Popular songs have burnished the word LOVE into the fabric of society—from the Beatles’ “All You Need Is Love” to Elvis telling us we “Can’t Help Falling in Love” and, of course Foreigner proclaiming “I Want To Know What Love Is.” For Christians, love is the very essence of our faith walk.    God’s love is so great that he gave his only Son to die for our sins and...

In order to fully comprehend and appreciate HOW MUCH God has given us, we need to intentionally and repeatedly remember HOW LITTLE we had without him. All Christians at some point will BLUR THEIR FAITH LINE and lose touch with how much they have been forgiven. How much they have in Christ. How blessed they are to be a new creature in him (2 Corinthians 5:17)    Here’s how the apostle Paul...

My 2020 LABOR DAY saw multiple glimpses–mostly on television—of people using the holiday weekend to escape the confining pain that comes from viewing their WORK as a SANCTUARY. It was a powerful experience watching the screenplay of so many lives unfold and then praying for the individual cast members. But it all felt like a sham. A dangerous dance with delusion. A frustrating façade of faces...

On this weekend when we celebrate LABOR and pause to consider “WHAT we do” and “WHY we do it,” I am thinking about Andy Griffith. Honest. Why him? Because I grew up watching the Andy Griffith Show as a kid and was mesmerized by those peaceful scenes in Mayberry with friends sitting on the porch at dusk WITHOUT a vibrating smartphone shaking their glass of tea.   With that peaceful remembrance...

ARROGANCE in man is ABHORRENT, especially when it produces judgmental thoughts of grand superiority that “LOOK DOWN” on others. It gets worse.    Being arrogant with that kind of judgment has an evil twin and master chameleon hiding in plain sight. What is it? A barrier to believing the best in people that OVERLOOKS their good and ELEVATES the “bad.”    This scourge shows up in...

I had a heart-pounding conversation with a close friend yesterday that, INITIALLY, had the two of us SHAKING IN OUR BOOTS. What caused all of that shaking? News that his family farm and related business were being declared a toxic waste site by the Canadian government and confiscated by the bank. He told me the gut-wrenching story through tears laced with fear. Sixty-one years in business…gone. The...

Have you ever looked hard for something where you KNEW it was located, but come up empty? Where you were embarrassed when someone pointed to a spot only a meter away and said, “Hey, it’s right there”? I have!    Most of the time it turns out that the object of my search—usually my keys—was hiding in plain sight.    Our faith walk with God has its own HIDING-IN-PLAIN-SIGHT challenge.    It...

This just in from our global tribe of nearly 800,000 online followers: A close Christian friend said I have the “WRONG KIND OF DISCIPLINE.” What does that mean? The word DISCIPLINE represents a sweeping force in life that holds the power to transform people, projects, and the planet. It is also WIDELY MISUNDERSTOOD.    Let’s start with the word’s deep roots in the Christian faith that make...

We all have bosses.   The two-year-old who tests the boundaries set by well-meaning parents.    The teenager managing her online profiles the way SHE thinks is best.    The head-strong CEO who thinks he is boss of EVERYTHING—not just the business but his entire life (me early in my faith walk).    Playing boss creeps into the life of every human being...

This just in from our global tribe of 771,000 online followers: “Mark, how do I know when I am legitimately sad and when I have self-pity?” This question does not come as a surprise to me at all.    We are seeing an increase in self-produced pity around the world that “validates” negative circumstances and marinates our soul with hardships—past and present.    The sin of SELF-PITY...