What Value is there in Short-Term Missions? Over the years, I have had people ask me why my family and I go on short-term mission trips. Some of the more cynical have wondered aloud, “Isn’t it reall...
The world, in fact, is not as it had been represented to us. Things are not all right as they are, and they are not getting any better. We have been told the lie ever since we can remember: human bein...
James 1:2-4, Romans 5:3-5, John 16:33, 2 Corinthians 12:9, Psalm 34:17-19
While serving as British Prime Minister, Lloyd George had to deal with World War I, an economic depression, and the Sinn Fein movement attempting to effect Irish liberation, as well as many other smal...
In Thanks! I wrote that legendary investor and philanthropist Sir John Templeton had posed the question, “How can we get six billion people around the world to practice gratitude?” Not long after Sir ...
In his book Thrive in Retirement, Eric Thurman shares the story of close friends preparing for their golden years: My husband was a lawyer who joked that after “the big case” came across his desk, h...
An excellent way to test people’s values is to observe what we do when we don’t have to do anything, how we spend our leisure time, how we spend our extra money.
Isaiah 30:15-16, James 1:2-4, Romans 5:3-5, 1 Peter 4:12-13, Hebrews 12:1-2
A typical response to threat and burden is to want to flee it. It’s evacuation as the cure for trouble. If only I could get away is our mantra. Then I would be safe. Then I could enjoy my life. But wh...
Journey all over the universe in a map, without the expense and fatigue of traveling, without suffering the inconveniences of heat, cold, hunger, and thirst.
Let us begin with a question. Do you really know how to enjoy the world? Do you know how to enjoy yourself? One of the greatest parables in the New Testament has to do with the search for enjoyment an...
We say that Nature rests, yet she is working like mad. She has only shut up shop and pulled the shutters down; but behind them she is unpacking new goods, and the shelves are becoming so full that the...
As a society of unbelief, Western culture is devoid of a sense of journey, of adventure, because it lacks belief in much more than the cultivation of an ever-shrinking horizon of self-preservation and...
Isaiah 55:8-9, Matthew 13:44, Lamentations 3:22-23, Psalm 139:7-10, 1 John 1:9, 2 Corinthians 3:18, Luke 2:1-20, John 4:7-26, John 21:1-14, Luke 24:13-35, Matthew 17:1-8, Luke 2:25-38, Luke 1:35-38, Hebrews 13:2, Isaiah 43:19
Almighty God, you have surprised us with your presence in unexpected ways. In the expectations of our routine, we have missed the treasure that you place before us. We come to worship you in community...
For all our time and attention, no matter how carefully we curate our stuff or how much we might enjoy ourselves along the way, we’re all merely stocking and staging someone else’s opportunity for bar...
These people always find God in the sunsets. And in walks on the beach. Sometimes I think these people never leave the beach or the mountains, what with all the communing with God they do on hilltops,...
1 Samuel 2:1-10, Luke 17:11-19, Job 1:21, Acts 16:25, John 6:11
Accept, O Lord, our thanks and praise for all that you have done for us. We thank you for the splendor of the whole creation, for the beauty of this world, for the wonder of life, and for the mystery ...
There are many people who will always want to return to the time when America was great. But was there ever a time when America was a wonderful place for everyone? As I saw on a Facebook meme recently...
Advent means “coming,” from the Latin word adventus, and demarks a season of expectantly preparing to celebrate the first coming of Jesus, while eagerly awaiting His second coming to establish His kin...
I've seen far too many Christians who are more than willing to travel halfway around the world to volunteer for a week in an orphanage, but who cannot bring themselves to take the personal risk of...
This is what Jesus does. Jesus makes life better. Jesus brings the better wine. He takes empty religion and ritual, and brings it to life for everyday people. He takes what many deem holy (like the wa...
Isaiah 40:31, Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 , Matthew 11:28-30, Luke 10:38-42, Philippians 4:6-7, Psalm 131:1-2
[T]he old adage “it’s the journey, not the destination that matters most” is particularly true of modern pilgrimage. If the destination is the point, I can get to Santiago from anywhere in the world i...