Background on Step By Step

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A Quiet, Regular Step

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Experienced mountaineers have a quiet, regular, short step—on the level it looks petty; but then this step they keep up, on and on as they ascend, whilst the inexperienced townsman hurries along, and ...

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A Step to the Block

Author

Alan Noble

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 22:1-14 , Daniel 3:16-28 , Esther 4:14-16 , Philippians 1:20-24 , Luke 9:23-25 , Psalm 31:14-15

In Four Quartets , T. S. Eliot writes that “any action is a step to the block.” He means that our actions always draw us closer to death, and in that sense every action we take is a wager of our ...

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Divine Intervention & One more Step

Author

Dallas Willard

Keywords

Scripture

1 Samuel 3:4-10, Exodus 23:20, Isaiah 30:21, Acts 16:6-10, John 10:27-28, Psalm 91:11-12

One remarkable illustration concerns Peter Marshall, the Scot who in the middle of the twentieth century became one of America’s most widely acclaimed ministers. Through his outstanding qualities as a...

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One Mile at a Time

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

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Scripture

Exodus 16:4, 1 Kings 17:8-16, Joshua 3:14-17 , Matthew 6:34, Philippians 4:6-7, Psalm 119:105

Journalist Eric Severeid recalls a valuable lesson he learned at seventeen while preparing for an ambitious journey. He and a friend had set out to canoe from Minneapolis to the historic fur-trading p...

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One Step At a Time: Advice from the Desert Fathers

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Sayings of the Desert Fathers and Mothers

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The following story comes from the collection of sayings of the Desert Fathers and Mothers in Egypt, teaching that would have first been transmitted orally (around 350-450 A.D.) and later written down...

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One Step Away from Disaster

Author

D. L. Mayfield

Keywords

I was teaching an English class in a high-rise apartment complex full of low-income families in Minneapolis—mostly immigrant and refugees from East Africa. The tenants’ association paid for me to come...

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Don’t Try to Hug Jesus and Step on His Feet

Author

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

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To paraphrase St. Augustine of Hippo: If someone comes hug, kiss, and honor you, but steps on your bare feet with hobnailed shoes, you’ll still complain. So will God complain when those who honor him ...

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Don’t Eat the Frog

Author

Michael Hyatt

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Years ago I heard a motivational speaker encourage his audience to “eat that frog.” … it makes sense in its own way: Stop procrastinating and just do the thing you fear. Once you do that, everything e...

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The Path We Tread

Author

Richard L. Baxter

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From valley to valley out over the hilltops, From sunshine to fog like the darkest of night; So we follow the Lord down life’s winding pathway, And walk much by faith and little by sight. It would be...

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Moving to the Front Yard

Author

Jay Pathak and Dave Runyon

Keywords

Tom and Angela had lived in their neighborhood for about twelve years without really getting to know many people. They lived in a cul-de-sac of eleven houses and had limited communication and interact...

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Putting Ourselves in the Hands of the Lord

Author

Hannah Whitall Smith

Keywords

Sanctification

All that we claim then in this life of sanctification is that by a step of faith we put ourselves into the hands of the Lord, for Him to work in us all the good pleasure of His will; and that by a con...

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Pilgrimage and Progression

Author

Christian George

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Pilgrimage is centered around one thing—progression. God does not call us to be static saints, even if we cannot move physically. We are constantly on the move spiritually, evolving in our understandi...

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Embodying a Decision

Author

Wesley Granberg-Michaelson

Keywords

Scripture

2 Corinthians 6:2, Matthew 4:19-20, Hebrews 11:8, Acts 2:37-38, Mark 10:50

Billy Graham had a weekly radio show titled The Hour of Decision. Normally it was a tape recording of the service and message he’d given at a recent evangelistic rally. And at the conclusion of every ...

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A Marinating Process

Author

Christian George

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Scripture

Deuteronomy 8:2, Matthew 4:1-2, Acts 9:19-30, Galatians 1:15-18

Pilgrimage is a marinating process. The Bible is bursting with people who traveled to places of retreat where God seasoned and tenderized them, preparing them to take the next step of the journey. Mos...

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No Silver Bullet to Progress

Author

Temple Grandin

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Scripture

Genesis 12:1-4 , Exodus 13:17-18, Nehemiah 2:17-20, Luke 17:5-6 , Psalm 37:23-24 , Philippians 1:6

The animal behavior scientist Temple Grandin, who achieved significant success while struggling with autism, has this to say on the subject of progress: People are always looking for the single ma...

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Your First Assignment: Do Nothing

Author

J. D. Greear

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Scripture

Luke 24:49

I’ve always thought that Jesus gave a very odd first step to completing the Great Commission, basically telling them, “Do nothing until the Holy Spirit comes upon you” (Luke 24:49, my paraphrase). Wit...

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A Brook became an Ocean

Author

Louie Giglio

Keywords

God

Scripture

Job 11:7-9, Ephesians 3:18-19, Proverbs 3:5-6, Romans 11:33, Psalm 145:3, Isaiah 55:8-9

Dan DeHaan, talked about man’s quest to grasp a full understanding of God’s character being like a boy following a trickling brook as it flowed downstream. Step by step, as he followed each babble and...

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Putting Ourselves in the Way of Sick and Needy Sinners

Author

John Starke

Keywords

Heart

Here is the first step of prayer in a universe where God has put on flesh to be with us: we must put ourselves in the way of his friendship to sick and needy sinners. The heart naturally resists this ...

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A Simple Act of Courage

Author

Brad Lomenick

Keywords

Courage

Many, many great things have begun with a single act of courage, throughout history and today. A person steps out and makes one courageous decision and that one domino starts many other dominoes falli...

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Entering the Darkroom

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Ephesians 2:10, Psalm 139:12, Romans 5:3-4, Isaiah 45:3, Ephesians 2:10

While we are now surrounded by a never-ending number of pixels with our smartphones, there once was a time where the process of developing photographs took something much more significant than pointin...

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An Invitation

Author

Dallas Willard

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 11:28-30, Psalm 62:1, Isaiah 30:15, Romans 12:2, Galatians 5:1, John 15:4, Hebrews 4:9-10

He invites us to leave our burdensome ways of heavy labor—especially the “religious” ones—and step into the yoke of training with him. This is a way of gentleness and lowliness, a way of soul rest. It...

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Rich Mullins: Tell the Joke

Author

Ryan P. Tinetti

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A few weeks after Rich Mullins died in a car accident in 1997 at age forty-one, his friend and financial manager, Jim Dunning, went to collect Rich’s possessions. Mullins was a wildly successful Chris...

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An Uncle Tries to Buy Salvation

Author

David Peterson

Keywords

Scripture

2 Kings 5:1-14, Proverbs 11:4, Zephaniah 1:18, Acts 8:9-24, Isaiah 64:6

A little girl once wrote a letter to an advice column in the Newspaper. In it, she tells a story about her uncle and aunt. “My uncle was the tightest man I ever met.” She said. “All his life, every ti...

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Denethor From Lord of the Rings: When a Steward Pretends to be King

Author

Ryan Bundrick

Scripture

Matthew 2:1-16, Luke 19:14, James 4:7, 1 Samuel 18:8-11, Luke 14:11

In The Lord of the Rings, Denethor is a steward of Gondor, the great kingdom of men. He comes from a long line of stewards who have ruled Gondor as temporary lords while the kingdom waited for the n...

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When Faith Grew but Evangelism Failed

Author

Don Everts and Doug Schaupp

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Scripture

Romans 1:16, Colossians 4:5-6, Matthew 5:14-16, 1 Corinthians 4:10

I can remember that afternoon as if it were yesterday. I (Doug) was standing out in the middle of the green grass of the quad on campus, singing as loudly as I could. Twenty of my Christian friends an...

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How Good to Center Down!

Author

Howard Thurman

Keywords

Scripture

Psalm 46:10, Psalm 62:1, Isaiah 30:15, Psalm 25:4-5, Lamentations 3:40, Matthew 6:19-21

How good it is to center down! To sit quietly and see one’s self pass by! The streets of our minds seethe with endless traffic; Our spirits resound with clashing, with noisy silences, While some...

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Strategic Withdrawal: A Wise Strategy

Author

Ruth Haley Barton

Keywords

Scripture

Exodus 33:7–11, 1 Kings 19:3–9, Exodus 20:8–11, Mark 6:30–32, Luke 5:15–16, Psalm 46:10

When we hear the word retreat many of us think of the military use of the word, which refers to the tactic troops use when they are losing too much ground, when they are tired and ineffective, a...

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Refining Metals in Fire

Author

Eunice McGarrahan

Keywords

Scripture

Luke 12:49, Malachi 3:2, Zechariah 13:9, Isaiah 48:10, Proverbs 17:3, Psalm 66:10-12, 1 Peter 1:7

Refiner’s fires are used on precious metals, not for mundane elements. The refiner must hold the metal in the hottest part of the fire in order to burn off all the impurities, thus retrieving a pure...

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Remembering who we are and whose we are

Author

Mia Levetan

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 8:1, Genesis 19:29, Exodus 2:24, Exodus 6:5, Exodus 13:3, Exodus 32:13, Leviticus 26:42-45, Deuteronomy 4:10, Deuteronomy 8:2, 18, Judges 3:7, Psalm 78:11, 1 Samuel 1:11, 19, Psalm 63:6, Psalm 74:2, Psalm 77:11, Psalm 78:35, 42, Psalm 105:42, Psalm 106:45, Psalm 111:5, Psalm 119:52, 55, Psalm 143:5, Isaiah 44:21, Isaiah 57:11, Jeremiah 14:21, Jeremiah 51:50, Jonah 2:7, Mark 14:72, Matthew 26:75, Luke 22:61, Luke 22:19, Matthew 27:33-55, Mark 15:22-41, Luke 23:33-49, John 19:16-30, 1 Corinthians 1:18, Philippians 2:8, Hebrews 12:2

God remembers Noah. God remembers Abram. God remembers Lot. God remembers the Israelites. The Israelites, in the book of Judges, do not remember God—this was their problem. God remembers Hannah. The P...

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Born with Limits (Unlike God)

Author

Jen Wilkin

Keywords

Scripture

Isaiah 40:28, Job 11:7-9, 1 Kings 8:27, Romans 11:33, Psalm 145:3, Ephesians 3:18-19

On the day I was born, the doctor who delivered me inscribed my birth records with a firm hand: seven pounds, eleven ounces, twenty-one inches. It was the first legally attested evidence that I was no...

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