Recommendations, Relationships, Social Media, Suffering, Worship
John Beeson
This Week's Recommendations

  1. The wilderness was never meant to last forever: Christopher Cook says, “The wilderness was never meant to be your home. For many of us, however, it has become one (a dysfunctionally comfortable one at that). Not because God’s promises changed, and not because your story was disqualified, but rather, because somewhere along the way, you might have stopped listening to the voice of the Lord and trusting His nature and His ways.”

  2. The great friendship collapse: In this video, Derek Thompson explains why we spend more time than ever and what the impact that has had on us.

This Week's Recommendations
Church, Christian Living
John Beeson
The Most Dangerous Moment of Faith

What is the greatest threat to our faith? There is truth in the danger of all of the above. Jim Davis and Michael Graham commissioned the largest and most comprehensive study of dechurching in America” by leading sociologists Ryan Burge and Paul Djupe. They report their findings in The Great DeChurching. Over the past twenty-five years, forty million Americans have stopped going to church? What were the reasons they stopped attending? All of those cited above were mentioned as reasons. But three quarters of those surveyed shared the same single reason: life changed.

The Most Dangerous Moment of Faith
Identity, Reading, Recommendations
John Beeson
Who are You?

Do you want to know God better? Know yourself better. You, after all, were made in his image. Do you want to know yourself better? Know God better.

My wife Angel and I wrote Trading Faces: Removing the Masks that Hide Your God-Given Identity in order to combat the lies we are tempted to believe about who we are and press into God’s Word to hear his truth.

Many have asked when the audiobook will release. We are delighted to share that the Trading Faces audiobook is now available!

Who are You?
Recommendations, Church, Family, Religion
John Beeson
This Week's Recommendations

  1. Will I ever love a church again? Brittany Allen asks, “Could I reclaim that vulnerability that once came so naturally to me after it had been used as a weapon pointed at my own heart? Could God rebuild my faith in his Bride and redeem what had been lost?”

  2. The hidden curriculum of the wilderness: Christopher Cook says, “When you’re in that space—the wilderness between who you were and who you’re becoming—you will be tempted to mislabel it; to call it punishment; to rebuke it like it’s an attack; even, to distract yourself from it.

This Week's Recommendations
Generosity, Church, Gratitude, Leadership
John Beeson
Invisible Generosity

I’m normally the second person to arrive at church on Sunday morning. Nick is always first. Nick arrives at 5am, straps on his blower, and cleans the sidewalks and patios. What a heart of hospitality: to volunteer to make sure that the church is looking her best come Sunday morning.

This is one notable act of service among countless others. A few years ago, two members of our connection group showed up within an hour of my text to help me move a jacuzzi. In our two local moves, we’ve had more than two dozen help us. Our connection group dropped off meals at our doorstep when we had Covid.

Invisible Generosity

Noah

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Rainbows, Pride Months, and the Flood

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Rainbows, Pride Months, and the Flood

Rainbow flags might be filling store windows in your town this June. In 1978, Harvey Milk, a prominent gay politician and activist, commissioned Gilbert Baker to create a visual symbol for the gay community. Baker designed a rainbow flag with eight colors. The flag was flown at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade and quickly became a symbol of pride and visibility for the LGBTQ+ community.

Of course, the LGBTQ+ community was not the first community to claim the rainbow as a symbol. God gave the rainbow to Noah and his family following the flood as a promise that he would be merciful in his judgment.

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This Week's Recommendations

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This Week's Recommendations

1.       Ten Year Old With No Hands Wins Handwriting Contest: Wow. What's my excuse?

2.        It is Well... the Backstory of a Troubled Man and His Hymn: Janie B. Chaney shares the story of the classic hymn of Horatio Spafford. You probably have heard the first half of the story, but it's the second half that really tests our thinking about the hymn.

3.       Understanding the Sin of Ham: Tom Terry offers a compelling interpretation of what exactly Noah's son's sin was. He suggests, " Moses was using this idiom to say that Ham had a sexual encounter with his mother (or Noah’s wife, assuming that the woman in question was not Ham’s natural mother). Either way, this was an incestuous relationship."

4.       Some Good News About the Bad News About Marriage: Ron Deal begins, " We were led to believe by statisticians that in America about half of all marriages end in divorce, which led me to believe that about two-thirds of stepfamily couples divorce. But it turns out that the pessimism that currently exists about the institution of marriage is misguided."

5.       Dandelion Time Lapse: Two poignant minutes: it feels like you're watching the visual representation of the book of Ecclesiastes.

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