God speaks to Israel through the prophet Isaiah when she is surrounded by enemies and making every effort to appease them through diplomacy, gifts, treaties, and bribes, and says this to her:
"You went to Molech with...
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God speaks to Israel through the prophet Isaiah when she is surrounded by enemies and making every effort to appease them through diplomacy, gifts, treaties, and bribes, and says this to her:
"You went to Molech with...
READ MOREThe question lodged deep in our hearts, hidden from our conscious minds, is: "Do you care for me, God?"
What's under that question?
Blaise Pascal, in his Pensées, says, "The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing...
READ MOREAnd so Screwtape reveals the Enemy's ploy—first make humans flabby, with small passions and desires, then offer a sop to those diminished passions so that their experience is one of contentment. They know nothing of great joy or great sorrow....
READ MOREA young woman came to see me, as most seeking counseling do, because she was at the end of her rope. What had begun a year earlier as mild depression had sunk deeper and deeper until she found herself contemplating suicide. We met for many weeks...
READ MORESome of the sentences the Enemy accuses each of us with have been there since we were young; others were added in the ensuing years as Satan saw opportunity to strengthen our fear and cynicism through “interpreting” those events in our lives that...
READ MOREIn the short book of Philippians—only four chapters long—Paul uses the word joy sixteen times. Paul didn’t write this book during spring break. He wrote it from a prison cell in Rome while he was waiting to be executed. In what should...
READ MOREThere are many things we need to rename in our lives. Our work. Our relationships. Even our life itself. Rename them. Rename your life. It’s good. Because your life belongs to our good God, and he’s got you. Rename yourself. God has.
...
READ MOREThis is not to say the heart is only swirling emotion, mixed motives, and dark desire, without thought or reason. Far from it. According to Scripture, the heart is also where we do our deepest thinking. "Jesus, knowing what they were thinking in...
READ MOREIn all of our hearts lies a longing for a Sacred Romance. It will not go away in spite of our efforts over the years to anesthetize or ignore its song, or attach it to a single person or endeavor. It is a Romance couched in mystery and set deeply...
READ MOREWhere do we go from here? "This life," wrote Jonathan Edwards, "ought to be spent by us only as a journey towards heaven." That's the only story worth living in now. The road goes out before us and our destination awaits. In the imagery of...
READ MORENow, name one thing in the entire created world more precious than a human heart.
It can’t be done.
You might say “love,” but that would be silly because we cannot love without a heart. You might point to some immortal work...
READ MOREHe made you — on purpose. You are the only you — ever. Becoming ourselves means we are actively cooperating with God’s intention for our lives, not fighting him or ourselves. God accepts us right at this moment, and he wants us to accept...
READ MOREParents will often wonder where their toddlers learned to lie or how they came into the world so self-centered. It doesn’t need to be taught to them; it is inherent to human nature. Paul makes clear in Romans, “Sin entered the world through one...
READ MOREThe reason we don’t know what we want is that we’re so unacquainted with our desire. We try to keep a safe distance between our daily lives and our heart’s desire because it causes us so much trouble. We’re surprised by our anger and...
READ MOREI have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. (John 16:12-13)
There's more that Jesus wants to say to you, much more, and now that his...
READ MOREOur life is a story. A rather long and complicated story that has unfolded over time. There are many scenes, large and small, and many "firsts." Your first step; your first word; your first day of school. There was your first best friend; your...
READ MOREWhat Jesus primarily models for us is how to draw our life from the Father. This passage from Philippians—one of the earliest hymns of the faith—says that Jesus more than humbled himself when he came to earth. He emptied himself:
Who,...
READ MOREThe deeper reason we fear our own glory is that once we let others see it, they will have seen the truest us, and that is nakedness indeed. We can repent of our sin. We can work on our "issues." But there is nothing to be "done" about our glory....
READ MOREIn the time of our innocence, we trusted in good because we had not yet known evil. On this side of Eden and our own experience of the Fall—whatever our own Arrows have been and however the adversary has woven them together into our particular...
READ MOREIn the gospel of John, Jesus extends the offer to anyone who realizes that his life just isn't touching his deep desire: "If you are thirsty, come to me! If you believe in me, come and drink! For the Scriptures declare that rivers of living water...
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