Summer can be a very busy time for churches, and therefore for many devoted church leaders and members. Vacation Bible School, camps, mission trips, construction projects, and more can quickly fill the warm-weather months. But summer also provides most of us with a few days of vacation, or at least staycation. If we’re wise, those […]
Columns
Pat’s Playbook: Defuse the bullies
Question: Our student ministry has developed a reputation as “the mean girls group.” Two families told me they didn’t join our church because their teenagers felt unwelcome. How can I confront this attitude? Answer: This is obviously a spiritual problem and most likely involves a ringleader. The pastor and student ministry leader (beginning with prayer) […]
Called to comfort
Read: 2 Corinthians 1:3–5, ESV “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted […]
Was I in a prison cell or at the throne?
Many times in ministry, I have been called on to do something not because I wanted to, but because I knew I should or it was in my job description. Often these “acts of obedience” make me uncomfortable, but I’ve noticed when I am obedient in these hard things, I receive a blessing and satisfaction […]
Three Illinois girls
This month it is my privilege to officiate the wedding ceremony of our youngest son, Ethan, and his fiancée, Alyssa. They will be married in Elgin, where they first met as Judson University students six years ago, and where my wife, Beth, and I also met more than forty years ago. Our middle son, Noah, […]
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