John Mark Hicks

Every life visit graves, and every life ends with a grave. Where is the abundant life when we are standing beside a grave? I imagine that question passed through the minds of the disciples as they hid behind locked doors after Jesus died. From their vantage point, “Good Friday” was not good. It squashed their […]

Early Christians in the second century understood the cry dereliction as Jesus’s feelings of despair in the face of death in view of the fact that the Father had abandoned (forsaken) him to death. The Father did not rescue him from death, even though ultimately God rescues him through death when the Father raises Jesus […]

May 21, 2001 and May 21, 2008 have something in common, and I remember that today, May 21, 2016. Those are the days on which our children died–my son Joshua and John & Maggy Dobbs’ son John Robert. The memories are painful and today we will each remember, commemorate, and reflect. I pray for peace […]

This Easter, before assembling with other believers, I visited Joshua’s grave. For me visiting graves has rarely been comforting. In fact, it is the opposite. The graveyard seemed too permanent. It contained too many granite stones which testified to both the pervasiveness and intransigence of death. I have found in recent years visiting graves is good […]

Good Friday, and then Easter. But a day is missing in that story. To move from Friday to Sunday we must walk through Saturday. Saturday, however, is a lonely day. Death has won. Hope is lost. Jesus of Nazareth lies in a tomb. His disciples are afraid, hiding, and deeply depressed. Everything in which they […]

This past weekend, on February 20, I was honored to participate in the memorial service of a godly woman in Colonial Heights, Virginia. Rose Marie Paden–the beloved mother of the Paden boys and girls, and the second mother of the Hicks boys and girl–passed from this life on February 12, 2016. In 1953, Rose Marie […]

[Hear this sermon at here.] When Jesus saw Mary wailing in grief and saw the others with her—both men and women—visibly sobbing, a deep anger welled up within his spirit, and he roused himself and asked them, “Where have you laid him?” They responded, “Come and see.” Then Jesus burst into tears. As a result, […]

May 21 is an anniversary date for me. Joshua died on that day in 2001. Many friends helped. Mark and Margo Black were there, Rubel and Myra Shelly were there, Mike Cope was there a few days before as well as John York, and we were surrounded by many others (including my Woodmont Hills Bible […]

God, take your hands out of your pockets and do something! Psalm 74:11a A Lament Prayer. http://t.co/NpomTUK0HC

Last week Lipscomb grieved through a student’s death on campus. The University responded wonderfully and in every way. I was asked to speak in chapel last Tuesday. Here is the link if you wish to hear it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMc39Go6d7Q