discipleship on Achievement

Harold Kushner wrote about a very bright, driven pre-med student at a very competitive college. While traveling in the East the summer before his junior year, he met a guru who said, “Don’t you see yo...

Truly great [leaders], no matter how successful they become, maintain a learning curve as steep as when they first began their careers.

[Speaking about art] As you climb the stairs of quality, you’ll meet individual works that you’ll need for the rest of your life, works that will thrill you, energize you, lift your soul, soothe you, ...

Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. No single instance will transform your beliefs, but as the votes build up, so does the evidence of your new identity. This is...

*it is possible this story is apocryphal, we were unable to find the original source of the story. Admiral Nelson of the British Navy was renowned for his mastery of naval strategy, a genius fro...

George Garrett, a novelist and amateur boxer wrote about a transformation that often takes place for fighters who stick with the sport. Throughout their journey to boxing excellence, in which they mus...

In her excellent book on following Jesus in the suburbs, Ashley Hales describes one of the ways in which our discipleship has been influenced by modern secular trends such as the desire for self-actua...

My central claim is that we can become like Christ by doing one thing—by following him in the overall style of life he chose for himself.

Beholding beauty produces fascination, and fascination is the best way to transform a person. Consider a young man in love. Parents, professors, mentors, and friends can plead with a young man to chan...

One saint used to say that she was the type of woman who advances more rapidly when she is drawn by love than when driven by fear. She was perceptive enough to know that we are all that type of person...

Conversion does not make us perfect, but it does catapult us into a total experience of discipleship that affects - and infects - every sphere of our living.

Discipleship is transformation, not information overload or behavioral modification. When transformation occurs, there is an increasing hunger for more knowledge of Jesus and His Word, but the primary...

Resolved: that all men should live for the glory of God. Resolved second: that whether others do or not, I will.

The goal in handling dragons is not to destroy them, not merely to disassociate, but to make them disciples. Even when that seems an unlikely prospect.

Your words and ways are Perfect Sure Right Clear Your words and ways are Pure True Righteous Every one Their value, beyond price Their goodness, beyond delight Their counsel, en...

preaching commentary The context The parables we hear this week are part of a collection of parables of the Kingdom collected by Matthew in chapter 13 of his gospel account. As with the Sermon on t...

When we speak of Christian living as a learned craft, we have a particular image in mind, that of an apprentice serving for years under the tutelage of a master. This is what my (Rich) grandfather did...

Preaching Commentary Context The last “I Am” Statement The Gospel text for this week includes the final “I am” statement in John’s Gospel: “I am the vine.” The lectionary text for this week ends...

Lord Jesus, your life shows us how you want us to live. So often we know exactly what it would take for us to become more like you, and yet we sit back, rather than taking a step toward your holiness....

Gracious God, we admit that though You have sent each of us out with the task of raising disciples, we often neglect that task. We remain content, stagnant, in our Christian calling, while we regularl...

Ultimately, each church will be evaluated by only one thing—its disciples. Your church is only as good as her disciples. It does not matter how good your praise, preaching, programs or property are; i...

Pride must die in you or nothing of heaven can live in you.

Preaching Commentary John's Imprisonment, Jesus' Debut John the Baptist is as good as dead when we hear of Jesus’ splash onto the Galilean landscape in Mark 1:14. Mark tells us that Jesus a...

We are practiced in pleading inadequacy in order to avoid living at the best that God calls us to.

preaching commentary The Servant Leader The servant leader is the hero of this text.  And the example,  par excellence,  is the Apostle Paul. He has never shied away from holding himself up as a pe...

In her book, Invitations from God, Adele Ahlberg Calhoun shares a great analogy of the difficulty of faithful discipleship: it’s not always easy to follow: Recently I had to follow another car to a ...

Imagine you were cast to play the role of legendary baseball player Babe Ruth in a biography of his life. You could simply follow the script, reading out what is written. How much better, though, to s...

In his excellent book, An Unhurried Life, Alan Fadling contrasts our overly busy lives with a vision of the kingdom from Isaiah chapter 61: Isaiah envisioned a kingdom in which those people in need ...

It costs something to be a real Christian, according to the standard of the Bible. There are enemies to be overcome, battles to be fought, sacrifices to be made, an Egypt to be forsaken, a wilderness ...

To be alive is to be broken. And to be broken is to stand in need of grace. Honesty keeps us in touch with our neediness and the truth that we are saved sinners. There is a beautiful transparency to h...