02217 – The Best Ideas Come from…

Don't confuse being a fast talker with being a deep thinker. Speaking quickly signals confidence, not complexity. Don't mistake volume for expertise. Speaking loudly reflects conviction, not credibility. Sometimes the best ideas come from the least assertive voice in...

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01781 – Hell is Not God’s Choice

Often hell is portrayed as a place of punishment and heaven as a place of reward. But this concept easily leads us to think about God as either a policeman, who tries to catch us when we make a mistake and send us to prison when our mistakes become too big, or a Santa...

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01682 – If You Look Back…

If you look back only at your mistakes, you'd think you were an idiot. If you look back only at your wiser choices, you'd think you were infallible. But if you look back on everything, you realize you're a human being who has been through a lot, grown a lot, is always...

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01516 – A Serious Malady of the Soul

A generation of Christians reared among push buttons and automatic machines is impatient of slower and less direct methods of reaching their goals. We have been trying to apply machine-age methods to our relationship with God. We read our chapters, have our short...

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01402 – “It’s Not about Me”

I think Jesus would have said, "It's not about me." During his lifetime, he deflected attention from himself. In an illuminating passage in our earliest gospel, when a man addressed him as "Good Teacher," Jesus responded with, "Why do you call me good? No one is good...

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01290 – Creation: Scripture vs. Science

I don't think that there's any conflict at all between science today and the Scriptures. I think that we have misinterpreted the Scriptures many times and we've tried to make the Scriptures say things they weren't meant to say. I think that we have made a mistake by...

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00842 – Church Music Forms a Braid

The hymns are bigger than any mistakes; you fumble around with the hymnal and sing the wrong words—you’re on the wrong verse—but the hymn expands to make room for all these voices, even yours. We speak as a body; we have set the intent together, so rather than...

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