It is easy to point fingers at the loudest voices in the divisive conversations fragmenting our world. I can clearly see how their understanding of God’s love story does not translate into their daily human stories, but one night at …
A few years ago, there was a church in Texas that was expanding their vision of God’s Kingdom by becoming an intentional multiethnic community. They had done the hard work of getting to know their neighbors, growing in love, and …
Read moreTrue Community Transformation Requires Reconciliation
Canadian author Charles de Lint describes our plight: “We end up stumbling our way through the forest, never seeing all the unexpected and wonderful possibilities and potentials because we’re looking for the idea of a tree, instead of appreciating the …
The negative and life-diminishing ways we manage our brokenness and uncomfortable emotions are physical—things we do with our bodies in hopes of making our minds and hearts feel better. We can tell that these coping practices are unhealthy because they …
We stew in a sour soup of emotions for far too long before coming to God. For some, it is the crazy notion of getting ourselves in a better condition to approach him. (As if our current situation and subsequent …
Our first and most important battleground against shame? Childhood. Shame is transmitted primarily through shame-based family systems. If our child hearts receive the parental love we’re created for, we flourish—and begin to be drawn to an even Greater Love that …
I must start with a confession: Encouraging others is very difficult for me. I’m not 100 percent sure why, but when someone I know accomplishes something great—especially in my own areas of perceived expertise—my natural instinct is not to immediately …
Step One—Prayer of Silence Listening Prayer uses silence as a way of consciously making space for God. Silence is less about not talking and more about having a posture of open, attentive listening for God. Group Listening Prayer typically begins …
The vision of a God who has himself suffered testifies to his mysterious but good character. God’s suffering is part of the answer to that deeper, emotional struggle with evil. God does not give us all the answers. He cannot. …
Many fathers (and mothers, too—this is an issue that warps all parent-child relationships) are simply awful to their children—which means that Jesus’ words about God’s “fatherhood” (or any invocation of “parenthood” applied to God) are not easy pills to swallow. …