In his book Please Don't Squeeze the Christian, Scott Sernau reflects on the danger of cynicism—especially in the life of believers who claim a "living hope." He writes:

Cynicism kills in the manner of frostbite: the only symptom is a deadening numbness. And even Christians are often tinged with this frostbite. Callousness and doubt numb us to life and joy. We find ourselves leaving the triumphant ...

We live in a time when people have become extremely conscious of nature, its beauty, its wonders, its indescribable value. We appreciate our planet more than we did before. We realize that in a very real sense, the earth gives us physical life. It's not surprising, then, that some people take this truth one step further and regard the planet as somehow giving them inner life as well.

This worldview ...

Years ago I visited one of my kids' pre-school classes. On this particular day, the kids were really excited because the teacher had promised to bring in a real, live rabbit to show them. The kids all gathered on the rug, and she brought in the wire cage, set it down in the middle of the rug, and opened the door so the rabbit could get out. No sooner had she done that then the kids crowded around ...

Highlights from a 2008 Harris Poll nation-wide survey of 2,126 U.S. adults:

• Americans who believe in God: 80 percent (unchanged since the last survey in 2005)
  
  
• Americans who believe Jesus is the Son of God: 71 percent
  
  
• Americans who believe in the resurrection of Jesus: 70 percent
  
  
• Americans who believe in the Virgin Birth: 61 percent
  
  
• Americans who believe in the survival of the soul after death: 68 percent
  
  

The Tuesday night prayer meeting at Brooklyn Tabernacle felt like skydiving into a tornado, exhausting and exhilarating all at once. I'd read about the meeting in Pastor Jim Cymbala's book Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire, but nothing prepared me for the event itself: 3,500 God-hungry people storming heaven for two hours.

Afterward, my friend and I went out to dinner with the Cymbalas. In the course of the meal, ...

In an interview about his book The Folly of Prayer (IVP, 2009), author and pastor Matt Woodley shared a story about his friend Theresa. Theresa was experiencing what St. John of the Cross calls a dark night of the soul—a period of spiritual loneliness and despair. Over the course of describing her story, listen to how Woodley discovered that what seemed most helpless in his ministry was actually ...

A sad soul will kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ.

—Author John Steinbeck

My goal, as a Stanford University student, was to start a Bible study in the Sigma Chi fraternity house. For over a year I could get nothing going. Then came my "God-given opportunity disguised as a hassle."

I was rushing to the campus post office to mail some packages before the morning classes let out. A man on the free-speech platform was pointing out specific sins in the lives of people he'd never ...

In a 2009 article in Time magazine, writer Coco Masters shared a startling statistic: one in five Japanese men and women have seriously considered taking their lives, and each year over the past decade, more than 30,000 people have killed themselves in that country. But Masters surrounded those troubling statistics with the story of Yukio Shige. It's because of Shige that at least 188 Japanese men ...

Among his many virtues, [St. Francis of Assisi] is known for his passionate embrace of poverty. Not only did he forbid his emerging Order to own property, he added this discipline for each of the brothers: "Let none of the brothers … wherever he may be or go, carry, receive, or have received in any way coin or money, whether for clothing, books, or payment for work."

There were few exceptions. ...