The Discipline of Listening

Discernment involves listening with love and attention to our experiences, to each other, to the inner promptings of the Holy Spirit deep within ourselves ...

Spiritual Transformation Is a Joint Effort

Pastor John Ortberg writes in Leadership journal:

Significant human transformation always involves training, not just trying.

Spiritual transformation is ...

C. S. Lewis on How Pain Transforms Us

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what he is doing. He is getting the drains ...

Bono on Spiritual Formation

Your nature is a hard thing to change; it takes time…. I have heard of people who have life-changing, miraculous turnarounds, people set free from ...

Christian Life: Getting a Feel for the Game

A common theme in modern Christianity has been that head knowledge is how one becomes more adept at following Christ: the more you know, the better you'll ...

Spiritual Enlightenment Through Profound Darkness

Can you imagine what it would be like to lose three generations of your family in one blinding moment? How would you survive? That happened in 1991 to ...

Importance of Spiritual Mentors

Gordon McDonald, at the passing of a lifelong mentor, recalled his loyalty and the crucial counsel he gave in a crisis:

He was there when, many years later, ...

Importance of Church in Spiritual Formation

Spiritual formation is so often couched in more individualistic terms, that it's easy to forget the important role the church community plays in our ...

The Irony of One Man's Anger

Justin John Boudin, a 27-year-old man from Minnesota, pleaded guilty to fifth-degree assault charges for violently losing his temper. Here's the irony: ...

Finding God in the Closet

In an article for Today’s Christian Woman, author Jan Struck writes:

As a child, I was captivated by Jesus' words on prayer [in Matthew 6:5–6]. ...