I’ve said many times before, both in what I’ve written and spoken, that I grew up with the habit of seeing the cup half empty. I don’t know all the reasons for this. Some of it may be temperament. Some of it may be learned. It doesn’t matter much how it came to be. What matters is what I’d like to do about that in my life now as a follower of Jesus.

My pessimism has, at least at times, been rooted in remembering and rehearsing what I think went wrong in...

This episode is airing on the last Monday of 2020. I know that many can’t wait to put this year behind us and hope for a better 2021. But just as true as it is that 2020 was a hard year full of troubles, it was also a year in which God was doing very good work in his people and through his people. It is a gift to turn back and look for evidences of God’s measureless grace at work, especially in the midst of a very hard season. That’s what we’ll talk about today on the...

During this Advent week of Love, I’d like to take a look at love through the eyes of the woman who carried Jesus from conception, through birth, childhood, and then through to the cross---Mary.

God initiated our love relationship by creating humankind. He then lovingly outstretched his arms to us in Jesus. God is certainly our first and foremost example of overflowing and very specific love. Emmanuel, God with us.

We know that Jesus was divine as Son of God. He was also...

Last December Alan interviewed John Mark Comer. His episode has remained near the top of our 10 most downloaded shows. So we thought we’d replay it for you today. I think it’s because John Mark is singing the same song as Unhurried Living and Alan’s book, An Unhurried Life. John Mark wrote The Relentless Elimination of Hurry and we are delighted to share the replay of Alan’s conversation with him now.

John Mark Comer lives, works, and writes in the urban...

It’s very tempting to look back at 2020 and see only the hardship, trouble and scarcity of it. There has been plenty of that, for sure. Perhaps it is at a time like this that we especially need the wise guidance of passages like Psalm 103:1-5. I’ve often taken leadership teams to this passage at the beginning of trainings I’ve led.

Take your time as you read it. Let the words soak into your thinking patterns and your emotions.

¹Praise the Lord, my soul;

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We live in a profoundly wordy world. I sometimes feel utterly surrounded by words: social media, emails, text messages, news feeds, websites, television, radio. And it seems rare that words are being used to simply tell the truth and describe reality. In his sermon on the mount, Jesus had some profoundly powerful words to say about how we speak. 

Alan Fadling, (MDiv),serves as a frequent speaker and consultant with local churches, national organizations and leaders internationally....

An entirely new set of words and phrases entered our colloquial lexicon this year: 

• Curbside pickup
• Flatten the curve
• Wash your hands
• Social distancing
• May I take your temperature?
• Six feet apart, please
• Wear your mask
• Do you have any toilet paper?

We can laugh about it now (or not). But this is just the tip of the iceberg of changes we’ve had to make this year.

And like any good spiritual director or formation coach, I willingly and humbly propose the question I...

We live in a visual culture. Just a few years ago the Internet Trends Report shared that an average of 1.8 billion images were uploaded to the internet daily. That adds up to 657 billion photos in one year. Every two minutes, people take more photos than existed in total 150 years ago.

With all of that imagery floating through our consciousness every day, how might we use intentional imagery to grow closer to God? If a picture is worth a thousand words, is it also conducive to prayer?

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We live in a day when people feel pressure to establish their identity as though it were a frail, fragile thing. Will I be able to post something that goes viral? Will I be seen as an influencer for this reason?

I was recently re-reading a C. S. Lewis classic, Mere Christianity, and found this on the very last page in a chapter titled “The New Men.” (Forgive his male-centered language. I have a feeling he’d want to say the following to each of us reading).

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Author, Greg Holder, in his book Never Settle, suggests that “while we don’t consciously choose a less-than-life, it happens.

Little by little, we start putting down roots in a land of less than: less than satisfying, less than interesting, less than helpful, and certainly less than hopeful. Before we know it our faith is lukewarm, apathetic, bland.

Never Settle is a tangible reminder that every choice in your day is crackling with God’s redemptive power...