• Featured

    Five Signs that Reconciliation is Impossible

    Reconciliation is a world of its own apart from forgiveness. So I hesitated when someone recently asked me, “How long do I need to keep forgiving?” Because I realized the real question was about reconciliation, I didn’t respond with the standard seventy times seven answer.  I suppose we don’t really ever stop forgiving, but knowing when to end futile attempts at reconciliation can be important, even life-saving. I used to be a champion reconciler. What that really means is that I went through the motions of apology and apology acceptance as if they meant something. Sometimes they did. Sometimes they…

  • Subconscious Mind - The enemy

    How to Disagree with the Enemy

    Stay a Christian for long and soon enough you will hear about the enemy. The Bible calls him the father of lies and the wedge-driver. I think every believer has heard Ephesians 6:12 many times: For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. I am, if anything, a very practical theologian. I don’t care so much about etymology and ancient languages as I do information that I can use. If I am wrestling with entities I can’t see, I need a little…

  • Featured

    Spiritual Formation: The Eight Stages of Growth

    Spiritual formation is rarely discussed in church. At least, I am sure I have taken in or endured as the case may be, thousands of sermons. The closest they seem to get is on the topic of discipleship, which is related, but not the same. We pore over books about the stages of child development or how a marriage grows, yet spiritual formation remains a bit of a mystery. Part of the reason for this is that, like most theories about spiritual or emotional growth, spiritual formation remains a bit of theory. Like the stages of grief, the actual living…