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What do pastors in conflicted churches need the most?
A classic! What do pastors in conflicted churches need the most?
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How to Find the Perfect Church
I love this article by my coauthor and friend, Dave Edling, and I thought I’d re-run it since I’m offline all week due to our family vacation: How to Find the Perfect Church
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Enemies Perfectly Disguised — Wolves in Sheep Clothing
When I popped over to Amazon to pre-order Gloria Furman and Dr. Kathleen Nielson’s latest book: Word-Filled Women’s Ministry It reminded me of one of my favorite articles by Dr. Nielson: Never Retreat! Challies pointed to it a few years ago and I’m glad he did. I love everything I’ve ever read by Kathleen Nielson—she communicates her love for literature and Scripture in profoundly wonderful ways. (Plus, she has only ever been extraordinarily humble and gracious whenever I’ve interacted with her in person.) Beyond the personal attraction, however, I must tell you that the content (an old letter from her grandfather to his parents two days before one of the…
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The Five Marks of Authentic Leadership
What a great reminder from Michael Hyatt! The Five Marks of Authentic Leadership
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How Do You Respond When You Have Been “Put on the Shelf”?
I am slowly working through D.A. Carson’s, “For the Love of God,” and today’s reading (like most of the other ones!) is worthy of reflection: “THE STORY IS TOLD of Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, one of the most influential preachers of the twentieth century. When he was dying of cancer, one of his friends and former associates asked him, in effect, ‘How are you managing to bear up? You have been accustomed to preaching several times a week. You have begun important Christian enterprises; your influence has extended through tapes and books to Christians on five continents. And now you have been put on the shelf. You are reduced to sitting…
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To be known and not loved is our greatest fear …
The above quote captures the essence of my day of tears. (The salt is burning my eyeballs so harshly now, that I feel quite sure that I need to find a way to stop crying, not only for my emotional health but my physical health too.) And so I will end my day with one of my all-time favorite Tim Keller sermons. I hope it is a blessing to you too. (One side note? Please ignore the description of this sermon on the Redeemer Pres. page because MAN! Does the description make it sound BOR-OR-OR-ING. It is not. It is heart and life-changing!) The Two Great Tests
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Gospel Coalition Women’s Conference 2012 — Over 6,200 LiveBlog Replays in the First Two Weeks!
I wanted to send Collin Hansen some stats for my LiveBlogs from The Gospel Coalition’s 2012 Women’s Conference, so I ran a quick report. How fun to see that I’ve already had over 6,200 replays in just the first two weeks! I really hope that they are a blessing to people and that I represented The Gospel Coalition, Kathleen Nielson, Don Carson, John Piper, Paige Benton Brown, Nancy Leigh Demoss—and, well, all of the speakers well. I just love to LiveBlog!
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Happy 4th of July!
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Pain is the Price we Pay for Love
Two of my dearest friends are facing similar “peacemaking opportunity” (i.e. CONFLICT) situations this week, although each is in a different context. One is in the church. The other is in a business situation. But both are the same issue: they have been informed that someone “out there” is upset with them and is talking to others about them behind their backs. Of all of the peacemaking scenarios, I think I dread this one the most. It is so tempting to really freak out and lose perspective when we have to go to church or go to work knowing that someone we are sharing fellowship with, taking communion with, or…
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The Greatest Danger to Your Pastor’s Spiritual Growth
Dave has a great post over at our RedeemingChurchConflicts site: The Greatest Danger to Your Pastor’s Spiritual Growth Here is just a snippet: This is what the dangerous downward spiral looks like: The pastor preaches a powerful message that really communicates. Church members congratulate him on his fine work as a powerful communicator of difficult theological material. The pastor is praised for “changing lives” and is pleased that the church members respond so positively. The next week the same thing happens—praise, adoration, applause … for “the man.” Week after week, the pastor receives this praise and feeds his ego by gathering close to himself only the people who agree with…
