Encouragement
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How God Works In Spiritual Winters
I’ve always thought there was something magical about spring. It’s the season where snow melts, flowers blossom, and the world casts away its winter blanket to greet the warmer days. I live in a place where spring looks like the dry season and not the picture-perfect version I mentioned above. So this visual of fresh life and shedding of the cold has always had a unique appeal to me. I believe it holds this special appeal because of its sense of hope, resurrection, and overall newness. But here’s the thing. For spring to arrive, winter must first run its course. How many times does it occur like this in our…
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When Faith Runs Out, God Has Enough for Both of You
“Against all odds, when it looked hopeless, Abraham believed the promise and expected God to fulfill it. Or ‘who beyond hope in hope believed.’ He took God at his word, and as a result he became the father of many nations. God’s declaration over him came to pass: ‘Your descendants will be so many that they will be impossible to count!’” – Romans 4:18 Sometimes I wonder what our lives would look like if we took God at face value and actually believed that He will do what He says He will do. Many of us have gotten used to praying without expecting answers, believing without expecting to see, and…
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Advent Reflections: A Christmas Allegory of Love
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” – John 3:16-17, NKJV Many would argue that the cross is the greatest act of love in human history. And while there are many reasons I would agree to that statement, I want to take a different approach and present Christ’s birth as the greatest act of love. A Perfect Kingdom and a New Creation Imagine a perfect kingdom, where every being…
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Advent Reflections: Joy When Life Feels Joyless
In various carols and songs, Christmas is presented as a season of joy. In fact, in the Gospel of Luke the angel appeared to the shepherds and said, “I bring you good tidings of great joy.” Christ’s birth was cause for celebration! Today, that joy is still available, even if for some it may not be easily accessible. Finding Joy When Life Seems Joyless I know that this season can be full of grief and loneliness for some. It can be full of constant reminders of the joy that’s been taken away. It can feel difficult to find a reason to celebrate and rejoice when everything in the season is…
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Advent Reflections: Peace When Your Mind Is in Pieces
Busyness usually comes hand in hand with the Christmas season. It seems that the end of year is a constant slope beginning with Thanksgiving and speeding down to New Year’s. This is both energizing—time with family, friends, celebration—and also wearying over time. For some the season is smooth, but for many the road to the new year is full of bumps along the way. Whether from family stress, grief, feeling overwhelmed, or a sense of dread of the unknown, Christmas season can be the most wonderful time of the year or the most mentally chaotic. When Your Mind Is in Pieces During Christmas Christmas is a reflective season. This isn’t…
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The Turning of the Soil: When God Disrupts to Prepare
What do you do when life turns topsy-turvy? While talking with some friends in my small group, we realized that most of us are currently experiencing a stretching in our relationship with the Lord and our daily lives. We’ve all been feeling this odd tension, where things that used to be perfectly fine are no longer working quite the same. There’s this feeling of discomfort, that the places where we felt steady and established are suddenly not so deep rooted as we thought and there’s this nudging in our hearts that Holy Spirit is calling us higher. As I reflected upon this, I realized that this is what God does…
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Between the Promise and the Breakthrough
“But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.” – Romans 8:25, NKJV I wonder how many times Abraham felt like giving up. He was promised a great family who would fill the earth and yet year after year went by with no sign of even one child. Or even the entire nation of Israel, wandering in the wilderness waiting to someday enter the fabled promised land God had promised generations ago. What about David before becoming king? He’d been promised a glorious kingdom, and yet he’d spent years upon years in the wilderness, running for his very life and eventually taking…
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The Roadmap to the Christian Life and the Warning of Spiritual Amnesia
Last weekend I led a Bible study through the first part of 2 Peter. We spent time digging into Peter’s last words to the church and, as we read, two things that kept being highlighted were Peter’s roadmap to Christian maturity and his warning on spiritual amnesia. Here’s the deal: Peter was about to die and he knew it. Which is why he had to encourage the church, leaving them a solid roadmap to the Christian life, and warn them about spiritual blindness and false teachers/prophets infiltrating the church. Today I want to share both of these vital things with you. Let’s begin with Peter’s roadmap to Christian maturity. Roadmap…
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“Look at Me”: Seeking God’s Face in Chaos
“When You said, “Seek My face,” My heart said to You, “Your face, Lord, I will seek.” – Psalm 27:8, NKJV It’s very easy to focus on the biggest, loudest or most prominent problems in our life. Somehow, problems, worries and challenges act like a magnet and continually draw our gaze. And yet, focusing on the dark of our life only creates more chaos and confusion in our heart. We have this capability of magnifying what we focus on, which if used negatively, can be detrimental to our faith and our life. But if we choose to shift our focus, what incredible things could we magnify in our life? A…
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He’s Brave Enough for Both of You
It has been said that courage isn’t the absence of fear, but taking a step while you still feel afraid. I have thought about this often as someone who has battled with fear and anxiety. One time, as I was praying, God reminded me that no matter how dark the valley gets, He is still in control. He is still watching out for me and His plans for me are, ultimately, good. I want to take a moment to remind you that, whether you feel brave right now or not, God can be brave enough for both of you. All you have to do is hold His hand. David struggled…
