exodus on Diversity

The world of Jesus was not the Old Testament Hebrew world. Like the United States now, Israel was multicultural, including a combination of Aramaic, Greek, and Roman influences. The people looked Jewi...

Holy and just Lord, we come before you today guilty. Guilty of reducing Jesus in our minds and hearts. At times we make him our personal savior, forgetting that his love and mercy are for all tongues,...

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

One of the gravest dangers to the Christian faith is its wholesale appropriation of the larger culture. When this happens, the citizens of those places cannot recognize the difference between their cu...

If your success is defined as being well adjusted to injustice and well adapted to indifference, then we don’t want successful leaders. We want great leaders who love the people enough and respect the...

Desegregation was one of the big goals of the civil rights movement. “Separate but equal” in the South became “separate and unequal.” The disparities were in things as small as water fountains and as ...

The very nature of light provides contrast. In juxtaposition, differing levels of light illuminate in extraordinary ways, helping us to see what we’ve been missing. In the late 1400s, the art world ma...

Goodness is beauty in the best estate.

Transition is one of the givens in our lives, and we only live well, we only manage our lives well, when we manage these transitions well. Our world changes; the circumstances of our lives change. The...

The point of discourse is to learn with and from one another. I used to tell my students that at least 20 percent of what I was telling them was wrong, but I didn't know which 20 percent it was: I...

The challenge each of these faced in their deconstruction—and what we may face—is walking the tightrope between becoming our own person and honoring our past. In The Homeless Mind , sociologist P...

Nothing can stand against You Nothing No sin, no death No prejudice, no division Nothing can stand against our God You’re making us whole and holy in your mercy and grace Standing together in truth an...

There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception.

The problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete.

As a black man, I pause when I see that Jesus was taken to Africa as a baby for refuge (Matthew 2:13–18). My blackness will not allow me to gloss over the Ethiopian man whom Philip cozies up to in Act...

The Church is not a clean, well-lit place where everything runs smoothly and actions automatically match ideals. It is, in the words of the Gospel, a field of chaff and wheat growing up together and b...

The problem is not recognizing the importance of the individual. The problem is the glorification of the individual. When the individual self is glorified over the greater good of the community, right...

Peter Drucker suggests that we should always sustain two streams of learning and self-improvement. And though he is speaking specifically about work and career, what he says is equally applicable whet...

The more I understand people and their needs, the more I am persuaded that God has uniquely designed the local church to respond to those needs.

A fourteenth-century definition of courage is “to speak one’s mind by telling all of one’s heart.” Courage is connecting one’s heart back to one’s mind, stitching together the separated parts of ourse...

The human capacity for burden is like bamboo – far more flexible than you’d ever believe at first glance.

Consider the banyan tree, a remarkable species found in India and other subtropical regions. As it grows, its sprawling branches become increasingly heavy. But instead of breaking under their own weig...

Holy Spirit You are not just a whirlwind in the desert a tempest in a teapot You are also here in the slow growth of learning a nearly imperceptible accrual of wisdom Holy Spirit Inspire us from th...

The wonderful word master used to describe the person who is at the top of his or her craft, whatever the profession. It was a title that one could work toward and with some degree of confidence ascri...

Christian civility does not commit us to a relativistic perspective. Being civil doesn’t mean that we cannot criticize what goes on around us.  …Civility is a different matter, though. I can treat ...

Too many people hear the word capacity and assume it’s a limitation. They assume their capacity is set—especially if they’re beyond a certain age. People give up on the idea that their capacity or the...

Ambiguity may keep people up nights, but anyone seeking exquisite simplicity in his or her career ought to look for a non-leadership position. Leaders, by definition, have followers. Followers need di...

Robert Lupton offers insight into the complexities of human impoverishment, reminding us that in spite of our best intentions sometimes our philanthropic efforts can yield unintended consequences: “Wh...

Invitations are powerful. Like tides, they ebb and flow, shaping the contours of our existence. Some invitations we desperately want but never get—“Will you marry me?” or “Would you consider a promoti...

Adoption … is not the cause merely of a partial salvation, but bestows salvation entire…