Something strange happened the day before the terrorist attacks on 9/11—I received a warning from heaven. Opening my Bible to 2 Chronicles 20:2 (NASB1995), I read, “‘A great multitude is coming against you from beyond the sea.’” King Jehoshaphat had proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah after learning his enemies were marching toward him to ambush his people. He gathered…
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Clues to Your Calling
Why are you here on this earth? What is your purpose? Some people receive their calling in dramatic ways—in an encounter with God or a watershed moment—but whether that lightning-bolt moment has happened for you, you have a purpose on this earth. Would you hold space for these big questions by answering a few others? Who are you? What experiences…
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ICE Detention Centers: Silence is Complicity
Some years ago, on a visit to the Stewart Detention Facility in Lumpkin, Georgia, I was divested of my delusions about what a “detention center” was. This was a high-security prison. My colleagues and I entered through rows of tall chain-link fences, topped and surrounded by razor wire. We left our belongings in a locker and proceeded through a metal…
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Chronic Pain & the Battle to Believe God is Good
If God is good, why is there evil in the world? Plenty has been written on that subject. The answer usually boils down to free will. Humans used the free will God gave them to plunge themselves and the world into a fallen state. We caused harm — to ourselves, others, and the earth . ‘Free will’ as an answer…
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The Moral Courage of Jesus To Treasure Women
Imagine this scene with me. Jesus is delivering a sermon in the synagogue about the kingdom of God (Luke 13) when his eyes fall on a disabled woman who’d been stooped over for eighteen years. Though she was completely unable to straighten herself, she had not neglected to worship her Creator in the temple with God’s people that day. In…
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Weeping with Those Who Weep – A Ministry of Presence
Weep with those who weep. The command Paul gives in Romans 12:15 (ESV) is in the the larger context of his instruction to believers to offer their bodies as living sacrifices, which is their spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1). He continues, admonishing them to let their love be sincere (Romans 12:9), and details the various forms sincere love may…
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