change on Exploitation

I am convinced that the scourge of our scientific and technological age is depersonalization. There is a heartbeat pulsating at the center of the universe, giving life and meaning to everything, but o...

[W]e cannot really solve the problem of our world’s injustices by merely giving a little more of our surplus to fight hunger. More deeply, we need to be freed from our reliance on material consumption...

Resentment is like a poison we carry around inside us with the hope that when we get the chance we can deposit it where it will harm another who has injured us. The fact is that we carry this poison a...

The standard account of power says there’s only one kind of power in the world and we, the good people, must get on the right side of it, using it to bring justice into the world. Power is power. It i...

People who blame things rarely change things. Blame is an unassailable change-avoidance strategy.

This scripture guide is adapted from the Summer Settings sermon guide Road Trips II . For more Summer Settings sermon guides, click below. Saul's Confident Error Last week, we considered A...

Here is the uncomfortable truth: Humans run to a much slower evolutionary clock than our inventions. To use an engineering term, we are the “gating factor” that keeps a process from running faster. It...

In order to exercise leadership on that challenge, they had to go beyond what people expected of them, risk testing some relationships, and move themselves and their organizations into unfamiliar terr...

We were created for goodness and perfection. That’s why we innovate, progress, and change. But if our progress loses its purpose, it cannibalizes our humanity, leaving us distracted and disoriented.

In the late 1800’s, no business matched the financial and political dominance of the railroad. Trains dominated the transportation industry of the United States, moving both people and goods throughou...

You have enemies? Why, it is the story of every man who has done a great deed or created a new idea. It is the cloud which thunders around everything that shines. Fame must have enemies, as light must...

Times of crisis, of disruption or constructive change, are not only predictable, but desirable. They mean growth. Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.

When a leader raises awareness of the need for change, the natural result is for stakeholders to resist that change and the loss that comes with it. When weeks go by and the secret hopes that our live...

Saul's Confident Error Last week, we considered Abram and the way that God may send us out on a journey, waiting to see his will without knowing the destination.  Today we move forward to Saul on...

Christians are supposed not merely to endure change, nor even to profit by it, but to cause it.

[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...

“If your eye causes you to sin…” is one of the boldest phrases from the mouth of Jesus, appearing three times in the gospels. Our eyes not only leads us into sinful behaviors, but also to take in sinf...

At root, change means the partial or total abandonment of the norms, safeties, and patterns of behavior that make our lives manageable.

Crises, and pressures for change, confront individuals and their groups at all levels, ranging from single people, to teams, to businesses, to nations, to the whole world. Crises may arise from extern...

Some people find themselves stuck in a rut. Without challenge or new opportunities, they begin to sound like Snoopy from the Peanuts cartoons: “Yesterday I was a dog. Today I’m a dog. Tomorrow I’ll p...

If there is no struggle, there is no progress.

It is not strange... to mistake change for progress.

May God bless you with the ability to recognize that the world is not yours to save. May the Spirit awaken you to the beautiful truth that you have a part to play.  May your eyes see resurrection in ...

The most powerful choices we will make in our lives are not about specific decisions but about patterns of life: the nudges and disciplines that will shape all our other choices. This is especially tr...

We would rather be ruined than changed We would rather die in our dread Than climb the cross of the moment And let our illusions die.

Road Trips in Scripture While the definitions of “oceans” and “lakes” had to be qualified a bit in order to relate biblical locations to our present-day vacations, road trips—like mountains—can be fo...

Jesus, You call us from what we know to something new From a life on this sea with this family From the nets of generations before us You call us to a new beginning A new being and doing You call us ...

Road Trips in Scripture While the definitions of “oceans” and “lakes” had to be qualified a bit in order to relate biblical locations to our present-day vacations, road trips—like mountains—can be fo...

In 2010, an oil rig named “Deepwater Horizon” suffered a catastrophic failure. Due to improper installation of the cement seal, a malfunctioning blowout preventer, and cost-cutting decisions by corpor...

Life is precious. Not because it is unchangeable, like a diamond, but because it is vulnerable, like a little bird. To love life means to love its vulnerability, asking for care, attention, guidance, ...