genesis on Authenticity

One Ash Wednesday a decade ago, when I was new to Anglicanism, I knelt at a rail as Fr. Thomas, my priest, smeared a black cross on each forehead. “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall ret...

Christian character is not an act but a process, not a sudden creation but a development. It grows and bears fruit like a tree; it requires patient care and unwearied cultivation.

The True Self is all about right relationship, not requirements. It’s not about being correct; it’s about being connected, which you always were—you just didn’t realize it.

Penitential Psalms When discussing the forgiveness of sins offered in Christ, John Calvin refers to Psalm 32:1 and says, “It is certain that David is not speaking concerning the ungodly but of believ...

Preaching Commentary Penitential Psalms When discussing the forgiveness of sins offered in Christ, John Calvin refers to Psalm 32:1 and says, “It is certain that David is not speaking concerning th...

Origins matter to humans. The Antiques Roadshow has held the interest of its viewers for over thirty-five years with a simple formula of determining the origins of items people have not properly...

As my AA, NA, and CA friends have repeatedly reminded me, rigorous honesty is the first rule of recovery.

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

When I get honest, I admit I am a bundle of paradoxes. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am...

Scripture also speaks of “discernment of spirits” and encourages us to “test the spirits to see whether they are from God.” This aspect of discernment helps us to distinguish the real from the phony, ...

Who we are is deeper than where we find ourselves in this moment. And Jesus illuminates that deeper identity.

The pyschologist Carl Rogers, a person who would know quite well the interior lives of others, has this to say of our inmost thoughts: I have most invariably found that the very feeling which has see...

If I asked you the same question I asked my patient Aaron—“What do you want?”—and you could for a moment put aside the predictable anxiety that comes with it, I’m confident that at some point in your ...

At some point in childhood we all make the powerful discovery that we can manipulate the truth about ourselves.

The word “acceptance” has an interesting origin. It comes from the Latin ad capere, which means to “take to oneself.” What does that mean? It’s a paradoxical truth, but in order for us to accept other...

Before my mentor, Dallas Willard, passed over to glory, I asked him what he thought about the rapid rise of the Christian spiritual formation movement. He said, “It is a wonderful thing, but my fear i...

In stark contrast to ourselves, when Jesus needed to know who he was, he listened to his Father’s voice, trusted that voice and claimed its truth for his own life.

Gracious God, sometimes I am so caught up in my failures, in all the ways I am not like you, that I neglect the deeper truth, the earlier truth of Genesis 1. You have made me, as a human being, in you...

Thomas Merton once said, “Every one of us is shadowed by an illusory person: a false self, This is the man I want myself to be but who cannot exist, because God does not know anything about him. A...

Carl Jung, one of the early pioneers of modern psychology, wrote this from his years of experience as a therapist: The acceptance of oneself is the essence of the moral problem and the epitome of ...

There is a great difference between successfulness and fruitfulness. Success comes from strength, control, and respectability. A successful person has the energy to create something, to keep control o...

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

If I am not for myself who will be for me? If I am only for myself, who am I?

There’s a somewhat naïve belief among some that, in general, most people are inherently good. While many Christians may not fully embrace John Calvin’s doctrine of total depravity (which I believe is ...

If you think of your identity and heart as an engine, you could say there is a kind of fuel that powers it cleanly and efficiently—and a kind of fuel that is not only polluting but also destroys the e...

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...

I lust after recognition, I am desperate to win all the little merit badges and trinkets of my profession, and I am of less real use in this world than any good cleaning lady.

Gracious God, in our desire to achieve success and recognition, we have disregarded honesty and integrity in our speech and actions. Forgive us for our shortcuts, white lies, and dishonesty. Help us b...

The spiritual discipline of honoring the body helps us find our way between the excesses of a culture that glorifies and objectifies the body and the excesses of Christian tradition that have often de...

The mystery of perfection as an aspect of beauty is its transcendence. It points to a glory beyond itself. I knew that when I held my children, I didn’t simply cradle flesh and blood. I held a living ...