thought exercise from genesis 4

I did some of my Clinical Pastoral Education Units in Gastonia. One of the units that I served was the Emergency Department. If there was an incident that was suspected to be gang related, they would ...

When the Bible uses the term heart , it means the causal core of your personhood. The heart is your directional system. The heart is your steering wheel. Your behavior isn’t caused by the situati...

In her book, Grace for the Good Girl , Emily P. Freeman charts her early years growing up in the church believing in grace but living according to the rules of perfection. One thing that would, a...

In 1889, the French novelist Paul Bourget penned The Disciple , where he depicted the life of a renowned philosopher and psychologist, whose existence was marked by a seemingly monotonous routine...

As any parent of small children will tell you, children have an amazingly acute sense of justice. Even the most fractional disparity in the distribution of the most trivial family good will be met wit...

Sometimes we have to “step over” our anger, our jealousy, or our feelings of rejection and move on. The temptation is to get stuck in our negative emotions, poking around in them as if we belong there...

The Hebrew word yada (“to know”) is, in fact, used for both sexual intercourse as well as our relationship with God. Every relational event is a stage that affords one a glimpse into the consumm...

Two Hebrew words deeply inform and enrich our understanding of meditative prayer: haga and siach . Our English Bibles most often translate both of these words with the simple word “meditate...

At the core of every project of self-salvation is the staunch unwillingness to believe that God’s love and forgiveness can be unmerited. Those who would try and save themselves prefer work to rest, ef...

Imagine you’ve just purchased a brand-new car—it’s no ordinary car, it’s a luxury vehicle, with the highest trim levels, equipped with all the latest technology. Among its many upgrades is a voice ale...

Lucy says to Charlie Brown: ‘You know what the whole trouble with you is, Charlie Brown?’ ‘No; and I don’t want to know! Leave me alone!’ ‘The whole trouble with you is you won’t listen to w...

Some years ago when radio was still a primary source of entertainment, a French dramatist was commissioned to write the script for the debut episode of a Bible study radio series. For the most part, ...

Syndrome (formerly called Incrediboy) in the film The lncredibles is one example of envy’s futility and the envier’s inferiority, which together secure the inevitable lack of success in besting one’s ...

I first encountered Mary and Eve by Sister Grace Remington at my friend’s house in Atlanta. It was hanging as a decoration in their bathroom, and I was stunned by its message. My friends may have been...

Music, vocal and instrumental, played a significant role in the organized institutionalized worship of ancient Israel. It was an accepted constituent of religious self-expression. Nevertheless, Israel...

Two shipwrecked men in tattered clothes slouch together at one end of a lifeboat. They watch casually as three people at the other end of the boat bail furiously, trying to keep the vessel afloat. One...