Graciously Receiving and Giving

Being a super high-achiever, I must confess I find it difficult to receive from others. Really difficult. I’m usually on the giving end, not the receiving. My pride fights hard to stay intact when receiving generosity.

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Being a Servant Is Unannounced

As Jesus prepared to wash His disciples’ feet, He never said, “Men, I am now going to demonstrate servanthood—watch my humility.” No way. That kind of obvious pride was the trademark of the Pharisees. If you wondered whether they were humble, all you had to do was hang around them awhile. Sooner or later they would announce it . . .

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Proud Hearts and Dirty Feet

The gentle and humble lifestyle of the Savior is nowhere more evident than in the account of John 13, where He washed the feet of His friends, the disciples. In that event, He left us some timeless principles we dare not ignore regarding serving God.

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A Self-Description of Jesus

I’ve been involved in a serious study of Scripture for more than fifty years of my life, and in all that time I have found only one place where Jesus Christ—in His own words—describes His own “inner man.” In doing so, He uses only two words. Unlike most celebrities, those words are not phenomenal and great. Jesus doesn’t even mention that He was sought after as a speaker.

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Three Timely Lessons for God’s Servants

In recent posts, I have written about God’s servants feeling used and unappreciated, experiencing undeserved disrespect and resentment, and having hidden greed—a desire to be rewarded. From these very real and common perils, there emerge at least three timely lessons for all of us to remember.

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Seven Impossibilities Jesus Made Possible

Impossible!                                Has this word crossed your lips lately as you peer at an unsolvable problem? The dictionary defines impossible as “incapable of being done, attained, or fulfilled: insuperably difficult.”1Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Ed., ed. Frederick C. Mish, (Springfield, Mass: Merriam-Webster, Inc., 2008), s.v. “Impossible.” So, what’s your “insuperably difficult” circumstance? Perhaps an adult child […]

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Being a Giver—Is Worth It?

Early one chilly morning an American soldier was making his way back to the barracks in London. As he turned the corner in his jeep, he spotted a little lad with his nose pressed to the window of a pastry shop. Inside, the cook was kneading dough for a fresh batch of doughnuts. The hungry boy stared in silence, watching every move. The soldier pulled his jeep to the curb, stopped, got out, and walked quietly over to where the little fellow was standing. Through the steamed-up window, he could see the mouth-watering morsels being pulled from the oven, piping hot. The boy salivated and released a slight groan as he watched the cook place them onto the glass-enclosed counter ever so carefully.

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Does God Hate?

Hate is a powerful word. We are taught from childhood to avoid hatred at all costs and to obey the command of Christ to love everyone, including our enemies. So it’s shocking to read the words that Paul quoted from Malachi, who declared that God loved Jacob but hated Esau (Malachi 1:2–3). How can a […]

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