Facing Harsh Reality

The trouble with steeling yourself against the harshness of reality is that the same steel that secures your life against being destroyed secures your ...

Lives of 95 Percent Boredom, 5 percent Terror

I saw a troubling quote today. I was reading a news story about an NYPD detective named James Zadroga who had died from lung problems. Following 9/11, ...

Raising Kids without Religion

Parenting Beyond Belief is the newest resource for parents who don't believe in God.

In a review of the book, Lisa Miller explains that it "aims ...

Loving Your Neighbor Reasonably

Love your neighbor as yourself; but don't take down the fence.

—Carl Sandburg, American poet, novelist, and historian (1878–1967)

Seeing Jesus in the Dark

When I was a student at Harvard Divinity School, I learned preaching from Dr. Gardner Taylor, a pastor in New York City. I'll never forget those lectures. ...

Sitting with God on the Bathroom Floor

In his book The Pressure's Off, psychologist Larry Crabb uses a story from his childhood to illustrate our need to delight in God through adversity: ...

Broken Globe Symbolic of Broken World

In a sermon Pastor Matt Woodley shared the following story:

When I was about ten years old, my dad, a medical doctor, received a special gift from one ...

Woody Allen on Immortality

I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it by not dying.

—Woody Allen, comedian and filmmaker

Racial Reconciliation: Moving Beyond Words

Describing the difficulty of racial reconciliation, one African American church leader tells this story:

It was my third year with the ministry. I got ...

"Akeelah and the Bee": Girl Overcomes Her Fears

Akeelah and the Bee is the story of a talented South Los Angeles girl who overcomes her fears and all other obstacles to compete at the National Spelling ...