Thom S. Raynor notes that leaders often fail to apologise properly for their failures and mistakes. They thereby sacrifice integrity and lose credibility.
Among the worst examples of nonapologies, Raynor suggests the following:-
Pharaoh, the ruler of Egypt, refused to release the Hebrew people from slavery and allow them to leave his country. So the Lord sent ten plagues upon the Egyptians to break Pharaohs stubborn will and to demonstrate his power and superiority over the pagan gods of the Egyptians.
These plagues occurred within a period of about nine months, in the following order:
According to the Bible, sin is
(Source unknown)…
Matthew 18:21-35
I’ve never yet met a person who didn’t think that forgiveness was a good thing. Peter certainly thought so. He just wanted to check what its limits might be. The rabbis said that one should forgive a person up to three times. Peter was prepared to more than double the figure: “Up to seven times, Master?” “Not seven, but seventy times seven,” says Jesus; meaning, of course, one should forgive his brother an unlimited number of times.…
Have you ever received a really unusual, unexpected, useless, or tasteless gift?
A woman was browsing in a second-hand bookshop when she saw a book that she thought would be just what her husband needed to read, so she bought it for him. It was called How To Hug. You can imagine how pleased she was when that evening she saw him leafing through it with obvious interest. It was only then that she discovered her mistake. …
Mark 10:13-16
Imagine the scene: Jesus is resting, perhaps, in the home of one of his friends. There is a sound of chatter at the door. Mothers and fathers, grandparents too, are arriving with little children, toddlers, babies. They’re asking to come in, so that Jesus can touch the little ones.
Peter and the others will have none of it. Standing in the doorway, they seek to protect their Master from all this fuss and intrusion. …
1 Peter 4
The letter begins: Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God’s elect, strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.
Peter deals with the very practical tension between the dignity of being God’s chosen people and the struggle of living as Christians in an alien and often hostile world.
4:19 provides a summary of what has gone before:- So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.…
Ephesians 4:1-16
Ephesians the Switzerland of the NT.
But Switzerland isn’t all mountain peaks, and Ephesians isn’t all lofty doctrine.
We move from belief to behaviour, from principles to practice, from our wealth in Christ to our walk in Christ, from doctrine to duty, from exposition to exhortation, from the indicative to the imperative, from what God has done to what we must do, from the credenda to the agenda
Yet the two parts of Ephesians are closely connected. …
1 Timothy 6:3-21
Parents can love their children too much – or so they are sometimes tempted to think.
Here are some apostolic concerns, for Timothy, ‘my true son in the faith,’ (1:2).
Cf. 1 Tim 1:3-11; 1 Tim 6:1 ,3,5,11,12,14,20,21.
We know that mere head-knowledge does not make a Christian. Indeed, it’s a menace. The devil is a better theologian than any of us, but still a devil.
I’d might even be willing to concede that Christian belief is less important than Christian behaviour. …
