We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.
Showing Up
Jonathan Kos-Read via Compfight
Shauna Niequist over at Donald Miller’s Storyline blog shared some thoughts on Why You Should Stop Waiting for Life to be Perfect. She points out that sometimes this waiting for perfection gets in the way of noticing the goodness that is already here for you.
Show up to your life today, even if it’s imperfect and messy. God is here.
From Shauna’s reflection:
What I saw in her was a vision for how I want to live: in the midst of one her darkest seasons, twisted with uncertainty, bruised by the words of former friends, she sat with me, present and unarmed by busy-ness. She looked in my eyes and told me they’d be fine. She told me funny and sweet things about her kids, asked me about myself.
She wasn’t waiting for the good part. She knows that these are the good parts, even while they’re the bad parts. She wasn’t shut down, going through the motions. She wasn’t holding tight till this season passed. She was right there with me, right there with her kids, right in all the glory and pain and mess and beauty of a spring night in between everything.
That’s how I want to be. That’s who I want to be: deeply present in the present, in the mess, in the waiting, in the entirely imperfect right now.
Category: General
Tags: Kingdom Living, Perfection, Practicing the Presence of God, Simplicity
Related Reading
Sermon Clip: Hunger Games
To begin the series on emotional intelligence and the roles this plays in our relationships, Greg Boyd introduces the foundational teaching of the entire series. Here’s a hint, it’s LOVE. In the full sermon, Greg takes a look at the role Jesus plays in our relationships and the importance of letting Christ be the source…
Have You Taken a Gospel Immunization Shot?
Why does being “Christian” in America make so little difference in so many people’s lives, when the kingdom movement revealed in the New Testament revolutionized people’s lives? This drastic difference is hardly surprising when you consider that the gospel that people are often given today is little more than a contract of acquittal that is…
Lighten Up: Meet Rollins
Greg introduces his grandson Rollins and talks about the God of little things.
The Kingdom of God ≠ Political Activism
Given the centrality of following Jesus’ example, it is vitally important we not only notice that Jesus was a revolutionary (see post) along with some ways that we can join his revolution (see that post here), but how he was a revolutionary. Many Christians today assume that in order to revolt against ungodly aspects of…
Kingdom Reconciliation is Not About Politics (But it is Political)
In the broader culture, the social and political discussions about racial reconciliation are usually focused on people’s rights and privileges as a means of making the world a fairer place. The criteria such efforts at reconciliation appeal to are common decency, fairness and reason. The enterprise is certainly necessary, and all decent, fair minded, rational…
Guante: Starfish
http://youtu.be/oYkoVFfYdC0 Guante is a Minneapolis-based spoken-word artist. His piece here is called Starfish and it speaks to the tension between working for small changes and dreaming of a better world where much bigger changes are needed. Amen. (Special Thanks to Rod Thomas for reminding me how great Guante can be.)