Misunderstanding Forgiveness

Leslie Leyland Fields had a painful relationship with her father, a journey of pain, healing, and forgiveness she outlined in a beautiful piece for Christianity Today. This was part of a brand new book, Forgiving Our Fathers and Mothers, Finding Healing from Hurt and Hate. This is such an important book for many who endure difficult relationships […]

Guest Post: Real Reconciliation

Today I’m honored to feature a guest-post by Renee Johnson Fisher, author and speaker. Renee runs the very popular webzine, Devotional Diva and is the founder and host of The Quarter Life Conference. Her latest book is Forgiving Others, Forgiving Me.  If forgiveness wasn’t difficult enough, then comes the hard part! Reconciliation. The problem is most people don’t […]

Don’t Judge Me By My Worst Day

I was driving home the other day and flipped on the local sports radio station here in Chicago. I enjoy listening to sports talk–particularly ESPN 1000, WMVP. For the most part the talk is lively, there are good interviews, and the discussion is about something that takes my mind off of the other pressing and […]

5 People We Should Pray For Even Though We Don’t Want To

Let’s be honest. There are certain types of people we are conditioned, by our culture, to not like. These are the people that nobody is going to give us credit for liking, the people we tend to distance ourselves from. For good reason. And yet, these are the sinners Christ most likely would have sought […]

Resisting the Pound of Flesh

One of the best illustrations of leadership in the Bible is King David’s refusal, twice, to kill King Saul (1 Samuel 24, 1 Samuel 26). You don’t have to be well steeped in Old Testament history to know that Saul was the jealous king who had disobeyed God and took out his anger and wrath […]

The Rhythm of Forgiveness and Repentance

This past Sunday, in our sermon series Teach us to Pray, we looked at this phrase in the Lord’s Prayer: “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” Now this phrase of this prayer would be really wonderful if it stopped at “Forgive us our debts.” That’s how most of us pray, if we’re […]

Russell Moore on Forgiveness:

When we forgive, we are confessing that vengeance is God’s (Rom. 12:19). We don’t need to exact justice from a fellow believer because justice has already fallen at the cross. We don’t need to exact vengeance from an unbeliever because we know the sin against us will be judged in hell or, more hopefully, when […]

Forgetting the Past – Of Others

I had a conversation the other day with someone about a guy we both grew up with. This guy was considered a “bad kid”, always getting in trouble, kicked out of school, and proudly wearing the reputation as “no-good.” So when he came up in this conversation, the person I was talking to sort of […]

Leading from Bitterness

A few years ago I read a few books on the life of President Richard Nixon. I have always been interested in American history, especially Presidential history. I’m fascinated by the inside look at leadership at the top levels. But the one enduring lesson I gleaned from Nixon’s life was his inability to forgive. It […]

Friday Five – Jackie Kendall

Today, my good friend, Jackie Kendall stops by to chat. Here is the reason I like Jackie: My wife, Angela, read Jackie’s best-selling book Lady in Waiting, while she was a single girl in Bible college. Angela says that this really prepared her for life. Angela is a super mom and wife, so I have […]