If you belong to a warm, embracing, encouraging and fun church congregation, today’s post is not for you. All I can advise is this: keep it that way, and you do this by limiting the size and power of leadership/management. When these people control as opposed to serve, you lose what you have. We did, and so have many others: a long time…

Years ago, when we still attended weekly church services, a longtime acquaintance (that’s generally what we are in church situations — we’re rarely given time to freely mingle and get to know one another as friends) left. If you attend church, you know how this goes: Bob and Allison aren’t there one week. Probably sick,…

Christians frequently talk about grace, love, acceptance, and freedom, and indeed, these attributes are abundantly available to the person who follows Christ. Unfortunately, however, within Christian group settings (“community” is the latest buzzword), rules abound, all the more insidious because they are never identified as rules. A believer just gets this idea, sort of, that he doesn’t measure up, that…

I just returned from posting letters in our mailbox, 3oo feet from our house. It’s a cold, foggy day, and over the crunch of gravel under my feet I heard the sibilant song of a little bird. Five little notes. They transported me to spring. I spotted the bird — a drab grey thing perched…

More from Beliefnet and our partners
More from Beliefnet and our partners
Close Ad