In general [when I write here of discernment], I am thinking of what a local church or a local denomination does in order to discern how best to live out the gospel in its day and in its way. While personal discernment for my own life is important, that is […]

What do you think we get wrong about the book of Esther? For most of my life, I heard two themes around the book of Esther that I now believe to be totally off-base. The first is that Esther is a story about a virtuous Jewish girl who won the […]

One might ask, if what we believe about God determines our ultimate destiny, shouldn’t the evidence [for God’s existence] be more obvious and available? If knowing God is so important, why does he remain so hidden? Space doesn’t permit us to explore all the answers to these questions here, but […]

As we progress in the Christian life, we find that it is a never-ending process. We go back, breaking some destructive power of the past. Then later, on a deeper level, God has us return to the same issue on a more profound level. I have experienced four conversions so […]

Jesus’ preaching about the kingdom, and his reputation as a miracle worker, raise the critical question of how he understood his identity and mission. While our limited sources do not allow us to build a psychological profile of Jesus, the implicit significance of Jesus’ words and deeds can tell us […]

Many of us feel like we are not getting done what really matters to us and what we are truly capable of doing. And even when we are accomplishing things, doing so is a battle that surely must be harder than it really has to be. The goal of my […]