That is what this person said when I told them all I did on Saturday night and Sunday morning to ensure I had my sermon memorized, along with being thoroughly prepared for worship.

They are correct. If I were only working for a wage and didn’t care about how the message of Jesus was received. I could choose the path of least resistance. If I didn’t desperately want people to know Jesus as their Savior, I could use other people’s sermons, take a stack of notes to the front, and not care about personal engagement. If I didn’t know that my personal journey and experience of grace were connected to a pastor like me, I could approach things in the simplest way possible and not care how the sermon is received.

You see, my dad did not grow up attending Church or having a relationship with Jesus as his Savior. He was in his early thirties when he attended a small Christian Church, where a man named Albert Amos preached each week. And, as my dad would tell me hundreds of times growing up, “he didn’t use a single note and just opened his Bible.” It so impressed my dad that he cared that much that he started to listen. If this meant something to Albert, it must mean something to him. Finally, at the age of 33, he surrendered his life to Christ.

Eventually, my dad would lead me to Jesus, and I would commit my life to full-time service to Him as a preacher. With every passing year, my notes have become less and less until I now only have a few random words written in the margin of my Bible. My prayer is that one day I will impact a man, and he will tell his son about Jesus.

Sure, I could make life easy on myself, but the call of God is not about making life easy; it is about faithfulness with the gifts He has given us.  

We need someone we can sit down with and discuss significant issues face-to-face. These people are willing to ask hard questions. They can look in our eyes and see when we are lying, avoiding, or feeling hurt.

We need someone we can walk side by side with and have a conversation. This is a very informal setting that allows us to explore our thoughts, ask questions without judgment, and makes us feel like we have a friend.

These might come from two totally different people, or possibly from one person in various settings. However, everyone needs both types of conversations to bring the connections into our lives that we need for a healthy mental attitude.

Many people only have one of these. Which one do you have? And which one do you need to add to your life?

As believers, God gives us the gift of community through the Church, but it is up to you to determine how you connect with others.

Throughout my years of ministry, I have spoken very little about Church culture. In fact, it makes me slightly nervous to address it, since the Bible never does it directly. So I want to cautiously inform people about the type of culture the leaders create in a Church.

Culture is the environment created when people interact with one another. It is the way people speak to one another, the attitudes they display, the ideas they share, and the actions they value the most. Everywhere you go, a different type of culture is on display, even in the Church.

Personally, I strive to focus on two primary areas of culture in the ministries I lead. First, I want people to view themselves in a godly way. I want them to be honest about their flaws, overwhelmingly thankful for grace, and able to laugh at themselves. Second, I want them to treat others as better than themselves (Phil 2:3). This means they welcome strangers with kindness, speak well of others, and make choices that improve the lives of those around them.

I push back against a culture that thinks they are doing everything right. They believe they have the best Church in town, have the entire Bible figured out without flaw, and you are not a good Christian if you go anywhere else. Yes, I believe in standing for the truth of Scripture and striving to be the best we can be, but that does not mean taking ourselves too seriously and thinking we have everything perfect.

The way people feel when they attend the Church I lead is crucial to me. The way they view themselves and others should be filled with grace and love. Scripture is essential. Doctrine is vital. Discipleship is non-negotiable. And culture is how we experience those things, which makes it an important consideration for every believer in each Christian community.

I don’t know exactly where it originated, but I first heard it in a recovery meeting. The speaker said that we need to H.A.L.T. bad decisions. Then they explained that meant we are to be very careful about the choices we make when we are Hungry, Angry, Lonely, or Tired.

Since I heard that comment, I began noticing the truth of the observation. Whenever I am depleted in one area of my life, I tend to make poor choices in other areas.

Sometimes the best way to remedy bad decisions is to pause, grab a meal, walk away for a time to cool off, connect with a friend, or even take a nap. I know there may be deep psychological issues that all of us need to address to improve our lives. But occasionally, the answers are much simpler.

Recently, I went on a fishing trip.

We caught a few fish, but the experience wasn’t about fishing, at least not for me. It was about time together.

The next time someone asks you to do something, whether it’s a parent, child, or coworker, know that they are asking because they want to spend time with you. Accept more invitations than you reject, and focus on the person and not the event.

In retrospect, enjoyment is rarely about the experience; it is about who you share it with.

This person wrote a critical piece about “some Christians, most pastors, and Churches today.” The comment section was filled with two types of responses. The first were people who agreed and then piled on to the criticism. The second group went into defense mode, stating something like, “Not the people in my Church,” or “not my pastor,” or “not at my Church.”

Generic criticisms, by their very nature, do not take into account the individual nature of each situation. They draw conclusions based on appearances and not firsthand knowledge.

If you are a Christian, and someone begins to offer their generic statements, respond by asking, “Tell me exactly where you have seen that?” Whenever you begin to probe their conclusions, they usually start falling apart.

Many ideas that people possess are not rooted in any real situation. People are parroting what they heard from a favorite public speaker in some format. That doesn’t make them accurate; it only makes them easy to repeat, so they do not have to engage personally. The truth is usually far from the criticisms we paint with broad brush strokes.

There’s an old saying that we should leave every place better than we found it. That might mean picking up trash, washing the dishes after a meal, or putting things back in order before heading out. It means not leaving things the way they are but seeking ways to make them better.

We can also apply the same principle to our relationships, workplaces, and faith. Wherever we go, we can shine Jesus’ light to bring peace where there’s conflict, encouragement where there’s discouragement, and hope where there’s despair.

Leaving things better than we found them isn’t about perfection; it is about intentional kindness. It’s about seeing opportunities to reflect Christ wherever you go.

When we walk away from a conversation, a meeting, or even a room, may we leave it infused with our kindness, God’s grace, and more goodness than when we arrived. The Kingdom of God grows, and the world becomes a better place one small act at a time.

There are multiple types of Christian knowledge.

The base layer is knowledge of the Scriptures. This is the foundation of everything a follower of Jesus believes and does. It requires a working understanding of how the concepts of the Bible are shown and connected throughout its pages.

Another layer is the knowledge of “Spiritual Disciplines.” These are the righteous actions of a believer that connect them to God. It includes prayer, giving, fasting, serving, and time to reflect and meditate on God’s word. These actions require us to move into a closer relationship with God as we come to know him on a personal level.

The other type of knowledge is what I refer to as Church knowledge. This is built on an understanding of people and organizations. There are specific dynamics that leaders need to be aware of when making decisions. These aspects are frequently changing in response to cultural shifts, but others are grounded in human nature and remain unchanging. Some of these are explicitly stated in the Bible, while others are not.

One mistake you can make as a follower of Jesus is to think that maturity is possessing a thorough knowledge of everything. That is simply not true. Some great preachers and teachers have little knowledge of the workings of a Church. Some leaders have a vast understanding of the Church, but their scriptural framework is lacking. Still, someone may know both of those and lack a deep relationship with God, and they derail a rapidly growing Church with a substantial sin that makes headlines.

While I hope that all of us continue growing in our knowledge throughout our entire lives, I also believe that Christian maturity is found in appreciating the diversity of the group that God has brought together in the Church. True wisdom is a willingness to humbly acknowledge that we don’t know it all, and we need other people to help us. The scholar needs the prayer warrior. The pastor needs the theologian. The servant needs people with the gift of leadership.

No one person alone knows everything, but together we can know enough to bring God the glory he deserves through the local Church.

Sometimes when the nights are quiet and my wife is sound asleep, I lie there and start saying a silent prayer to God. And then the spiral begins. I start by confessing my sins from the day and asking God to forgive me. That sparks the thoughts of some of the other sins I have committed in my life. Finally, I land my mind squarely on the two or three most ungodly things I have ever done.

Feelings begin to well up inside me, and guilt wraps its evil little fingers around my soul. While I know in my mind that I am forgiven, deep in my soul, I am not so sure. Even though I’ve prayed, confessed, and believe God’s promise of forgiveness, that heavy weight lingers.

The truth is that guilt is not from God once we’ve repented. Scripture says, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). If God declares us clean, then the voice that keeps accusing us is not His. That’s the enemy trying to chain us to a past that Jesus has already freed us from.

Letting go of guilt doesn’t mean forgetting what happened, but it means trusting that Christ’s sacrifice is greater than our sin. It means believing that the cross is enough, even when our feelings say otherwise.

When guilt rises, I need to remind myself, just like you do: I am forgiven and I am free in Christ. That’s not wishful thinking; it’s the truth of the Gospel.

Many people have become slaves to activity. It has been called the tyranny of the urgent.

We spend each day running errands, putting out fires, and handling whatever is required of us at the moment. We move through our day-to-day without prioritizing a firm schedule.

Whenever we focus on serving our immediate needs, we often neglect what is truly important in life. The things that matter most, such as showing love and building strong relationships, are frequently left with little time to accomplish. Spiritual growth can become nonexistent because we usually feel no immediate need for it.

One significant question for us to ask ourselves weekly is this: Do I have a plan to do the things that matter most to me this week?

If we do not make time for what is truly significant, those things will never happen.