We all understand that abuse is harmful. It leaves deep scars and wounds on our heart, especially when committed by the people who should have loved us. That’s Type B trauma—a “Bad” thing happened. We all get that abuse is really bad. But Type A trauma—the “Absence” of the necessary good thing—is still trauma. But […]
Sarah was in church smiling, conversing with all her church friends. “If they only knew the mess in my life,” she thought every week, “they wouldn’t have anything to do with me.” So she kept pretending, and she was good at it. They all knew Sarah the Good Girl. No one knew Sarah the Alcoholic. […]
The truth is you have tremendous value. I have struggled actually believing this. Well, truth be told, I have no trouble believing you have tremendous value. I have trouble believing I have tremendous value. Can you relate? I’ve been asked by people I trust to share more of my story. So in the hope that […]
Too often, “how to walk a hard road” isn’t something we talk about enough in Western Christianity. Our life is so comfortable, on the outside at least, that too often we neglect talking about walking hard roads. And yet, although we have freedoms and conveniences, our lives can be just as painful and torn as […]
One of the biggest lies we constantly believe is our current situation is forever. It’s not. It’s a season. Whatever you’re struggling with, you don’t have to endure it forever. Unless you choose to. Here’s an example. For those of you who don’t live in the Washington DC area, Interstate 95 is a giant parking […]
People come to church in silent pain, isolated and hurting. “Look at all these happy people getting close to God. I’m the only one who’s faking it.” Nothing could be further from the truth. But we drive people to internalize and hide their pain because, by and large, the church doesn’t know how to help […]
This could quite possibly be the most important post I’ve ever written. It could save a life. It’s based on Sarah Robinson’s excellent post here (not an affiliate link). Sarah is a personal friend in our writer’s mentoring group, and a very strong believer. Please read her article, share it, and then come back and read […]
The most obvious signal of danger is fear. I wrote about the 3 types of fear here. A lot of fear is unhealthy and keeps us bound up by the enemy. But there is a good type of fear. Fear Means “Move Back” When the threat is real, healthy fear is a God-given emotion that […]
Looking back at history, we can see amazing things God was doing that nobody recognized at the time. Learning this skill helps us see what God is doing in us today that other people, often friends and family, don’t recognize. While Europe was in the chaos of the Dark Ages, God used Saint Patrick to […]
As our regular readers know, this blog is all about our true identity in Jesus—the identity God created us to become. But let’s take one giant step backward. How can we understand who we really are in God if we’re confused about who God really is? In order to understand who we really are, we […]