challenges on Troubles

Leader: May the Lord, who is your stronghold, help you in times of trouble. You who know the triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—as your God, trust in the Lord. He will not let those who seek Hi...

Preaching Commentary What is “Good” about Friday? For the work-a-day world in the United States of America, Fridays are good. TGIF, “Thank God It’s Friday!” is an interjection we use to convey reli...

What is “Good” about Friday? For the work-a-day world in the United States of America, Fridays are good. TGIF, “Thank God It’s Friday!” is an interjection we use to convey relief that the work week i...

Ancient lens What’s the historical context? Psalm of Lament or Psalm of Trust? We’ve categorized this psalm under the psalms of lament. The psalms of lament highlight the problems and enemies tha...

Preaching Commentary Besieged from All Angles The context of this passage is best summed up with the words recorded throughout the letter: Trouble, Distress, Suffering, Hardship, Death at work, Jar...

Notes on the Passage Besieged from All Angles:  The context of this passage is best summed up with the words recorded throughout the letter: Trouble, Distress, Suffering, Hardship, Death at work, Ja...

Father God, we confess that our shortcomings are far more than we care to admit. Like Pharaoh, our hearts are often hardened and we don’t always look to you as the God who Saves.  Like the people...

Ancient lens What’s the historical context? Psalm of Lament or Psalm of Trust? We’ve categorized this psalm under the psalms of lament. The psalms of lament highlight the problems and enemies tha...

We have to pray with our eyes on God, not on the difficulties.

Trials are the ruler and scale to reveal in our lives.

Circumstances which we have resented, situations which we have found desperately difficult, have all been the means in the hands of God of driving the nails into the self-life which so easily complain...

In the last resort it is highly improbable that there could ever be a therapy which gets rid of all difficulties. Man needs difficulties; they are necessary for health.

Problems in relationship occur because each person is concentrating on what is missing in the other person.

The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.

O curse of marriage, that we can call these delicate creatures ours and not their appetites.

God never calls you to a task without giving you what you need to do it. He never sends you without going with you.

Almighty God, we confess our need of Your presence and Your guidance. We each have our hopes and expectations for what lies ahead, but only You can give us the strength and the wisdom we need. In life...

The waters are rising, but so am I. I am not going under, but over.

Don’t get sucked into short-term thinking. Your struggles will not last forever, but you will.

Statistics show that 80 percent of new pastors leave the ministry within five years. A friend once remarked, “If they were able to pastor churches without people, they might last ten years.” Most past...

There are three stages to every great work of God: first it is impossible, then it is difficult, then it is done.

Life can often feel like a bully, throwing punches at us we didn’t see coming. We get taken out, for a moment. But how we jump back in becomes our decision.

Someone once quipped that we spend the first half of our lives struggling with the sixth commandment ( Thou shalt not commit adultery ) and the second half of our lives struggling with the fifth comma...

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...

If you aren't in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?

Ambiguity may keep people up nights, but anyone seeking exquisite simplicity in his or her career ought to look for a non-leadership position. Leaders, by definition, have followers. Followers need di...

It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.

These periods of struggling to overcome challenges are what people find to be the most enjoyable times of their lives. A person who has achieved control over psychic energy and has invested it in cons...

If you’ve ever watched a war movie, or a film that takes place in the military, you’re likely to have encountered a specific scene, in which a subordinate will have something to tell a senior officer ...

I came home the other day to a house of blocked doors. Not just shut doors, closed doors, or locked doors. Blocked doors. Blame them on Molly, our nine-year-old, ninety-pound golden retriever, who, on...