Around seventy years ago, a psychiatrist named Murray Bowen began to articulate a theory of how emotions operate in family systems. Bowen noted, as our own experience shows, that when…
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The sermon on the mount—Matthew tells us that Jesus spoke to the people on a mount, a big, high hill. Maybe that would remind Jewish listeners of Moses on the…
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Jesus is back from the wilderness, tested, steeled with the Spirit, with purpose, devotion, zeal, focus. People notice. People gather. So many bump through life wishy-washy, pale, bruised. Oh, why…
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My phone buzzes at odd, unpredictable hours, especially around the big holidays: amber alerts—child abductions. Often at those times of the year, it seems one parent is taking a child…
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We want—and, indeed, need—time for ourselves. Self-care is important! And Christ shows us a model of sacrificial living that may well feel exhausting: when do I get time for me,…
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If Jesus is always teaching, he is also preparing his followers. He has something he’s asking them to do, wants them to be doing. In much of the first part…
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Now, everyone was always eager for Jesus to do some miraculous sign, some awesome work. They weren’t looking for parlor tricks. People around them were sick, crippled, blind, deaf, hard-hearted…
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When I began attending church twenty-two years ago, I’m not sure I knew what I was expecting. I just had this inner sense—whispering, nudging—that God wanted me to go to…
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It’s not hard to think of biblical lands as wilderness and wasteland: Big Bend as far as the eye can see, but remember that the land God promised His people…
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I suppose we each have a picture of how the church ought to be, including this little congregation of it. No one’s picture looks just like the church as it…
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