Faith
Fulfilling the purpose of small groups
I have had the joy of participating in multiple study/community/small groups over the course of my 30+ years as a Christian. For the most part, these weekly gatherings have been a regular boon to my life. They encourage me. They sharpen me. They equip me. I look forward to them.
I say “for the most part” because occasionally the dynamics shift and the benefits are lost (or at least reduced) due to human frailties disrupting the fruitfulness.
Read MoreHow to become a spiritual grown-up
It’s been a minute since I sat in my mother or father’s lap.
Heck, it’s been a minute since my kids have sat in my lap. (I sure miss those little people; all of mine are over 21 now!)
What on earth does this have to do with anything?
Fair question. Here’s the answer:
Read MoreServing a better master: trading busy for rest
As a business owner, I wear many hats. (Actually, I wear all the hats because I don’t have employees.) Like all of you who work in the home or out in the marketplace or ministry, that means there’s always a task that needs doing.
Always.
So, we continue “doing.” The alluring idea of getting ahead of our tasks list (or merely caught up), coupled with devices that make work accessible anywhere, anytime, causes us to work incessantly. But “ahead” and “caught up” are mirages that elude us from the distant horizon.
Perhaps you, like me, enjoy (or are addicted to?) productivity and relish in goal-setting sessions and achievement—all of which make resting a challenge. Yet an inability to rest and take breaks from work makes for a life equivalent to that of an indentured servant, subject to the masters of
- materialism,
- a need for success (as a “perfect” parent or star performer at work),
- the reputational currency of being busy, or
- the exacting requirements of our managers and bosses.
But God doesn’t want us to be enslaved to anything but righteousness and His love:
Read MoreHow to talk to each other at Christmas
Mary and Joseph. Joseph and Mary. We talk about them like an old married couple.
As two pivotal “characters” in the story of the Bible, we mention both when we reference either, almost as though they’re a single name or unit—which in some ways they are. But we mustn’t forget that they were two distinct and very real people. And their experiences as the humans who raised Jesus were entirely different from the start.
It shouldn’t surprise us, then, that God revealed His astonishing plan to them individually—and in ways that honored that they needed to hear it differently, too.
Read MoreWhat a little light can do
With the glorious colors of fall also come darker mornings and afternoons. Not having the glow of morning sun to greet us can be difficult for those of us who don’t rise early enough to be greeted by darkness year-round. Even as a morning person (my kids laugh at how early I go to bed!), there’s something defeating about making my way into the kitchen or family room in the dark.
I started using light timers to facilitate an easier entry into my fall and winter days. Though I’d used them for years to automatically turn on lights in the afternoons and evenings, having them click on in the mornings was something new. And I discovered how much I liked feeling the living areas of the house were already “awake” when I entered them.
But there was another—lovely and unexpected—spiritual boon to this electronic tactic I’ve been using…
Read MoreFinishing strong: questions for fall self-reflection
I just can’t help myself.
It must be something about the season: hints of fall and kids returning to school always prompts introspection in me. (Even though my nest is empty, years of my own schooling and those of my kids have me conditioned!) I purposefully use this time of year as my second of two “life check-in” junctures.
I do my annual spiritual inventory, self-reflection and (personal and professional) goal-setting every January. In late August/early September, I check in on those items again, course-correcting for anything that’s gone awry and thinking carefully about how to best use the remainder of the year for God’s glory.
This year the exercise feels especially significant as I’ve relocated to a new state. That transition has, as you might expect, come with a significant amount of change (and a very quiet blog/newsletter—huge “thank you” to my subscribers for their patience!).
Here are the questions I’m asking myself; perhaps they’ll prompt something valuable in you, too, with which to forge ahead into the rest of the calendar year:
- With the growing seasons of spring and summer waning: How have I grown in recent months? What part of my life has God nourished especially (even if it’s different than I anticipated or hoped)?
- Fall is the time when many plants need pruning to weather the winter: What might God be asking me to let go of or cut back on for health and future growth?
- As school resumes for students: What is God teaching me right now about Himself? About myself?
- Fall will eventually give way to cool weather: Who around me needs to be drawn near for the warmth of fellowship? How can I fortify new and existing relationships against difficult seasons that might lie ahead?
When James wrote to the Jewish Christians scattered abroad, he reminded them how important it is to not merely hear the Word but to internalize it and live it out. He used the metaphor of a mirror: that God’s law provides us with a reflection that reveals to us the dirt on our faces (sin). To walk away from the mirror without choosing to wash off the filth (repentance, trusting in Jesus’ sacrifice), is utter foolishness.
For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror. You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.
James 1:23–25 NLT
While this seasonal check-in doesn’t address our moral failings (that should happen daily!), the spirit of the exercise is the same: we may have “forgotten what we look like” somewhere along the way, so let’s return to the mirror to see what God is doing in our lives and how we can respond in faith.
What we miss when we read the Bible alone
I’m a sucker for a good story.
I know you are, too. We can’t help it. God hardwired it into our brains. Functional MRIs show how our brains respond to stories (versus information)—more areas of the brain light up and with greater intensity. And even newer research has shown something fascinating: our heartbeats seem to synchronize when we hear a story at the same time, in a shared experience.
How. Cool. Is. That?!
While this is obviously relevant for my work with speakers in crafting their content, I think there’s a treasure here for followers of God, as well.
Read MoreThree vital ways using our voices shapes our faith
As an introvert, whose nervous system goes into hyperarousal with too much stimuli from sound and light, I often opt for quiet, introspective, individual faith-building practices like reading or prayer. (This is also why welcoming my kids home for visits means I have to gird myself for the steady stream of music! But having them home is worth every loud minute.) I’ve been thinking a lot about voices of late as part of my work as a public speaking coach/consultant. As I’ve reflected, I’ve come to better appreciate how significant our voices are to growing in faith.
Three ways voices play an important role faith-development:
Read MoreHow to build (and maintain) friendship in an era of division
I could not relate to what she was saying. If I may be candid, I was even a bit turned off by what my friend was sharing with me. I felt the urge to disconnect rise up inside me: Well, I guess I know not to broach *this* topic again in the future.
And then there are the times when I’ve shared my thoughts and experiences with a friend only to have her expression reveal how surprised she was to uncover a difference where we’d previously seemed to share a sense of sameness. I’d wonder whether our friendship had a future; if our friendship had been built on common ground, would this quake bring its demise?
There have been similar instances in many of my friendships over the years. I used to think it meant I hadn’t found the “right” people to have in my life… that if I kept searching, I’d be able to surround myself with people whose perspectives always aligned with my own. On every topic.
I know, I know… it seems a bit naïve to me, too, when I see it written out in black and white.
And yet, I think—even if only subconsciously—it’s how most of us are interacting with the world. We allow our differences to drive us apart. And the result is a loneliness epidemic. There’s a good bit of research detailing this reality, some of which I’ve written about and referenced before. If the statistics tell even part of the story, about half of us are without even a single meaningful friendship. And while we can’t control all the reasons—and certainly will not lay blame at the feet of those who are ailing from a lack of friendship—there are things we can do differently for ourselves and for others.
Read MoreWhen you don’t know you’re sick (or somehow forgot)
Is there anything scarier than being sick and not knowing it?
Okay, there probably is. But I find the idea of an undetected illness terrifying. (Just me?)
If you’ve been following Jesus for any length of time, you’re undoubtedly familiar with our sinful nature being likened to an incurable disease that we’re all born with as descendants of Adam. When we trust in Jesus as our Savior we are “cured” through a righteousness transplant of sorts.
Related: New DNA in Jesus (an article I wrote for Our Daily Bread based on an amazing true story)
In Luke 5, Jesus rebuts the Pharisee’s criticism of His willingness to spend time with sinners saying “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:31, 32 ESV)
At first reading, it appears Jesus is describing the gaggle of social outcasts sitting at Levi’s table as being “the sick.” Indeed, they were all spiritually sick and in need of a Savior. And, as the religious elite, the Pharisees knew it too—that’s why they questioned Jesus for associating with them.
While that description may be accurate, it’s not the entirety of what Jesus was communicating. In a poignant way, He was holding a mirror up to the Pharisees, reminding them of the truth contained in (what we call) the Old Testament, asking them to recognize their own spiritual sickness.
This passage should make us uncomfortable, friends. Not because we’ve spent time at Levi’s table as a sinner. We all have! Knowing that about ourselves is what enables us to receive Jesus’ gift as the unfathomable grace that it is.
It should make us uncomfortable because it asks us to see how we’re like the Pharisees.
The Pharisees knew they carried the gene that predisposes us to sin and separation from God—remember, they were the religious experts.
And yet they ended up with hearts far from God, prideful over their position in the Jewish social structures and distancing themselves from those they deemed unseemly. Somehow, it seems they’d forgotten they, too, were ill.
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