circumstances on Weariness

God our Father, Lord our Shepherd, Spirit of the Living God, One in Three … and Three in One: We praise You our Creator, Savior, and Provider. By Your grace, we lack nothing. You feed us in body...

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...

Heavenly Father, we confess that we often see difficult circumstances and discouragement as barriers to doing the work you have called us to do. Rather than rejoicing in what you have provided, we lam...

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...

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...

The more one probes the workings of an emotional life the more he will be convinced of its vacillation and undependability. No one should wonder that a child of God who walks by emotion rather than by...

Preaching Commentary The resurrection was inconceivable for the first disciples, as impossible for them to believe, as it is for many of us today. Granted, their reasons would have been different f...

When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.

The resurrection was inconceivable for the first disciples, as impossible for them to believe, as it is for many of us today. Granted, their reasons would have been different from ours. The Greeks did...

It’s hard to tell what brings happiness. Poverty and wealth have both failed.

Dear Lord, Today I thought of the words of Vincent Van Gogh. It is true that there is an ebb and flow but the sea remains the sea. You, oh God, are the sea. Although I experience many ups and downs i...

Most alarming is the absence of peace among our youth. Research from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is showing an epidemic of mental health problems among eighteen- to twenty-four-year...

Joy has nothing to do with material things, or with a man's outward circumstance ... a man living in the lap of luxury can be wretched, and a man in the depths of poverty can overflow with joy.

It is no stretch to say that the Lord may orchestrate amazingly challenging circumstances for you and your family for the primary purpose of giving your supernatural hope and Christian contentment a p...

Preaching Commentary Summary of the Text What is the role of prayer on life’s journey? For James, its role is central. A letter that has been historically bashed for an emphasis on “works” over “fa...

We confess our sins to you, today, O Lord. We confess that we sometimes find it difficult to believe that you are actually involved in our day-to-day experiences, that you actually impact our circumst...

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.

The novel Martin Chuzzlewit , written by Charles Dickens, is one of his least successful works, though Dickens himself commented to a friend that he believed it was his greatest work up to its pu...

Almighty and loving God, all of us here today are hurting. Some of us are hurting as the result of circumstances beyond our control. Some of us are hurting because of our own choices. Some of us are f...

Summary of the Text What is the role of prayer on life’s journey? For James, its role is central. A letter that has been historically bashed for an emphasis on “works” over “faith” is immensely pract...

Heavenly Father, we confess that we often forget Who it is that we worship. You, Lord, are the great God Almighty and our Heavenly Father. Yet, at times, we deny that truth by living in fear and respo...

Although we use the word stress in a negative connotation, it actually is a value-neutral concept. In the medical sense, stress is the body’s response to any change required of it or any demand impose...

Everything can be taken from a man (or woman) but one thing: To choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's way.

On a daily basis we’re faced with two simple choices. We can either listen to ourselves and our constantly changing feelings about our circumstances, or we can talk to ourselves about the unchanging t...

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...

I have read that each of us experiences a relatively significant crisis on an average of once every six months or so.

If a man have Christ in his heart, heaven before his eyes, and only as much of temporal blessing as is just needful to carry him safely through life, then pain and sorrow have little to shoot at.

Yet, while Your love is consistent, eternal and strong, Our love is fickle, finite and easily swayed. So, we confess today that we have not loved You as You deserve, with our whole selves – heart, min...

Do you ever feel as if God is far from you? Be assured, He is steadfastly near. Do not be disheartened because you don’t see Him in your circumstances. I saw an illustration of this during a photograp...

Gratitude magnifies the spirit and promotes well-being. In good times and bad, authentic appreciation creates perspective, literally stepping back from the distractions of the moment and affirming som...