Articles
Strengthen Your Faith: Science Confirms the Bible
Today, Christians are faced with challenges from unbelievers which causes many to doubt their faith. Can the Bible be trusted? Are the sections of Scripture written as history meant to be viewed with suspicion until verified by modern science? Jesus talks about the...
God’s Valuation of Women
God’s original design of women was good, but Genesis 3 tells us that the fall mars all of creation. In God’s kindness, He still uses both men and women to accomplish His good purposes. Throughout Scripture, including the Old Testament, we see the importance and value...
Navigating Envy in Relationships
To know that envy disrupts the peace, contentment, and joy that God would otherwise grant to our internal life is bad enough, but even worse is the fact that if envy is not detected, dug up, and thrown out it will inevitably inflict some serious relational damage on...
Enduring Hope: A Pastor’s Guide – Christian Hope
God is not a hustler. And the hope he calls us to cannot be built on naive expectations that people will start seeing things the way we do. Our longing cannot be built on the arrogant assumption that we are completely right in the positions we take. It cannot even be...
Conquering Anxiety: Embracing God’s Love
I’ve come to believe in a better equation to describe what anxiety does: anxiety equals care minus God. We use the word care for both anxiety and love. We speak of not having a care in the world: that’s about anxiety. We tell someone we care for them: that’s love. The...
Trusting the Bible: Navigating Doubts on God’s Word
Who told you that the Bible is God’s Word? Do you trust this person with your life? The person who asserted this claim probably has some credibility with you, if not some influence and perhaps even authority. This person is asking you to base your entire life on this...
Persistent Faith: Overcoming Resistance
Here’s God’s honest truth—you aren’t the only one who’s looked giving up straight in the face. It doesn’t always feel that way, does it? There’s one feeling that frequently overwhelms me when I’m in the thick of trial: a sense of being alone. I’m the only one who’s...
The Unraveling of Ministry as a Profession
Ministry Challenges There is a place for visionary leaders and wise guides in both very large and very small communities. But the bifurcation of congregational sizes creates a world in which a small number of ministers have great autonomy, financial security, and even...
Missional Redevelopment: Transforming Church Properties
Steeples were designed to point to God. The concept of architecture reflecting theology and meaning is a relic from antiquity. The architectural elements of a classic church building are part of a centuries-old word picture summed up in the word “church.” “Church”...
Faith in the Midst of Doubt: A Pastor’s Journey
“If you take my son, we’re done!” Drew screamed as he sobbed into the steering wheel of his car in the hospital parking lot. Drew had just come from the neonatal intensive care unit, where his son, Linden, lay in his mother’s arms. Linden had been born prematurely and...
Redefining Ministry Success: A Biblical Perspective
I was devastated when one of my seminary students, a pastor of fifty-plus years, said, “I feel like neither my life nor my ministry has made any difference.” This thoughtful, kind, and intelligent man believed his efforts had been all for naught. Yet he had served his...
Discover Your Unique Prayer Style
When I stepped down from the platform, a lady approached me. I knew what she was going to say. I had just finished an enthusiastic and biblical rationale for prayerwalking as an intercessory practice for our communities. I greeted her, and then she said it. “Janet, I...
Faith’s Tapestry: Memory’s Profound Role
Why can I remember the hospital transport person who graciously pushed my wife’s wheelchair as we left the hospital when my daughter was born, but for the life of me, I cannot remember his name? While his name might escape me, his gentleness and candor do not. I do...
Laboring with Purpose: A Pastor’s Insight into Faith at Work
WORK IS THE GREATEST OPPORTUNITY many of us have for fulfilling the calling of Christ and his command to love our neighbors as ourselves. Reflect on that statement. What if every Christ-follower really believed that? Building sewage systems, creating businesses,...
Unlock Spiritual Growth: Embrace Bible Memorization
Most Churches Ignore this Important Spiritual Discipline It felt like any other Sunday when pastor Levi Lusko stood in front of his congregation and asked them to turn in their Bibles to the book of James. While the sound of pages being flipped filled the auditorium,...
The Power of Prayer in Ministry
We have been in the ministry, David for more than 30 years, Maxie for more than 60. In every church we have served, the assumption was that if an area was growing then we should do more of it! Add another worship service! Expand the Sunday school! Do another Outreach...
Encountering God’s Love in Near-Death Experiences
Never in history, until now, have we been able to hear from so many people around the world brought back from clinical death. I believe NDEs are God’s gift to our globally connected world—widespread evidence of God’s reality and his great love for people of all...
Healing Hearts with Pet Therapy
As the founder of Canines for Christ, an international therapy dog organization with over 1,200 Spirit-filled volunteers, I have personally made thousands of visits with my therapy dogs over the years. I have seen the profound impact that therapy dogs have on people’s...
Navigating Christian Ethics
In many people’s minds today, the most offensive thing about Christianity is no longer Jesus’ exclusive claim to be our only hope for right relationship with God (John 14:6). Rather, it’s the New Testament’s uncompromising claim that sex belongs only in lifelong...
Building Sacred Foundations
As parents, we want to build a foundation of faith for our families, but figuring out where to begin can feel overwhelming. When you sketch out a rule of life, you create scaffolding to give your family stability as you build your life together. Creating a rule of...
