On January 8th, my dad lost his battle with a series of strokes that started almost eighteen full months before the end. It was hard to watch him go from this strong, stubborn, headstrong man to a weak and frail body. It was even more difficult to finally say goodbye. He was not only my father he was a mentor, teacher, and a friend. As an introvert by nature and a pastor by profession, friends are hard to come by for me. I am extremely close to my family, and I trust them completely. All of that together has made his passing one of the most difficult seasons of my life.

Over the past month, I have noticed a few things about myself that might you to understand someone going through a loss like this.

1. I Am Having Hard Time Controlling My Emotions
Little things trigger the tears for me. I am crying while I am writing this article. I spent the last hour of my birthday sobbing uncontrollably. It seems to come out of nowhere. I see a picture or remember a special time, and I break down. I am still struggling and have no idea when it will end.

2. I Am Tired All the Time
I suppose it comes from the emotional weight. I feel like I am carrying a fifty-pound sack all day long. I feel very little motivation to do things, even the things I enjoy.

3. I am Trying to Figure Out How to Help My Mom
I am venturing out into unknown territory. Mom cared for dad the past couple years, and I want to be there for her now. I am not sure what that looks like yet. I try to text frequently and call every day or two. I am bringing her to visit. I am not sure what else I am supposed to do. I know I want to be the best son I can be to my mother.

4. I Am More Empathetic to Others Loss
I have noticed how differently I feel when I hear the stories of other people losing loved ones. This morning in my prayers I remembered all those individuals who have lost a family member in the past week and I felt a deep, unfamiliar pain. I pray God is using this to soften my heart.

5. I Think About Heaven More Than Ever
I am glad my father was a man of faith. I long for the day I can see him again. I grieve, but not as one who has no hope.

Beside my desk attached to my filing cabinet is a wooden cross with magnets on the back. It hung inside of my dad’s coffin. I see it every day now. It reminds me of my father, his faith and the grace of our Lord Jesus. This has been a difficult time in my life, and with the grace of God, I am making it through each day.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers and may God bless you all.

I have a list of fears that guide my life. Some of them are entirely reasonable. I hate big dogs, especially if they run at me. I am afraid of heights and being near the edge of anything very tall. Some of my fears are completely irrational. Don’t laugh at these. I am scared of a microwave blowing up while I am using it. I never stand directly in front of it. I also have this recurring nightmare of finding a human head in a toilet. I always peak in the stall before I enter. (Actually, that goes back to a story I heard as a child.) Crazy huh?

I suppose all of us have a list of fears that affect the way we think and act. Many of our fears have justification in our experiences. Others of them are completely irrational. We have no real reason to believe them, but they scare us anyway. This applies to all areas of life, even our Christian faith.

Here are some of the fears I encounter from people on a regular basis.

1. God is Disappointed in Me
I once heard a Christian speaker talk about his experience with teenagers. He always gave his crowds a survey to see what they were thinking. One question was, “If you stood face to face with God, what would he say to you.” His number one response, “He would be disappointed in me.” Many people feel that way. I suppose we import the encounters we have had with other people and place them on God. If others are disappointed in me, then God must be too. Nowhere does scripture give us this concept. In fact, it appears that God is more focused on your future than your past.

2. God Wants to Punish Me
This one has been around for years. You have possibly heard someone say, “If I went to Church the roof would fall in.” The idea basically means that if I came into God’s presence, he would want to punish me. While God hates sin, yet his primary response is love and grace. God is not waiting for you to mess up so that he can hurt you. He is waiting for you to come home so he can love you.

3. If Christians Knew About My Sin, They Would Turn Their Back on Me
This one is perhaps the easiest to understand. Occasionally we have seen people confess their sin and the response has been negative. Let me be very clear, those stories are the exception and not the rule. I have heard people confess sins that were deep and dark, and yet the Church surrounded them, prayed for them and cared about them. I would guess that 99 percent of the time when Christians hear about the sins of others they meet it with compassion, love, and mercy. Confession is scary but healing.

4. No One Understands My Struggles
I firmly believe this is a lie of the devil. He whispers in our ear and tells us we are all alone and no one will understand. The truth is far different. Everyone struggles with something. Everyone! Whatever you have done, there is someone who understands exactly what you are going through. They want to help you and support you. In fact, even if your struggles are not the same, they still understand the power of sin and want to help.

5. Grace is Not Enough.
We know the ugliness found in our soul. As a result, I believe that many people do not love themselves. We want grace and mercy, but it seems too good to be true. Surely there is a catch. We question whether God could really forgive us with all that we have done and thought. The truth is that God does know us and yet he loves us anyway. He forgives us completely. His grace is entirely sufficient.

I recognize that many of my fears have no real grounding in the truth. I only know of one bridge that has collapsed. Yet I live in fear of them. My children think it is hilarious. I think it is not funny in the slightest. In spite of my fear when I come to bridge I say a prayer, hold the wheel firmly, and press on. The truth stands firm, and I cross safely.

I know that people who follow Jesus also have fears. They might even seem a little funny to other people even though they are real to you. My hope is that you will hear the truth. You will trust God and his word. You will cross over them into the future safely.

I usually have a plan to the blogs I post. I plan them out a week or two in advance and work on ideas in my head for an extended time. Today’s post if different. My words today are fresh in my mind because of last night’s Superbowl. As most of you know, the New England Patriots won the game with an incredible comeback from 25 points down to win in overtime. Nothing more can be written to underline how remarkable this game was to watch.

As the media has also pointed out, it was one of many comeback sports stories over the past 13 months. The Cleveland Cavaliers coming back to win the NBA championship. The Cubs coming back to win the World Series. Clemson coming from behind to beat Alabama in the college football championship. It seems every sport has had some type of dramatic come from behind victory.

This has my mind thinking about the people I know. Some of the people I know are facing a failing marriage. Some of the people I know have job situations that are uncertain. Some of the people I know have committed some ungodly act that has hurt them. Some people I know are at the end of their rope emotionally and are ready to give up completely. There are several people I know who are facing defeat in life. Maybe one of those people is you.

If there is anything that sports teach us, it is that we are never too far gone, there is always time for a comeback.

If you want something more spiritual, the heart of the Christian faith is a story about overcoming. I mean, what is the resurrection of Jesus if it is not the ultimate comeback story. What humanity thought was dead can be brought back to life by God.

You are not too far gone. The situation can be healed. God can bring good out of a bad situation. The story of your life is not over.

Hold onto faith and never give up. Move forward and forget the past. Do the hard work today that will turn your story around.

Trust God and allow your life to become another great comeback story.

Here is the encouraging slide for this Sunday. Enjoy.

Here are the best articles I have read this week –

This Study Reveals The 5 Biggest Regrets People Have Before They Die

12 THINGS PASTORS CAN’T DO

It Took a Successful NBA Coach Only 2 Sentences to Drop the Best Advice You’ll Hear Today

The old joke in Sunday School is that the answer to every question is Jesus, the Bible or Prayer. I know this sounds sacrilegious, especially coming from a Pastor, but those are not the only viable answers. In fact, quite often the answer is not even found in the Bible.

Let me explain. Through the years I have had numerous couples come into my office seeking marital counseling. Something has put them near the end of their rope. Usually, one person has made a mess of things for the final time and now with the end staring them in the face one of them finds religion. I ask them what that means for their marriage. Frequently I hear something about knowing they did wrong, attending Church, reading the Bible and prayer.

Each one of those actions is good in and of themselves. The problem is that they are not what the couple needs. What needs to happen is that the couple needs to make practical steps to deal with each other directly and begin making changes.

I offer this example. If I leave Adrian Missouri and head South, I will not end up in Kansas City because it is North. If I get out on the road and decide that I should be headed North, then I have made a great discovery. I can open an app or a map and see how I am headed the wrong direction. I can pull over to the side of the road and pray about the bad decision I have made that day. I can call Christian friends and ask them for advice on how to get to Kansas City. I can ask them to pray for me. I can cry out to Jesus in an honest voice for help to get to my desired destination. But if I do not turn around and actually drive North, none of those things will matter.

If people want a better marriage, then they need to change their schedule. They need to change their habits and their words. Switch to a new approach to everything. A change in action is the way to fix your mistakes in marriage.

Now, I do think there is power in prayer. I believe that God guides us, strengthens us and gives us grace for every day. I do believe that you need to read your Bible and attend Church. Those are essentials to the Christian journey. But those things will not turn your marriage around unless you begin to act differently.

You can apply this principle to your marriage, your parenting, your friendships and numerous other areas of your life. Don’t over-spiritualize everything. Allow your spiritual life to be the motivation and the power behind your change in action.

Those of us who follow Jesus make a mistake when we limit the transformation we need to the spiritual aspects of our lives. If it doesn’t affect your life in a very practical way, then you may have misunderstood what faith is all about.

Today is February second, better known as Groundhogs Day. I must admit that I never gave the day much thought until February of 1993. That was the year Bill Murray made a movie about this day that remains a classic film. In fact, a couple of channels on my DirecTV are running full day marathons of the movie.

If you have seen the movie, you immediately know the plot line. A man named Phil Connors gets caught reliving the exact same day, which happens to be Groundhogs Day, over and over. It is a simple concept with surprisingly humorous results. I did a little google searching and found that some people believe Phil was living the same day for over eight years. Another site says that for him to have learned to do everything the movie claims, it would have taken over 34 years. Either way that is a long time to be doing the same things over and over.

With that in mind, I am reminded this day every year of the numerous people I know who keep reliving the same issues every day. Their parents only communicated through yelling and arguing, so they speak the same way. Their parents were verbally abusive to them, so they become verbally abusive parents to their children. Their parents lived for God on Sunday only and the rest of the week was faithless. They now live the same way.

There are numerous ways this concept plays out in our lives. Basically, we see a set of behaviors from our parents or guardians, and we repeat them. This action is repeated year after year and then generation after generation. We are not just living the same day over and over, we are living the same lives with the same mistakes over and over.

What if today was not remembered for being just another day where we repeat the same mistakes? What if today was the day we broke the cycle? What if we asked God in prayer to give us guidance to live differently? What if we said, “Today this behavior stops?” What if today we spoke kindly, loved deeply, listened closely and cared genuinely about the people close to us?

It all starts with a decision to live differently.

Let today be the day we start to break the cycle of hurt.

When I first entered the ministry, I had the idea that no one would ever leave a Church where I was the pastor. I would preach inspiring sermons and offer educational teaching. I would be pleasant to be around and would have great advice to offer. I would work to develop Godly leaders and lead inspiring worship programs. With all of this happening, there would never be any reason for people to leave the Church where I was the Pastor.

Then it happened. A couple left the Church to attend another Church. They gave me a reason, and I could see it. We needed to improve that area of our Church. I took it on as a mission to enhance those programs, and that would eliminate it from happening again.

Then it happened again. Another couple left. It didn’t take many years to discover that no matter what I did some people were always leaving the Church, even the one that I lead. In fact, through the years I have discovered that every Church is losing someone. It might be that the guests do not return or that the senior saints drift away.

It happens and here is some of what I have learned.

1.You Can’t Please Everyone. What you think is great worship is not to someone else. What you think is inspiring preaching is shallow to someone else. What your church does each week, someone else does it better.

2. Everyone can find an excuse if they want it. If I attended your Church this Sunday, I could find flaws with it. Some people choose to ignore those flaws, others do not. If I don’t want to be at that Church, I will find a reason

3. Many people do not quit one day, they fade away slowly. Most of the people who leave the Church do it over the course of time. They miss a Sunday here and there. Then they miss a month. Then two months. Finally, they are gone, and people don’t even notice. Drifting happens more than deciding.

4. Church hoppers are true to their nature, and one day they hop away. I had a friend in business who used to tell me that if a customer came in cursing their last place of business then one day they will leave cursing your business. The same is true in Church. Some people are looking for the perfect Church that does not exist.

5. Standing for truth will repel some and attract others. When you take a stand on anything, you will create friends and enemies. Every Church has a long list of people who agree with them, but also those who disagree with them.

6. Matthew 13 is still true. There is a parable in Matthew 13 about a sower and four soils. In this story, a sower spreads seed all over the place. The seed lands in four different locations, and three of those do not produce fruit. 75% of people who hear the message of Jesus will eventually walk away.

7. Evil is still at work in the world. This can take many forms. It can be an unfortunate accident that leaves us with overwhelming questions. It can be sin that drags us away. It can be a sinful decision that allows guilt to smother us. Even the most committed Christians have a weak point.

8. No matter what happens, love and trust people anyway. You never know what will happen to the people you encounter. They may quit. They may also become the next great Church leader who helps to transform the world. You never know. On top of that, each one of us is called to love people no matter where the future takes them. While they are near me, I am called to care even if one day they walk away.

Some days I find myself still dreaming that no one will ever leave my Church again. Then I wake up and come back to reality. People will come, and people will go. I cannot take it personally. I cannot mold everything in the Church to keep them. The Church is called to love people while we can and to keep pointing people the right direction.