A student who had recently lost his sight was sent to the Seeing Eye Institute for the Blind in Morristown, New Jersey, for specialized training. Upon arrival, he was greeted by another young ma...
Dag Hammarskjöld, a Swedish economist and diplomat deeply committed to his Christian faith, served as the Secretary-General of the United Nations during some of the most turbulent times of the Cold Wa...
Ministers run the awful risk . . . of ceasing to be witnesses to the presence in their own lives — let alone in the lives of the people they are trying to minister to — of a living God who transcends ...
2 Corinthians 11:2, Acts 13:50, James 4:13-15, Philippians 2:3-4, Romans 12:17-19, 1 Peter 2:23, 2 Timothy 4:2, 1 Peter 5:2-3, John 21:15-17, 2 Corinthians 4:5, 1 Corinthians 2:1-5
The Protestant Reformer John Calvin (1509-1564) arrived in Geneva to lead the city’s church in 1536, but not, as we might imagine, to universal acceptance. Rather, there was significant resistance and...
[Jonathan] Sacks comments on this passage, tying it back to his study of adaptive leadership concepts. In the first occasion, Moses was faced with a technical challenge: the people needed food. On the...
Editors Note: This is perhaps less a review as a jumping off part to articulate some thoughts I developed while reading The Minority Experience. For a full review of the title, a cursory google search...
John 16:33, Proverbs 24:10, 1 Peter 5:10, Isaiah 40:31, Philippians 4:13, 2 Corinthians 4:8-9, Romans 5:3-5
Of all the virtues we can learn, no trait is more useful, more essential for survival, and more likely to improve the quality of life than the ability to transform adversity into an enjoyable challeng...
Matthew 16:25, Luke 9:62, Philippians 3:7-8, Acts 20:13-36, Matthew 10:16-42, James 1:2-4, 2 Corinthians 4:16-18
The renowned scholar and musician Albert Schweitzer’s life was turned upside down one summer morning in 1896 while reading his Bible. He came upon Matthew 16:25: “For whosoever will save his life shal...
2 Corinthians 12:2-10, Philippians 2:7-8, John 1:11, John 14:2-3
Inexpressible Things This chapter of Paul’s Corinthian correspondence is rich indeed, revealing so much about Paul and his relationship to the Corinthian church, a church which he himself founded. Bu...
2 Corinthians 12:2-10, Philippians 2:null, Philippians 2:7-8, John 1:11, John 14:2-3
Preaching Commentary Inexpressible Things This chapter of Paul’s Corinthian correspondence is rich indeed, revealing so much about Paul and his relationship to the Corinthian church, a church which...
In this short excerpt, professor and pastor Tod Bolsinger describes how the changing world of ministry (in the West) has led some pastors to simply give up trying: About twelve years ago, I heard a ...
Mending is an act that requires courage. To mend can be to repair a relationship, as described in the line above from Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing . In this splendid play, Benedick and Be...
Here is the uncomfortable truth: Humans run to a much slower evolutionary clock than our inventions. To use an engineering term, we are the “gating factor” that keeps a process from running faster. It...
A close friend who started a financial loan business took thirty of his executives to the poverty- and violence-filled section of Montreal where he grew up in order to introduce them to the section of...
The improvisational ability to lead adaptively relies on responding to the present situation rather than importing the past into the present and laying it on the current situation like an imperfect te...
Crises, and pressures for change, confront individuals and their groups at all levels, ranging from single people, to teams, to businesses, to nations, to the whole world. Crises may arise from extern...
Relational congruence is the ability to be fundamentally the same person with the same values in every relationship, in every circumstance and especially amidst crisis. It is the internal capacity to ...
Change invariably leads to loss, loss to grief, grief to anxiety and, finally, anxiety to hostility. We need therefore, to acknowledge grief. We need to understand and choose to walk with the grieving...
The Servant Leader The servant leader is the hero of this text. And the example, par excellence, is the Apostle Paul. He has never shied away from holding himself up as a person to be imitated, as...
Eternal God, lead me now out of the familiar setting of my doubts and fears, beyond my pride and my need to be secure into a strange and graceful ease with my true proportions and with yours; ...
preaching commentary The Servant Leader The servant leader is the hero of this text. And the example, par excellence, is the Apostle Paul. He has never shied away from holding himself up as a pe...
I feel stupid. Do you ever feel that way? People think I’m smart because I have a PhD in psychology and I’m blessed to have people like you listen to me. But in reality I often feel stupid. As far b...
Father–Thank You for the opportunities You put before us every day to make a difference; and for special friends who serve You in all they do. Thank You for those faithful in their callings: whether ...
In her book Invitation to Retreat , Ruth Haley Barton shares some of the many insights she has had since she began intentionally taking inattentional retreats to re-connect with God and her own d...
The Messy Middle In his classic work Transitions, author and professor William Bridges shares an excellent anecdote about life in crisis: it can happen at any time and in a myriad of ways. It also de...
James 1:2-4, Romans 5:3-5, 1 Peter 1:6-7, 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, Isaiah 40:31
It’s human nature to resist change—particularly when it comes in the form of adversity or challenges. But change is inevitable, and developing the trait of resilience helps us not only survive change,...