Recently I met with a pastor who wanted my advice about launching a new worship service at the church he serves. He shared with me timelines, objectives, strategies, and the detailed agendas for the next several months of launch team meetings. I paused. “Ok, sounds...
Leadership is a choice. This is apparently controversial, but more than any other element I can track, leadership occurs when someone decides it's important that they lead. The challenge, then, is in making the choice to lead...
I would like to invite you to do one new thing. I’ll get to what it is in a minute. The evidence is in and, honestly, if you hang which nonchurch people at all, you can verify this yourself, that one of the features that marks...
I hope you’ve seen this 2011 viral video of this amazing kid’s rendition of DC Talk’s “Nu Thang,” If you haven’t, lighten up your day a bit and take a look: Typically, when I hear someone quote Isaiah 43:19, in which the Lord says, “I am...
Theologian N.T. Wright has reminded us that the gospel “is news, not advice.” That news, coming in the days of celebration of the incarnation is straight-forward: God has come to us in Jesus Christ. Grace abounds. Love wins. And everything the church is called to...
I know a family who got hockey sticks and pucks for their two older sons and an electric guitar for their younger son for Christmas. By noon, the boys had broken all of the garage windows and shorted out the electrical system! That family did...
James Baldwin once wrote, “It has always been much easier (because it has always seemed much safer) to give a name to the evil without than to locate the terror within. And yet, the terror within is far truer and far more powerful than any of...
Have you ever made a decision because you wanted to please someone? If the person we want to please is a significant donor in our church, a leader in our ministry, or an important person in our life…we may find it difficult to disappoint that...
“This saber-rattling with North Korea really has me scared.” “I’m worried that with this new tax plan, I will have to quit graduate school.” “I live in fear every day that my son will be deported.” “Of course, I carry a gun. I ‘m afraid...