If you’re caring for people that have been traumatized or are in crisis then you’re suffering with them vicariously. If you’re a pastor, you probably think you live in a nice city, but actually you’re in a spiritual and emotional war zone! Just being a tender-hearted person in our world today exposes you to vicarious…
We love being with family for the holidays — or maybe not! It can be stressful! And in some family relationships it’s awkward or uncomfortable. Personalities don’t mesh, or there’s distance or unresolved conflicts. Jesus experienced this. He had conflict in his family too! In my book Your Best Life in Jesus’ Easy Yoke we…
Often in marriage or another relationship we think we have an intimacy problem when really it’s more about a boundary problem. Boundaries between people get blurred if either one tries to share their “feelings” by sharing their perceptions of the other person. This blurs boundaries and leads to conflict. Instead, if you share your personal…
Setting boundaries is more than a psychological tool — it’s really a spiritual discipline that helps to establish further your self-identity in Christ.
A young pastor in one of my Soul Shepherding Groups asked all of us pastors seated around him, “Please pray for me. Everyday I can’t finish my work so I have to bring it home, but my four year old son wants to play with me. Most of the time I have to tell him no.…
We all have a certain rhythm of life, our own pattern for how we relate to people and do our work. It can become like a rut that we slide into without realizing it. Perhaps we say that we want to be more peaceful or loving, or more like Jesus, but our rhythm of life…
Many Bible students miss the importance of Jesus’ Solitude and Silence. Every pastor, ministry leader, and caregiver — any disciple of Jesus! — needs to learn from Jesus’ example of intimacy with God. I don’t want to miss this! So I went back to the Gospel of Mark and did a Bible study on Jesus’…
Today we are desperate for God’s wisdom on our sexuality. These Bible verses on sexual purity will get the conversation started on the right track. You don’t need me to tell you that our world today is really messed up in it’s understanding of sex. “Sex sells” so it’s used everywhere in our society from…
Kent was ten minutes late for his meeting with me again. He tried to make a joke of it, “I’m sorry. I guess I need 25 hours in my day!” Invariably he ran late for meetings and events because he was always trying to squeeze one more thing into his day. Kent complained about having…
We’ve been providing care, counsel, and prayer to pastors and other servants of Christ for a number of years. One of the most important things we do is help them to rest in God. Every pastor and ministry leader I know — starting with the one that looks back at me in the mirror! —…