Coffee with Creamer

Barry focuses in on Mary’s Magnificat along with the importance of her faith and obedience. He acknowledges that for many denominations, Mary is sometimes overlooked or downplayed—pushed to the side—rather than seen at the center of the stage where she stands in the text, exemplifying women throughout Israel’s and the church’s story.     Scriptures: […]

Barry heads into the 5th commandment. This one is an especially tricky one, the opposite of which seeps into our lives at every turn. How can we begin to fight back against our sinful nature? We can start by having the highest regard for the person in the world we know to be the most […]

Barry arrives at the fourth maxim, which battles it out with our culture every single day—being a follower. In God’s command to honor one’s parents, he provided a method of training us to be ready to honor others for the rest of our lives.     Scriptures: Ex 20:12 Matt 16:24, 19:18-19 1 Cor 11:1 […]

Barry connects our third maxim to the Sabbath commandment, reminding us that on the seventh day God created nothing material; instead creating a space every week for us to value all things correctly. It is an invitation for us to consider more carefully what’s really real.     Book: An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section […]

Psalm 104 reminds us of at least two more things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving week. Time and order display God’s faithfulness to those he loves. He continues to engage with his creation moment by moment, evincing that he walks among us now toward a future where all will be made right. Scriptures: Ps […]

Barry is back to the essentials in the 10 maxims series. This time, it’s about the sanctity of human life, and the fact that is intrinsic to bearing the image of God. He challenges us with this statement: If all we mean by the value of human life is the importance of not taking it, […]

Barry begins a new series covering 10 maxims that he believes are essential to the Christian faith. These “commandments” are not those 10 commandments, but they are aligned with them and remind us that these truths will last even when we do not. Number 1: The Lord is as important as we are not.   […]

Barry talks about some of the challenges with populism and a two-party system. He provides a curious example of how, in some instances in populist movements, because of a two-party system, the minority can actually rule the majority. His conclusion? If we value freedom then we have to value it for everyone, even the ones […]

As promised, Barry provides a reflection on the book of Job. While we often think the book focuses on the righteousness and sovereignty of God, he suggests that mercy is the central point to the story. God’s answer to evil’s problem has always been mercy. The mercy of Job is his righteousness.       […]

Barry walks us through Psalm 101, a psalm with parallelistic properties that points out a daunting fact: a sure way to be excluded from God’s house is to treat other people badly. This is likely why God found Job so blameless. Job practices what his friends did not: mercy.   Scriptures: Psalm 101 Matt 5, […]