New Year's Resolutions and the Importance of Community

With a new year just around the corner, most of us are busy scribbling down resolutions. We desire radical change in the way we look, the way we behave, ...

A.W. Tozer on the Irony of What We've Made of Christmas

Christ came to bring peace and we celebrate his coming by making peace impossible for six weeks of each year …. He came to help the poor and we ...

A Deeper Reason for Our Christmas Greed

In his book Things Unseen: Living with Eternity in Your Heart, Mark Buchanan points out how we all continually live for the "Next Thing"—the ...

Doing Battle with the "Eve Factor"

Joe Stowell writes in “Jesus Nation”:

Several years ago, [my wife] and I moved out of Chicago to the western suburbs to be near our grandkids. ...

Man Desires the Trust of His Homeless Friend

Author and Pastor Matt Woodley writes in a blog post titled "The Happy Homeless Man”:

A little while ago I wandered into the wrong hospital ...

St. Francis's Extreme Embrace of Poverty

Among his many virtues, [St. Francis of Assisi] is known for his passionate embrace of poverty. Not only did he forbid his emerging Order to own property, ...

What It Means to Excel at Giving

Paul said, "See that you also excel in this grace of giving" (2 Corinthians 8:7). Like piano playing, giving is a skill. With practice, we get ...

The Failure of "Almost"

Since the 1940s, the Ad Council has been the leading producer of public service announcements. Of the thousands of commercials they have produced, their ...

Toxic Assets

The 2009 economic crisis brought an interesting phrase into the headlines: toxic assets. Toxic assets are one of the factors contributing to the trouble ...

True Poverty

To help Americans understand poverty in its truest sense, Robert L. Heilbroner, a prominent U.S. economist, itemized the luxuries most U.S. citizens would ...