Moderators Note: Bishop Lowry's video message to the conference for Easter is available for viewing or downloading at the end of this post. The day opens simply, while teetering on the edge of eternity. The Evangelist Luke records the story. “But on...
Moderators Note: Bishop Lowry's video message to the conference for Palm Sunday and Holy Week is available for viewing or downloading at the end of this post. As we begin the week that we Christians call “Holy,” I invite you to step back with me into...
In this time of chaos and confusion caused by COVID-19 and, most recently, by the dangerous winter weather conditions throughout Texas that have left many without power, heat and/or water, many find it difficult to know how to best move, much less ...
Moderators Note: A video version of this blog from Bishop Lowry is available at the end of this post. Charles Wesley’s great resurrection hymn rings out: “Christ the Lord is ris'n today, Alleluia! Sons of men and angels say, Alleluia! Raise your ...
Moderators Note: An Easter video message from Bishop Lowry is also available at the end of this blog post. After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the tomb. 2 Look, there was a great...
Please see Bishop Lowry's video message for Holy Week at the end of this blog post. “As he was now approaching the path down from the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to praise God joyfully with a loud voice for all the ...
Bishop Lowry continues his latest teaching series titled The Cross and Resurrection. This episode is the fourth and final of the four session class designed to be used by individuals and/or small groups during the Lenten season (though the teachings ...
Bishop Lowry continues his latest teaching series titled The Cross and Resurrection. This episode is the third of the four session class designed to be used by individuals and/or small groups during the Lenten season (though the teachings are ...
Bishop Lowry continues his latest teaching series titled The Cross and Resurrection. This episode is the second of the four session class designed to be used by individuals and/or small groups during the Lenten season (though the teachings are ...
On Tuesday, Feb. 25, Bishop Lowry kicked off his latest teaching series titled The Cross and Resurrection. The video teaching is the first of a four session class designed to be used during by individuals and/or small groups during the Lenten ...
The fire rages. The steeple consumed in a reddish-orange blaze topples. Unrehearsed, a collective gasp erupts from the watching crowd. A great symbol of the Christian faith, Notre Dame Cathedral is gutted. On Easter morning itself, seven ...
It is sign and symbol. It towers over the religious landscape of our day even in a post-Christendom world. It remains both an offense and a glory. The cross of Christ looms before us on Good Friday. Before we arrive at Easter, we must first stop ...
'How do you imagine the Savior enters the Holy City? Images abound. Some are famous and others merely prosaic. We have an artist's rendering hanging in our front hall at home. I like to stop at it periodically and ponder. The Lord's entry into the ...
The question lingers from a sermon delivered by Dean David Watson. “When people look at your Facebook page or your Twitter profile, do they know you are a Christian? Okay, you say, I have repeatedly posted Bible verses with colorful, flowery ...
If Lent is anything, it is a journey with Jesus to Jerusalem - to the cross and beyond. If Lent is anything, it is a journey of faith. Recently, I have been reading Matthew Bates probing book on New Testament theology Salvation by Allegiance Alone: ...
As I move through Lent, my days are crowded with appointment-making, struggles around the future of the church, the ever-present paperwork required to keep a large organization (i.e. The Central Texas Conference of The United Methodist Church) going ...
Tomorrow begins the season of Lent - the forty days of journey to the death of Jesus on the cross for our redemption and the triumph of Christ in the resurrection for our salvation. Historically, this has always been a time for Christians to follow ...
As I write it is Monday, April 10, 2017. Yesterday, I worshipped on Palm Sunday with my wife. The children paraded through the sanctuary waving their palm branches. It was glorious; a joyous expression of the faith! I was sitting on the aisle and as ...
Below is Rev. Frank Briggs', Lead Pastor at Lighthouse Fellowship, Day 6 of Lent, which he posted March 6th. He is posting on Facebook a Lenten devotional to help and guide us through this season of remembrance of the sacrifice of Jesus for all. ...
“They went to the tomb” (Matthew 28:1). How simply the Easter story opens in Matthew’s gospel. A tomb-ward journey is one we have all taken all too often. I can remember full well such a journey in my life as a pastor in Austin, Texas. He was young; ...
Here we are partway through Lent and I find myself coming back time and time again to what I like to call the cross connection - that is the way we are connected to the Lord at the foot of the cross. After all, whatever you think of the cross, it is ...
This week we are walking the way of the cross. Across the globe Christians traverse the week we call holy in a spiritual and powerfully symbolic journey from the celebration of Palm Sunday to the cross of Good Friday. It is both tempting and easy to ...
Palm Sunday is upon us. What a great day! The Savior’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem hits a high note in the life of faith. Notice first where the story begins. “When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of ...
Casual Christianity as we know it is dying. For a good decade now carefully observant pastors have noticed people who typically would worship a couple of times a month moving to worship patterns that are more episodic. A variety of studies (Pew, ...
I readily confess that one of my favorite more contemporary Christian hymns/songs is “In Christ Alone” (written in 2001). Its emphasis on the centrality of Christ and the trust the Lord rarely fails to move me to a deeper conviction and engage me in ...
There is an old story passed on to me years ago by an Army veteran in a congregation I served. If I recall it correctly, a company of soldiers was dug-in on a hill and receiving a great deal of lethal shelling from the enemy. Through the explosions, ...
As we continue heading towards the cross in our Lenten journey, those who claim to be Christ-followers traverse a landscaped called atonement. We cannot help but do so. We may argue at length with each other on just how a new relationship with God, ...
In the late 1970s I read a story that came from Punch (a magazine dedicated to humor and satire). As the story went, a woman went into a jewelry story in Sydney, Australia and asked to look at cross necklaces. The clerk dutifully brought a number of ...