Discovering God’s plan, His unique will for you and I, our destiny—whatever you want to call it—is a journey. One just like sports teams take to mature and become championship quality. It’s not as basic as whispering a few prayers and poof! Now we know what to do.
So what can we learn about this journey in discovering God’s will for our lives?
By the very fact that it’s a journey, I’m sure it takes a lifetime to learn. But following are a few thoughts I have about the journey thus far.
Children raised without the grace of God become well-behaved jerks.
When I was still at home and people would visit and compliment my parents on raising good kids, they would always say, “But for the grace of God! It’s nothing we did.” That never made sense to me. Dad and Mom were extremely intentional with how they raised us kids. What do they mean, “It’s nothing they did?”
Growing up in Christian culture, the burden of our parenting isn’t so much that our kids come to know Christ—although we would all verbalize that’s what we want. But in actuality it isn’t. What we really want is well-behaved, sensible kids with a passion for Christ that make us look like perfect parents. We want to raise our kids without needing to lean into the grace of God.
Within the Christian culture, we don’t do well at caring for broken people, especially in a church mainly filled with multigenerational believers. We’ve known all of our lives how to live appropriately and so Christianity becomes more about living rightly than faith and transformation in Christ.
Requirements for church membership focus more on outside sins (smoking, dress, habits of leisure) instead of internal sins such as gluttony, gossip, self-righteousness, hypocrisy, anger, rebellion, materialism and many more. The idea is, once you have your outside life altogether you can become a member. And then, don’t show anymore imperfections after that.
The problem is, that only cultivates fake Christians.
How do you plan to spend your Christmas vacation? Will you be visiting family, or are you going to stay home and celebrate with friends? Do you plan to take any time off of work, or just Christmas Day?
In less than forty-eight hours my family and I board a plane for Los Angeles. We are excited about this trip! Not only because it has been two years since we celebrated Christmas with my family, but also because Teresa’s brother is getting married later in January. We’ll be in the States for six weeks and it will be a riot! (Yes, I’m anticipating a riot traveling with two toddlers.)
One of my biggest weaknesses is trying to do too much at one time. As a result, I often don’t get everything done. On Sundays, I find it hard to sit and read because I think of everything else I could and should be doing. I feel like I’m often running behind and not able to keep on top of life.
This weekend marks fourteen years since two airplanes careened into the World Trade towers in downtown New York City. It’s been seven years since the Great Recession impacted our economy. There is a lot of speculation among Christian communities about what might take place this year.
Was God sending America a message back in 2001, and again in 2008? If so, what will it be this year? Will America finally collapse? And if America collapses, does that mark the beginning of Christ’s return?
Authors Note: This is a guest post by my friend Emily Smucker. Emily loves to learn, but it hasn’t always been that way. It took a difficult experience for God to help her learn to love learning. For a few years she struggled with West Niles virus and wrote about it in her book Emily (Check it out on […]
So I finally read The Shack. The hype over this book was like five years ago, but I still wanted to read it for myself. I come away challenged and inspired, yet also a little confused. If you’re going to criticize the book, you should definitely read it first.* The story is powerful. And the […]
I think there are at least five types of books every person should read each year to help them grow. Here are twenty-five suggestions to get you started.
The story that’s being written in our lives, is the platform God will likely use for us to share Him with others.
That’s why people who struggle with their marriage, yet work through issues and find deeper intimacy, often go into counseling ministry. Or those who were sexually abused and found healing and freedom in Christ start ministries for abused and hurting people.
You see, our story is where God becomes relevant to our lives. Our story is made of the events that happen in our life which are out of our control. We didn’t plan them, but they happened anyway. It’s those things we often wish weren’t a part of our lives. The experiences that feel too vulnerable to share. God is using them to write a message of His glory for others to hear.
Sometimes it seems as though faith in God comes easier for some then it does for others. It puzzles me. One person readily accepts the mystery of faith and embraces the truth of God’s Word, another spends years wrestling with questions and can’t sense the presence of God. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjqvYVVW_sg Friends, very close friends to me, […]
Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of Mom’s accident. Today, I’d like to share an article she wrote several years ago that is meaningful to us as a family–especially now that she’s gone. Written by Rachel H. Witmer God said to Noah, “I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is the sign of my […]
This is where it all begins.
Author Asher Witmer knows what it’s like to want freedom from sexual sin only to continually fail. We’re often told we need more personal discipline, that we need to think godly things instead of fleshly things.
What if I told you that discipline won’t solve your problem with lust?
Our male sexuality is given by God for advancing beauty and goodness. But somewhere along the line it becomes something that causes devastation and guilt. The good news is we don’t have to live with guilt. In Live Free, Asher Witmer shows us how we can find freedom from sexual sin, live with nothing to hide, and be able to fight for others.
