When the Dream Dies
A dying dream doesn’t mean the end of the story. Sometimes a closed door is the launch of a new chapter.
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He Gave the Morsel to the Man Going Out to Betray Him
What the last supper says about the quality of love we’re actually called to There’s a detail in John 13 that most people read right past. Jesus is at the Passover table with his twelve closest friends. He knows what’s about to happen. He knows one of them is going to hand him over to…
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The Canoe Got Us Here. It Won’t Get Us There.
What do you do when what got you here, can’t get you there? Just finished “Canoeing the Mountains” by Tod Bolsinger, and I can’t stop thinking about the image at the center of it. A canoe, strapped to exhausted men’s backs, being carried over a mountain range because the river ran out.
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Who Told You About Jesus?
There’s a chain that can’t be broken. It started before you and it will go beyond you. What part will you play in keeping this chain going?
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Twenty Miles Doesn’t Change What We Lost
A correction to my last post: the nearest LCMS congregations to the two Iowa churches that closed are about 20 miles away, not 30-60 like I originally wrote.
I’m glad to fix that in the open. But it doesn’t change what I think this closure actually cost because the people I was really writing about were never going to close that distance, whether it was 20 miles or 60.
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Ashes on the Prairie: What We Just Let Die in Iowa
Two altars in rural Iowa have gone cold. The hymnals, the memorial gifts, the building fund…all of it scattered now, like ashes to a prairie wind. It didn’t have to happen. A young man was ready to be trained and called. He wasn’t 40 yet.
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Too Many Referees and Not Enough Players
We have become experts at identifying what’s wrong with everyone else’s ministry while neglecting the mission God actually gave us.
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What Do You Do When You’re Thunderstruck?
What is your response to seeing something you never thought possible? What do you do when words aren’t enough?
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The Volunteer Pipeline Nobody Builds Until They’re Desperate
Every organization builds its leadership pipeline the same way: in a panic, three weeks before it’s needed.
Here’s the shift that actually fixes it — stop asking “who can fill this?” and start asking “who am I developing right now, whether I need them yet or not?”
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When God Shows Up Late
What to do with the gap between when you needed Jesus and when he actually arrived. Can I just be honest with you for a second? There have been moments in my life where I’ve looked at God and thought, “if you really loved me, you would have showed up by now.” Maybe you know…
