Too often we listen to self-condemning lies because we don’t understand how God sees us. We put ourselves under pressure to be perfect. But God never designed us to bear such pressure. We can understand how God really sees us by looking at how we, as good parents, interact with our children. Let’s look at […]
Does that title seem strange? That’s because so often we really don’t know who our real enemy is. Let’s discover that first. Not Other People We often confuse people who hurt us with the enemy. But they are not our real enemy, even if they think they are. When people hurt us, they are acting […]
We have complete control over our biggest problem. Getting this one thing right changes everything. Our mindset—the assumptions, judgments, and expectations we have about the world, about God, about ourselves—filters how we perceive and process information. Our mindset is such a powerful force over our lives, determining what we do and what we don’t do. […]
At a recent writer’s conference (Jeff Goins’ Tribe conference), I heard a speaker, Joseph Michael, author of the online course Learn Scrivener Fast, say he was thankful for his failures. I’d always known intellectually that failures are good for you. As long as you learn something, failures are learning experiences. They’re a necessary part of […]
Recently we were at a conference and Janet ran into a friend who told her, “I’m so nervous about wearing something that looks good I brought 3 suitcases of clothes.” Now this young woman is gorgeous and would look beautiful in anything she wears. But that’s apparently not the story she tells herself. The negative […]
The most secretive prison in the world isn’t in some subbasement of some 1960s era non-descript government building in some closed dictatorial regime. But it is the most populated prison in the world. “Wait a minute, that doesn’t even make sense!” you say. “How do you keep the largest prison in the world secretive?” Put […]
Most of you remember the free ebook I gave to our subscribers as a Christmas present, Midget: A Fable of Giant Inner Healing. I plan to sell it later this year on Amazon and wanted you, our subscribers, to have it first for free. (It’s available on the downloads page; click the “Free Stuff” link […]
For so many of us our identity is in what we do or what we’ve done. Especially men – what’s the first question we ask each other when we meet another man? “What do you do?” There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s safe small talk. But that’s not who we are. God loves us based […]
There’s one question feared by the enemy above all others. There’s one question that, if we dared to ask it and follow the answer, would disrupt the status quo more than anything else. “What if…?” There’s something on our heart that God’s put there, but the distractions of life drown it out. The daily slog […]
The beatitudes in Matthew 5:3-12 are pretty self-explanatory, if very counter-intuitive. But there’s one in particular that’s often misunderstood. At least it was by me for a long time. “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God” (Matthew 5:9). But there’s a world of difference between peace making and peace keeping. […]