Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. — Paul to the Romans, Romans 12:2 On Friday mornings, I teach men at The Man in the Mirror…
Crossed Wires
My first car was not the regular 1979 but the upgraded Buick Century, the model with a spoiler on the back. And spoiler alert: your grandpa’s Buick did not have a spoiler! What color, you ask? C’mon, what color car do you think someone with my unbridled coolness would have? Brown. Yeah, my car…
Why Does God Allow Mental Illness?
And what is the purpose of suffering? I once worked with a man who started limping around the office one day. He had tripped during a recent half-marathon and thought his ankle was just taking longer than usual to recover. But then he started to trip when walking down the hallway and couldn’t keep his…
The Leadership Genius of Jesus
Titles and Deeds Let me tell you about the worst boss I ever saw. He was given authority prematurely, and he abused it wildly. He harshly ordered people when he should have gently directed. He bullied people when he should have asked nicely. He whispered when he should have screamed. He delegated poorly, and then…
How to Work for Racial Justice
Three hundred and eighty-one. That’s how many days the Montgomery Bus Boycott lasted. Sparked by lifelong activist and justice-seeker Rosa Parks, fueled by Black women who organized car pools, printed flyers, and walked to and from work, and with Martin Luther King Jr. as the spokesperson of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), Black people…
I Have a Dream
Editor’s note: Today we are sharing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech from the March on Washington in 1963. The speech is published in its entirety in A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King Jr. While the events surrounding the speech and the nature of…
Turn Your Season Around: Receive God’s Grace
By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. Ephesians 2:8-9 I had everything but I had nothing. As the 1983 National League Rookie of the Year and a perennial All-Star throughout…
Should You Give Up on Goal-Setting?
The term goals was virtually nonexistent before 1920. On a graph, looking at any mention of the word in all of literature across the board, it’s pretty much a flat line — until 1920, when it started to uptick and has continued to shoot up and to the right for the past ninety to one…
Jesus, Born a Servant
Editor’s note: As we celebrate the birth of Jesus at Christmas, enjoy these two short but powerful devotions on the beauty of the Incarnation from Eugene Peterson, beloved pastor and translator of the Message Bible. The 365-day devotional God’s Message for Each Day gathers Peterson’s best-loved, most powerful writing into a daily invitation to…
God Walk: Moving at the Speed of Your Soul
“God walks “slowly” because He is love. If He is not love He would move much faster. Love has its speed. It is an inner speed. It is a spiritual speed. It is a different kind of speed from the technological speed to which we are accustomed. It is “slow” and yet it is lord…