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Posts in Category: action

Are you abusing Phil. 4:6? “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer…”

8a1cce78429df942e8ad31256b3266ffPhillippians 4:6 is what I call a coffee cup verse.  It gets splashed around on mugs, tee-shirts, hats, and regalia.  It also gets tossed at people going through stress-laden experiences as the be all, end-all, prescription for facing hardship.  Frankly, doing so abuses the text and often times sets up that person to feel like a failure.

I’ve been in hard times and read this verse prescriptively.  I told myself, “Okay, just stop worrying and start praying.”  I tried.  I tried REALLY  hard.  Usually, I failed.  I couldn’t just turn off my anxiety because someone said, “It’s now time for you to choose to no longer be anxious.”

So, what’s the problem?  This verse is

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How To Never Miss Your Prayer or Bible Time

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You’ve got to love the tenacity of the little mouse with a helmet in the picture above that I found as a poster on zazzle.com. But all of the tenacity in the world isn’t going to help you without a successful strategy. Succeeding at keeping any spiritual discipline can be hard. We all fall into slumps. Even the most committed people do. When your prayer time tumbles down your priority list or you get behind in a bible reading plan, giving up can feel like your only option. Don’t. Try the five proven motivational triggers in this article first. These proven strategies boost your mental energy to help

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Greater Gratitude: Taking Thanks To The Next Level




 
Gratitude can transform your life. You can begin this journey by giving thanks to God for the blessings in your life. But, what does it mean to not just give thanks, but live a thankful life?
 

3 Grateful Living Strategies…

In Paul’s letter to the Colossians he exhorted them to do whatever they did in word and deed giving thanks to God in Christ Jesus. This prompted me to ponder, “What does it mean to give thanks via our actions, not just our words?” In today’s video, you’ll learn three specific strategies to move a level beyond just saying your thankful. Specifically, you will discover the strategies of:
 
1) Working heartily
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Tips for Slowing Down and Reconnecting with God through Sabbath




 
If you are busy and feeling disconnected from God, you may simply need to establish a Sabbath practice in your life. Our culture has become completed disconnected from both the need for keeping the Sabbath and the fact that it is a moral imperative. God didn’t just suggest or recommend the Sabbath. God commanded the Sabbath. And while many of us would never consider stealing, murdering, or committing adultery, we blatantly ignore the Sabbath.
 
I originally shot the video above as a supplement to a sermon I had written called, “The Forgotten Commandment”. It was intended as a video for our church website, but after shooting the video

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18 Free Spiritual Discipline Ideas You Can Use for Lent

Lent starts one week from today. Traditionally for churches that observe Lent, it is a time of reflecting on Christ’s sacrifice for our sins and a time of repentance. Often this season is marked by fasting or giving up something.
 
Lent has become THE most transformative part of the year for me because starting 7 or 8 years ago, I began adopting a transformative discipline for 40 days. I have done everything from praying for an hour a day to giving up use of my car.
 
Last year, I released a packet of 18 reproducible handouts of various disciplines that churches are welcome to copy and distribute within their congregation. The disciplines are a mix of study, prayer, and action opportunities. I am

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One thing you must do to move forward when forgiving others


THE PROBLEM
Hurts are hard to leave behind, especially if the other person has no remorse. Yet, God calls us through his Word to forgive as we are forgiven. Unfortunately, as much as I would like the Bible to say, “Only if they are really sorry and know exactly what they did wrong”, it doesn’t.

Several years ago, I struggled immensely with forgiving someone who was constantly working against me behind my back. He could without a hiccup in his conscience pump my hand eagerly after worship and tell me what a great sermon I had and then walk into the Fellowship Hall and tell another member, “I like him,

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