You can do hard things, like make peace with difficult people. Just make sure your goal is to make peace and not merely to keep peace. What’s the difference? Peacemakers value both truth and grace. Peacekeepers are so afraid of confrontation that they avoid...
People can be difficult. Grumpy. Hard to get along with. Controlling, manipulative, and even abusive. You get the picture, right? Chances are, you’ve dealt with a difficult person in the last week or two and you’re still trying to figure out how you could...
One of my favorite poems is Robert Frost’s Nothing Gold Can Stay. Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can...
Remember the song by Foreigner, I Want to Know What Love Is? If you grew up in the 80’s, or just have an appreciation for timeless classics, the chorus just started in your head and you know the next line… and I want you to show me! I think perhaps the...
When you imagine what Jesus looks like, do you picture him from an illustration from Sunday School? Perhaps a painting from the era of the Renaissance? Or maybe as he is often portrayed in movies about his life? I believe Jesus was incredibly winsome and gracious. His...
When Jesus rose from the dead, he spent a few more weeks with his disciples. After convincing all of them he was actually alive again, he gave them some final inspiration, and they were ready to GO! I would imagine they resembled a team about to take the field at the...
One of the reasons we struggle so much with the process of waiting on God’s timing is because we embrace the false notion that while we’re waiting, nothing is happening. But God is an active God, always on the move. That’s why it’s important to...
God re-named Abram to Abraham, the father of many nations, and then waited 25 years to fulfill that promise. Imagine all the awkward conversations in which Abraham had to introduce himself: “Hi, I’m the father of many nations…”...
As I asked a circle of friends and co-workers, what’s the thing that holds you back from doing hard things?, the overwhelmingly most common response was: fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure. Fear of getting hurt. Fear of judgment from others. Fear of...
I’ve written about how unrealistic expectations and unresolved pain will hold you back from fulfilling the great calling God has placed on your life, but there’s an even bigger barrier to your effectiveness if you allow it to exist: unconfessed sin. ...
