.

Passover week has just begun. A stranger is riding into Jerusalem, and exuberant crowds are hailing his arrival. They spread their cloaks on the road and cried out a name that ought to stop us cold: "Hosanna to the Son of David!"

That name. How?

How can the Messiah bear the name of an adulterer and a murderer?

How do we sing his Psalms?

How do we treasure his prophetic words?

How does any of this hold together?

“And that is what some of you were…” (1 Corinthians 6:11)

The Corinthians had messy lives. Sexual sin, broken relationships, distorted desires. Paul names it. He doesn’t pretend it’s fine.

But then comes one of the most important words in the Bible: “But.”

“But you were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”

That one word changes everything.

The gospel doesn’t ignore the past. It interrupts it. It breaks into the present with a future we didn’t earn and don’t deserve.

Since my middle name is Patrick and my last name is Cassidy (or “O’Cassidy” as it once was styled) - a name from the misty peatlands, drumlins, streams, and forests of Co. Fermanagh - I hope you’ll forgive me this St. Patrick’s Day for commending to you a book with the title “How the Irish Saved Civilization”, by Thomas Cahill… and a morning prayer to accompany your green fashions today.

The sixth commandment is not merely about avoiding violence. It calls God’s people to protect and cultivate life. A murderous philosophy motivated the Nazi regime, but it has its contemporary co-belligerent in the work of Princeton ethicist Peter Singer. His radically anti-Christian view that belittles the idea of humans as God’s image bearers, a view he refers to as “speciesism”, leads him to conclude that the newly born infant is not fully human - only potentially so, that a human infant is no different than a pig and must prove to the parents that he’s worthy of life. This massive deception is creeping into mainstream thinking and affects the Church as well. Against it, we affirm a Biblical anthropology and choose life.

Paideia means more than discipline. It refers to whole-life formation. The shaping of a person’s values, loves, habits, instincts, and imagination. It’s the deep work of enculturation.

Paul takes a word that once aimed at forming citizens for the empire and redirects it toward forming heirs of the kingdom, the citizens of heaven on earth. 

The Ten Commandments are not thin rules. They are seeds. Each contains an entire moral world inside it.

Just as the command not to bear false witness includes gossip, slander, flattery, and manipulation, so the command to honor father and mother stretches far beyond childhood obedience. The bare command does not exhaust its meaning.

It will take time to unpack even the surface issues. There are two main angles here.

First, honor and respect. That is the view from the child’s position, or more broadly, from anyone under authority.

Second, “raising” up. Paul uses the word paideia in Ephesians 6. It means discipline, training, and formation. That is the view from the parent or authority position.

Honor and formation. These two realities are central to how the kingdom of God becomes visible in the world.

“I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit.”

The word contrite means crushed. Broken. Not theatrically ashamed. Not self-hating. But pierced. Awakened. Humbled.

There is a world of difference between shame and contrition.

Shame says: I am worthless, so I hide. Shame looks for fig leaves and weaves a new runway-worthy clothing line.

Contrition says: I am sinful, so I come. No more hiding. No more pretending. No more minimizing. I can’t save myself; I must have a Savior.

Ash Wednesday is not about groveling before a reluctant God. It is about coming honestly before a gracious one.

Notice the promise: He dwells with the contrite.

Not tolerates. Not endures. Dwells.

The high and holy God makes His home with the humble.

Some personal news and a word about some upcoming preaching and teaching, along with an invitation to check out the Alliance for Mission and Renewal in the PCA.

Over the years, I’ve been asked many times to preach the Book of Revelation and, while I have often preached from it, I’ve never preached through it. There are a lot of reasons for that, not the least being the weird sensationalism that some people bring to the book. But I find myself considering doing so now, maybe in the winter of 26-27, though I’m not sure if I would do so on Sunday morning or a new worship service in the evening. This article simply lays out how I approach Revelation.

The exposure of our many sins can and should lead us to a renwed daily repentance, a firmer reliance on grace, and a determined prayer that God the Spirit would sensitize our hearts to the abuse of God’s name, strengthen our faith to proclaim his Name, and deepen our reverence for his Name in worship, joining the Psalmist to exclaim, “O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is your Name in all the earth!”

In this framework, both antinomianism and legalism are refuted, and a rich gospel proclamation is reinforced, together with discipleship shaped by the whole counsel of God. Grace does not cancel moral responsibility. It reinforces it and drives it home.. Because salvation unites believers to Christ, a life increasingly shaped by his love is the expected result.

Idols aren’t hard to find.

If we could run an echocardiogram on our souls, they’d show up quickly. Career. Comfort. Politics. Control. Approval. Pleasure. Even religion itself can become an idol. That’s why God doesn’t just say who to worship. He tells us how. Because left to ourselves, we will always redesign worship to suit our preferences. We’d make God in our image and worship that image the way we find fulfilling.