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Showing posts from April, 2017

Mixing the Holy with the Profane: Why I'm Ranting About "Easter" and Pagan Idolatry in the Church

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 Full-Blown Paganism in the Church Welcome, welcome, welcome to another edition of coffee with Conrad. Pull up a chair and get comfortable. I’m sitting here with my mug, looking out at the world, and I’ve got something heavy on my heart today. My passion, as many of you know, is for you to have a genuine, spiritual relationship with the biblical Jesus. Not a cultural Jesus, not a tradition-soaked Jesus, but the One found in the pages of your Bible. But there is a problem—a glaring, massive problem—that we seem to walk past every single year without a second thought. I remember a few years ago, I was sitting in a friend's living room. The sun was dipping low, casting long shadows across the floor, and the television was humming in the background. A commercial came on for a local megachurch. A man, who I knew to be a leader in that congregation, appeared on the screen. He wasn't wearing a suit or a robe. He had squeezed himself into a giant, fuzzy, white Easter Bunny costume. He...

Ministry Recap Pensacola Menge

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Listen to "Pensacola & Menge Weekend" on Spreaker. #TeamJesus in Pensacola this weekend.  And Menge Flea Market. Kingdom Connections made; Friend them on Facebook; We met Kevin Riordan; Street Preacher named Bruce; People were mad at this preacher; http://bit.ly/BrucePreaching Vietnam Vet get's healed at a stoplight; Not phased by rejection; Prayed for man with a bad neck; Prayed for people in the Laundromat; Some people just need a hug; Talking about Jesus at Menge; Prayed for a lady at Menge; Meet Doug Hanson at Menge; Bruce and Baruch in Jeremiah;

Stomping Iniquity: The Supernatural Science of Repentance and Overcoming the Flesh

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The Science of Repentance  I was sitting across from my wife, Susan, the other morning, wrapping my hands around a hot mug of coffee. You know how it is when you’re staring down a goal and you’ve done well, but that last little bit feels like a mountain you just can’t summit? I told her, "Susan, I don’t know if I’m going to lose those last five pounds by my birthday. I’ve dropped fifty-five, but I’m struggling." She looked at me with that simple, cheerleader-in-high-school clarity and said, "Oh, that’s easy. Just stop snacking." I just sat there. I think I actually blinked a few times in silence. Stop snacking? It sounds so simple, right? But inside of me, there is a "Cookie Monster" that lives and breathes. To me, peanut butter and crackers are a spiritual experience. My subconscious paradigm is wired to think that a snack is always a good idea. I remembered hearing Arnold Schwarzenegger once say that when he needs to cut weight, he just stops eating. I...

Standing in the Storm: The Secret to Communing with Your Own Heart

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 Standing in the Storm The sky over Gautier, Mississippi, was turning that heavy, bruised shade of purple-grey that usually means you ought to be inside. For hours, my phone had been blowing up with alerts—tornado warnings, severe thunderstorm watches, the whole nine yards. You know how it is; the "experts" tell you the world is ending tomorrow, but you look outside and it’s just a beautiful day. I looked at my wife, Susan, and said, "Let’s go for a walk while we can. Tomorrow isn’t guaranteed." We went for that walk, enjoying the calm before the literal storm. But this morning, reality caught up with the forecast. The wind started picking up, howling through the trees, and the thunder began that deep, rhythmic growl that vibrates right in your chest. Susan was getting ready for work, frantically searching for an umbrella. We finally found the one—just one—and she headed out. I stayed behind, phone in hand, realizing that there’s no better time to talk about the s...

Breaking the Chains of Iniquity and the Reality of Christian Deliverance

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  Sin at Your Door I was out mowing the lawn the other day, the summer sun beating down on my neck while the smell of fresh-cut grass filled the air. I had my Bluetooth headset on, listening to the Word of God as I made my rounds. My mind started to wander, just a little bit, drifting away from the scripture and into the mundane. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a wicked thought popped into my head. It was one of those dark, intrusive things that makes you stop in your tracks. I was literally listening to the Bible, yet there it was—a flash of darkness in the middle of a holy moment. I was surprised, to say the least. "Man, I'm listening to the Bible and here comes this wicked thought?" I realized right then that I wasn't truly meditating; I was just hearing. My mind was wandering, and that's exactly where the enemy looks for an opening. I had to immediately cast down that vain imagination. I started quoting the 23rd Psalm, not like some magic incantation, but really t...

Walking in the Supernatural: How to Move from Wishful Thinking to Mountain-Moving Faith

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Kingdom Keys for Answered Prayer I want you to close your eyes for a moment and travel back with me to the West Texas desert. If you’ve never been to Rotan, Texas, it’s a place where the horizon seems to stretch on into eternity and the sky is so big it feels like it might swallow the earth whole. When I was just a little boy, too small to even read the Bible my dad kept on the nightstand, I used to crawl into that flat space above the back seat of our car—the one right under the rear window. I’d lay there on long drives home, my face pressed against the glass, staring up at a blanket of stars so thick and bright they looked like spilled diamonds on black velvet. There was no smog there. No light pollution. It was the kind of sky that makes you realize just how small you are and how big God is. It was the same sky God showed Abraham when He told him to try and number the stars. In that moment, I didn't have any "theology." I didn't have a degree or a platform. I jus...