Many times we look at people who have endured pain and we say, “That person is a hero.” But pain isn’t the thing that determines a hero. It’s not what makes us celebrate them and want to pattern our lives after theirs. Bad things happen to each of us. The stuff hits the fan, and…
Here’s the thing about Christianity: The charge has been primarily led by men. Pastors, mostly males, set most of what we believe about God and the Christian life. Unfortunately, men tend to be fixers. We don’t like things we can’t hammer, tighten, or duct tape. We like the quick fix. But life doesn’t really work…
How many here love justice? Looking around the room, I see every hand raised. Justice feels good, doesn’t it? Christians like when things are fair. But here’s the thing: Scripture never called us to love justice. In fact, it tells us to love mercy instead. We are supposed to act in justice, but we aren’t called to…
You know that big struggle in your life? The one you might be afraid to battle because it appears to be a giant? Maybe it’s something that seems impossible. Well, if you don’t defeat that giant, somebody else will. God is determined to defeat giants in the world. But you get to decide if he’ll…
Was talking to a friend who’s self-employed. I asked him how he’s doing financially, and he said he wasn’t making as much money as he’d like. Granted, I don’t know if anyone makes as much money as they’d like. But he had a specific figure he felt would be a comfortable income for him and…
The bucket list is a fun concept. It’s all the things you want to do before you die. It’s a cool way to focus your priorities so you make the most of every minute of your life—especially as you’re getting older. But to be honest, it feels a bit silly sometimes. Yes, seeing the Taj…
The world’s big into innovation nowadays. We celebrate the innovators. But I believe a lot of what we call innovation is just good design. You see; innovation needs to help us do something we previously couldn’t do, or at least do it in a different way than we previously were able. So making a different-shaped…
I felt uncomfortable writing that headline, and I feel a bit uncomfortable writing this blog post. But I’ve come this far, so I’m finishing it. I work in the church industry. That sentence by itself is a bit uncomfortable, because the church was never intended to be an industry. “Worship music” makes about 40 million…
I almost let fear win last Monday. It looks like an issue of Sunday| Mag I’ve been counting on won’t be happening, and I had nothing for October 1st. The thing you need to know about Sunday| Mag is this: each month, I have to come up with twelve unique article ideas. Then I have…
A few mornings each week, I go for a run on a trail by my house. I have to do it early if I want to escape without having lost half my body weight in sweat. And on my way back from the run, I walk on a busy road where people are driving to…