How to Share Your Testimony
Do you struggle with sharing Christ with others? Does the thought of leading someone to Christ make you feel intimidated, overwhelmed, or just plain inadequate? If so, I’d like to offer you some encouragement. Sharing Christ doesn’t require you to be a Christian superstar or a theologian. It just requires that you share your story in…
Read More“To-Do” List or “To-Be” List?
When I was in my third year of seminary, I was living life at a crazy pace. I was up at 4 a.m. studying, then I’d go to my full-time job at the church, and then to class. Afterward, I’d go home and try to be a good dad and a good husband, and then…
Read More5 Keys to a Godly Perspective
Ever have one of “those days” when everything just seems to be going wrong? You get up in the morning still tired from a less-than-perfect-night’s sleep and you turn on the news only to hear one catastrophe after another. You’re also running late for work, and when you grab your phone, you realize that you forgot to…
Read MoreHope for Single Parents and Blended Families
If you’re a single parent or a parent in a blended family, you represent the majority of families in America. Now, only one out of four families is what we’d call a “traditional family” – a mom and dad with the same biological children. In addition, over forty percent of all babies in the U.S.…
Read MoreHow to Become the Parent God Wants You to Be
For a lot of us, we didn’t have the greatest parents in the world. We come from broken homes. We didn’t have a dad who led the way, who was strong, sensitive, biblical, and who blazed the trail. We didn’t see a loving relationship between our mom and dad. So, if we wanted a model…
Read MoreWhy Should I Trust a God I Can’t See?
Does trusting an invisible God to guide you sound crazy? Does it seem more reasonable to rely on your own five senses? Even if you grew up in the church, faith in God can seem like quite a gamble. He lives in our hearts and minds. He created our souls. He interacts with us in…
Read MoreGod’s Dream for Your Life
Every parent has dreams for their children. When we’re young, immature parents of little kids, our dreams go something like, “I hope he’s a baseball player” or “I hope she’s musical” or “it’d be great if she’s athletic or artistic.” And then, as we get a little bit older, our dreams for our kids shift…
Read MoreWhy We Should Trust in the Wisdom of God
You’ve experienced pain you brought on yourself. We all have. You made decisions that hurt others, hurt yourself, offended God, and the guilt you felt caused you to repent. This is not the same. No, the struggle you’re in now was not brought on by any sin in your life. This feels unfair. If you were…
Read MoreFour Ways God Encourages Us
Are you going through a difficult or painful circumstance? If you are, you’re not alone. Life is hard for so many right now. Recently, I’ve been reminded about the importance of encouragement—particularly spiritual. The very definition of encourage is: to infuse with faith, perspective, and hope that fuels the daily need for courage. We all need…
Read MoreIs It Possible to Be Certain of God’s Will?
As a pastor, I am often presented with tough questions, and the truth is that some questions don’t have easy answers. Life is complicated, and as such, decision-making can seem challenging. That was the basis for the following question I just received from someone enduring a difficult season: “When making decisions, how can we have…
Read MoreWhen Our Worst Times Are God’s Best
I can still remember it so clearly. I was a young pastor at a church in Santa Cruz, CA, and I was under some incredible pressure. The church was growing. We were in the middle of a capital campaign, and I had no idea what I was doing. So, one Sunday afternoon, I went to…
Read MoreAre You on Satan’s Agenda?
God has an agenda for every nation on this planet, for every man, woman, and child. It’s an agenda of unstoppable grace, of compassion, and love, and restoration. But did you know that Satan also has an agenda for this planet – including you? Jesus defined these two competing agendas in one verse when He…
Read MoreHow to Share Your Faith with Boldness
Sadly, around nine out of ten Christians who are legitimate followers of Christ have never verbally shared the gospel with another person. We are the possessors and stewards of eternal life yet most of us have never shared with someone at work, in our family, or in our neighborhood how we received this eternal life.…
Read MoreCan God Save You from Suffering?
If you’re at the end of your rope and are wondering where God is or why He’s not delivering you, you are not alone. It doesn’t matter how much faith you have. At such times, it’s only human to feel frustrated and angry. To be human is to doubt at times whether He’s there at…
Read MoreHow Do You Fit in God’s Plan?
Throughout Scripture, from Genesis 3 all the way through to Revelation 20, we see God pouring out His grace. From the very first moment when He clothed our parents after sin entered the world, God began this unstoppable tsunami wave of grace that wants to redeem, to reconcile, to forgive and to atone. God’s wave…
Read MoreThe Secret to Having an Extraordinary Life
Most of us spend much of our life telling ourselves, “I can’t do that because I’m not smart enough,” or “I don’t have the training,” or “I’m not bold enough” or “I’m not courageous enough,” or “I don’t know the Bible well enough…” The list goes on and on. What we tend to forget is…
Read MoreWhat If Breakthrough Was Your ‘New Normal’?
Many of us faithfully pray to an all-powerful, all-loving, and all-knowing God who says, “Nothing is too difficult for Me” and who told His disciples, “I expect you to do the impossible, like feed 5,000 people.” Yet we assume that the same God doesn’t want to continue to do the impossible through us in our lives.…
Read MoreWhat We Learned from Our Fathers
Charles Kettering once said, “Every father should remember one day his son will follow his example, not his advice.” As we near Father’s Day, the Living on the Edge team paused to reflect on the examples of our fathers and how they impacted our lives as well as lessons we have learned in our own…
Read MoreHas Happiness Become an Idol?
When we look in the Old Testament and read how easily the Israelites were seduced into idol worship, it’s easy for us to judge. I’ve never come home after a long day of work and said to my wife, “Honey, just stay right here. I put a little statue in the back room, and now…
Read MoreWhat Keeps Us from Telling Others about Christ?
Think of the last time you couldn’t wait to tell someone some great news. Maybe you just got the job you were hoping for. Or your daughter-in-law is expecting. Or maybe your favorite team finally reached the playoffs. You just had to talk about it, right? We tell others things that matter to us, don’t…
Read MoreSix Steps to Successful Single Parenting
Single parenting is an incredibly difficult job. If you’re a single parent (or know of one) and you’re faced with pain and consequences that are overwhelming, consider these six steps of faith.
Read MoreTrusting God on My Journey to Motherhood
Discover how one woman’s journey to motherhood led her to a deeper measure of faith and trust in God.
Read MoreWhy Is Thanksgiving in Prayer So Important?
Discover how powerful thanksgiving can be in your prayer life and why it’s a great perspective changer.
Read MoreHow God Can Heal Your Emotional Pain
We live in a culture where many people struggle with their emotional health. If you are tired of your emotional pain and wondering how to get healed, read to discover three ways to experience God’s help and healing.
Read MoreHow to Adore God in Prayer
What if you could pray in such a way that it would allow God’s power and peace to invade your soul in the midst of the challenges you’re facing? The Apostle Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, gives us a prayer model to help us.
Read MoreDo You Have Difficult People in Your Life?
Perhaps you’ve often wondered why God would even allow such people in your life. Many of us, in our heart of hearts, would rather God just “relocate” some of them. But what if the person we most want God to remove from our lives is actually the very person we need the most?
Read MoreWhy We Need to Speak the Truth in Love
When Jesus talked about how we’re to “love one another,” he said that we’re to honor one another, care for one another, and admonish one another. Yet admonishing one another is probably the most neglected, most misunderstood, least practiced, and the most needed course of action in the body of Christ.
Read MoreHow to Overcome the Painful Cycle of Prejudice
God wants us to know there is a pain that occurs from prejudice. And He wants us to be delivered from the prison of receiving prejudice and of extending prejudice to other people.
Read MoreTeach Your Loved Ones to Manage Their Money Wisely
Did you know that your money is the clearest barometer of your soul, more than anything else going on in your life? Imagine your wallet or your 401k, or your purse. Now imagine a chain connecting it to your heart, so that wherever your money goes your heart goes too. Our money reveals our priorities, our values, and where our heart is.
Read MoreGod Is Faithful in Our Weakness
God shows us His faithfulness in the way that He shapes our life. The way He intervenes in our lives when we are weak, when we are tempted, when we sin, and when we utterly fail.
Read MoreThe Holiness of God and Why It Matters
These days, it’s common for believers to view Jesus as a friend. Although it is true that when we have a relationship with Jesus, He is accessible and calls us “friend,” too often we forget that He is also holy.
Read MoreDo You Believe God is in Control of Your Life?
The truth is: Nothing will come into my life or your life today that God did not either allow or decree for our ultimate good. He’s in control even in our fallen world where terrible things happen and people do terrible things. He’s in control even when there are things we don’t understand.
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