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Resilience for faith leaders is the ability to wisely persevere toward the mission God has put before them amid both the external challenges and the internal resistance of the leader’s followers. -
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Who Didn't Make it Out?
Jim Collins, the author of Good to Great , interviewed Admiral Jim Stockdale, the highest-ranking officer in the Hanoi Hilton prisoner of war camp during the height of the Vietnam War. Regarding the ... -
Quote
One of my favorite sayings is, no matter how difficult it is to hear, “Reality is always your friend.” -
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Moses’ Need for Adaptive Leadership
[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... -
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Forgiveness is the key that unlocks the door of resentment and the handcuffs of hatred. It is a power that breaks the chains of bitterness and the shackles of selfishness. -
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Institutional Inertia
Churches, seminaries, and nonprofit organizations are notorious for saying they need change and then resisting the very leader they called to bring it. One of my consulting clients told me that he cal... -
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Learned Helplessness and Induced Inability
Learned Helplessness can be easily seen in a research study when participants are given a math test. In this study, some participants are told, “men don’t tend to do well on this test,” or “Millennia... -
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Farm Animals Prefer the Familiar to the Good
There is a story about a farmer who had a few animals he kept in a barn that had gotten old, drafty, and leaky. Concerned for his animals' well-being, the farmer decided to build a new barn. He bu... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, Numbers 21:4-9
Ancient lens What's the historical context? What Have You Done for Me Lately? If only the people of God in the pages of the Old Testament were unique. We could then comfortably read their for... -
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Brené Brown Struggling to Belong
Belonging can be such a fickle and painful process in life. As the popular researcher and writer Brené Brown describes in her book, Braving the Wilderness, she struggled to fit in after moving to New ... -
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Why Strike the Rock?
Why did Moses strike the rock? He was a man of faith, whose life had been characterized by trust in God (see, for example, the description of Moses in (Heb 11:24-29). So why did he fall into unbelief ... -
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Throwing Back the Big Fish
A man who was fishing one day noticed that the fisherman next to him threw the big fish he caught back into the water, while keeping the small ones. This went on all day until the first man couldn’t h... -
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Dwelling with Those We Love
An Irish church once had a humorous yet insightful motto that gets at the heart of the pain that often accompanies our relationships: “To dwell above with those we love will certainly be glory. But to... -
lectionary
Fourth Sunday in Lent
Lent 2024: Do This in Remembrance Look to the Cross AIM commentary Ancient lens What's the historical context? What Have You Done for Me Lately? If only the people of God in the pages... -
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The Root of the Word Doubt
The root of our English term doubt has to do with duplicity. It is being divided or doubled up in our thinking. But this isn’t a matter of simply being confused or unable to make up our mind or ... -
lectionary
12th Sunday after Pentecost
Ancient Lens What's the historical context? Back to the Wilderness As he has been doing, Jesus calls the people’s minds back to the wilderness during The Exodus and reminds them of the manna ... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, John 6:35, 41-51
Ancient Lens What's the historical context? Back to the Wilderness As he has been doing, Jesus calls the people’s minds back to the wilderness during The Exodus and reminds them of the manna ... -
Quote
To bless is to bridge. A blessing is a bridge to belonging, built right in the place we feel separated from hope. Words of blessing bring us back to the beautiful truth of being human: we belong to on... -
Quote
Illness is the night-side of life, a more onerous citizenship. Everyone who is born holds dual citizenship, in the kingdom of the well and in the kingdom of the sick. -
lectionary
Second Sunday in Lent
Preaching Commentary Introduction This is a well-known passage full of well-known phrases, and yet reading and meditating on the text continues to offer fresh understandings and applications. John ... -
Quote
Faith’s only function is to receive what grace offers. -
lectionary
Third Sunday of Easter
Preaching Commentary A Psalm of Trust Psalm 4, the lectionary psalm for this third Sunday of Easter, follows a psalm of lament (Psalm 3) in which David bemoans his political enemies, who included h... -
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When the Honeymoon Ends
It happens sooner or later in every relationship: someone will let you down. We have a term for the earliest stages of a relationship: the “honeymoon phase”—that rosy time period when everything but d... -
Quote
What are blind spots? They are areas in which people continually fail to see themselves or their situation realistically. -
liturgy
Benediction for the Sent and the Steadfast
May the peace of the Lord Jesus Christ go with you wherever he may send you. May the Spirit ground you in the truth that you were created with divine purpose. May you take up your God-given vocati... -
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Waking People up to Christ
It takes a great deal of freedom and love to be therapeutic with a group. Many years ago when Emil Brunner, the great Swiss theologian, was lecturing in this country, it was reported that when he prea... -
liturgy
Isaiah 61:11 and Numbers 6:24-26, "For as the earth
For as the earth produces its bud, and as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring up, so the Lord will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all the nations. May the L... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide Psalm 4
A Psalm of Trust Psalm 4, the lectionary psalm for this third Sunday of Easter, follows a psalm of lament (Psalm 3) in which David bemoans his political enemies, who included his own rebellious son A... -
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The One Ring and the Failure of Willpower
Nearly everybody knows of at least one sin habit in their life that they wish to leave behind them. Yet, no matter what they do, it seems impossible for them to be free of this habit, character flaw, ... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, John 3:1-17
Introduction This is a well-known passage full of well-known phrases, and yet reading and meditating on the text continues to offer fresh understandings and applications. John 3:1-17 is the account o...
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