Reality is obstinate and stubborn. Obdurate and inflexible. Recalcitrant and uncompromising. Reality is what will not go away when we stop thinking about it or escape momentarily from its grasp. Yes, Christians have been accused of escapism for a very long time. Karl Marx accused Christians of using their religion as an opiate to escape life’s discomfort.     This dystopian view of...

I’m watching 2018 begin its final march into the sunset with a burning desire to make 2019 more significant than the year it nudges off the horizon. More significant in understanding my life purpose. And more significant in serving others who need God’s love and hope. But making that dream a reality is not an automatic result from making another passive resolution and prayer for the new year. NO!...

A close friend of mine is struggling mightily with the notion of fairness right now as he endures a barrage of attacks from a troubled bully. His plea for prayer last night got me thinking that all of us face this challenge. That’s why I include this two-part question in my year-end spiritual assessment: 1) How did I handle personal attacks in the past year; and 2) How should I deal with them in the...

Life on earth is full of TOXICITY that can quickly ooze into our bloodstream and eventually reach our brain…and then our heart…and, eventually, our soul. These ubiquitous toxins greet us on each cyber wave we surf and each image we put into our mind’s projector. They are predacious and pervasive and powerful…stopping at nothing to compromise our faith and hijack our hope in Christ. The danger...

The planet is in a perpetual winter of sin that has produced a deep state of spiritual hibernation. And early in my faith walk I had joined that group in spiritual slumber. At the time, I looked at the Bible as sacred and important, but it was dead and dormant in terms of being alive in my life on a daily basis.  Like hibernation in the animal world, the Bible describes sinful man as hibernating...

December is my time of reflection on the past and repositioning for the future. A time when I confront reality head on and resolve to think different; act different; be different. This year my thoughts quickly turned to the notion of refuge—where I went when the storms of life crashed my pad. And I thanked God for how he gave me the strength to seek him out with a healthy sense of reality that I...

Expectancy is one of the most powerful words on the planet! It drives my faith and animates the desires of my heart. And it only takes 36 seconds to give it wings and the power to fly. We just need to do it! Earlier in my life I underestimated the power expectancy had on my worldview. But then God showed me that if I wasn’t expecting him to turn my life in a new and joyous direction, how could...

My end-of-year review hunkered down pretty deep over the last few days as I pondered that nettlesome but critically-important question “what have you done with your salvation, Mark?” I ask this question a lot throughout the year, but camp out on it in December with an extra level of scrutiny. It’s a self-challenging process that starts at the very beginning with recognition that I have come to faith...

Early in my faith walk I wanted to visit Bali or Fiji or Tahiti and stay in one of those bungalows hovering above the ocean’s cobalt ink. I wanted to rest peacefully under the sparking glints of sunlight that would later be punctuated by a silver moon dangling from a string so close you could touch its rough skin. Okay, fair enough. But there was more to that picture than those alluring components.    The...

I was frozen in place with too many options. Too many unknowns. Too many chances to do nothing. It was earlier in my faith walk when I thought options and choices equaled FREEDOM. My calculus was simple: God allows multiple options in a believer’s life, right? Yes. Ok, so options must be good.    A few years down life’s road I realized that God often gives us a multiplicity of choices that...