I have difficulty praying the Lord’s Prayer because whenever I say “Our Father,” I think of my own father, who was hard, unyielding, and relentless. I cannot help but think of God that way. — Martin Luther It has been said that God created man in His image, and man returned the favor. Our…
Becoming a More Kingdom-Minded Man
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…
How God the Father Initiates a Man
Desperate for Initiation A man needs to know his name. He needs to know he’s got what it takes. And I don’t mean “know” in the modernistic, rationalistic sense. I don’t mean that the thought has passed through your cerebral cortex and you’ve given it intellectual assent, the way you know about the Battle of Waterloo or the ozone…
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…
And Lo, the Kingdom of God is Like a Terrible Football Team
My son is like me. He’s not much into athletics. But we signed him up for a flag-football league when he was in sixth grade. My wife told me the league needed someone to coach my son’s team, the Rams, and I told her, point-blank, I would not be doing it. I know nothing about…
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…
The One Thing Jesus Couldn’t Stop Talking About
What Matters Most Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at something that doesn’t really matter.1 The key to life is finding out what matters most and building your life around it. In an age of distraction, however, focusing on what matters most feels impossible. Everything is grabbing at our…