As I began thinking about and working on my upcoming message for Sunday, I came across this question: How many of us pause to consider the ways in which we inadvertently quench the Spirit's work in our lives individually and in our churches corporately?Sam Storms How might an individual Christian do this? Maybe these are …
Tag: Christian life
Stopping for Sabbath Even When There’s More to Do
Last night I sat down with my family for Sabbath supper. I had been hoping to get certain things done before Sabbath began. But I didn’t. There were unfinished tasks all around me. There are always unfinished tasks all around me. But I still practice Sabbath. I told someone recently that even if my Sunday …
Continue reading Stopping for Sabbath Even When There’s More to Do
Living as Christians in a Crazy World
Have you ever felt overwhelmed by what’s going on in the world? By what you see on Facebook, in your newsfeed, on TV and social media? I think about Afghanistan. I think about Haiti. I think about our Canadian Federal election and politics in general. I think about the situation with COVID and the way …
A Short Prayer to Start Your Day
Are we starting our day in the right frame of mind (and heart)? Often our minds are already crowded and busy first thing in the morning. Or mine often is. For this reason, it is good to step back for a bit to quiet your heart and open yourself up to God’s presence. C.S. Lewis …
Expectations, Faith, and Why Our Experience Of God Isn’t What We’d Like It To Be
Expectations are a part of every relationship whether we are aware of them or not. I heard a story once of a pastor giving some premarital counseling to a couple. And when he asked the husband to be what his expectations were of his fiancé, his list of expectations took his spouse to be by …
Continue reading Expectations, Faith, and Why Our Experience Of God Isn’t What We’d Like It To Be
For Such a Time as This . . .
In The Fellowship of the Ring, the first book (and film) in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, a hobbit by the name of Frodo has volunteered to be the one to take the ring of power to Mount Doom in the land of Mordor so it can be destroyed once and for all. The …
Community is Messy
There really wasn’t anything we could do to help. And certainly by the time I got there it was pretty much all over. But there we were—neighbours, friends, family—standing shoulder to shoulder with another neighbour, friend, and family member who had just seen the work-shed behind his house burn down. Thirty years of tools, equipment, …
Neighbours
A few years ago I was with my wife and kids at the emergency room of the hospital and something happened while I was there that has stayed with me ever since. It was a striking reminder of how much has changed in our culture—and how even a small city like ours is also affected …
Stop
Quiet. It’s a rare thing for me these days, especially as a father of three. And not only for that reason. Our world is filled with noise: voices, music, TV, computers, traffic, crowds, appliances, phones. Unusual is the moment in the course of an average day that our environment is empty of sound. Even now …
The First Rule of Flying
At the end of the 2002 sci-fi film Serenity, the gruff, Han Solo-esque Captain Malcolm Reynolds is having a conversation with his ship’s new pilot, River Tam. She’s already quite adept, but he still takes a moment to offer this profound reflection on flying a spaceship: “You know what the first rule of flying is? …
grace notes 