• Communion - Featured - Imaginative Prayer - Presence

    You Are What You Eat: Communion Reimagined

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    While in Jerusalem some years ago, we visited the Upper Room.  It had long since been turned into a small chapel, and as we sat on the wooden pews, a tour guide took us through the story of Jesus’ communion with the disciples.  Afterwards, one of the students I was with asked about the authenticity of this site as the actual location of the Upper Room.  The tour guide smiled and then told us about the six other Upper Rooms in the vicinity.  Apparently, an ambitious tourist could go around and partake of the sacrament in seven Upper Rooms in…

  • Featured - Intervention - Rescue

    God’s Miraculous and Timely Intervention

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    I suppose I was prepped to believe that God’s intervention can happen miraculously by a youth spent devouring the books of evangelists.  These men and women of God proved over and over how He can and does aid those who for whatever reason find themselves caught in unforeseen and overwhelming circumstances. For instance, the story of Nora Lam gave me an understanding of God’s care of the widow and orphan. Her story of staying pregnant for nearly a year while she worked in a hard labor camp in Communist China is gripping. Though I did not expect to need rescue,…

  • self-awareness
    denial - Self-awareness - success

    Self-Awareness vs Narcissism: How to Tell the Difference

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    Self-awareness is to sensitivity as narcissism is to self-absorption. Many make the mistake of glossing over the term self-awareness as one of those jargon words like facilitate, monetize, or self-actualization.  Christians, in particular, are often suspicious of any word that begins with self. We forget that the injunction to love others as we love ourselves presupposes necessary self-love.  But self-awareness is the polar opposite of narcissism. Narcissism projects onto the world an image, while the true self, like the portrait hidden in Dorian Grey’s attic, grows less recognizable with time.  The cry of the narcissist is “I have been cheated!” …