Instead of shaming ourselves for trust issues or feeling ridiculous, we need to recognize that our trust issues have roots in reality. Trust requires two crucial factors: safety and connection.

Becoming like Christ, becoming relaxed, is the by-product of relationship with Him. Becoming more relaxed will happen, not as we try harder to be more relaxed, but as we open our honest hearts to the one who is not worried about a thing.

God made a covenant with Abraham that richly displays God's trustworthiness and faithfulness.

We are going to start not by looking at the events of the end but by going back to the beginning. God's original intent in creating humans was to have us rule as his regents over creation. So God made covenants with his people that reveal his intentions for us in the past, the present, and the fu...

Make an intentional shift in your approach to two core relationships. Then, learn the four most common dynamics that infect every relationship and notice how they hinder your daily experience of God.

What do we do when church isn’t what we thought it was? Many find that instead of the church helping us to make sense of the world, we can’t make sense of the church.

Why did the Israelites constantly fall out of peace and back into chaos? They wanted to be like the peoples around them, and they wanted the perceived security of the other nations’ gods. So they allowed things like fear, ambition, and pain to drive their decisions. But at the bottom of all this...

Remarkable as it may sound, even if we didn’t exist, God would still be love. In the first session, we explore this mystery at length and consider that everything in the entire world and creation is an overflow of this God of love.

When Jesus told his disciples to go to the other side of the Sea of Galilee where the Decapolis was, it was the absolute worst calling they could have received. To go there was a religious and social death sentence. While our “other sides” will vary, the trepidation we feel when facing them will ...

Learn how to intentionally harness the power of habits in ways that produce good for you and for those you love. There are two routines that are biologically essential and shape everything else that we experience in a given day: waking and sleeping.

Subtitle: How to Make "Age Appropriate" Mistakes
Topic: Wisdom, using mistakes to make better future decisions.

God’s message in Revelation spoke to believers when it was first written, assuring them that in spite of what they were experiencing in the world, Jesus was on His throne and ruling on high. They could live boldly and
confidently, knowing that God had set them in a divinely appointed time and place.

Our feelings are trying to tell us something important, not trying to take over. In fact, God gave them to us for a reason. Not to be controlled or “managed” but to connect us, to Him and to others around us.

Jesus had a habit of prayer and he taught us how to pray. But what we often overlook is that Jesus is still praying for us. Prayer begins not with us but with Jesus. Every prayer that we have ever prayed or that we will ever pray is a response to Jesus’ prayers for us. This must be the starting p...

Practicing a defiant joy is an active engagement of the mind in which we choose to place our trust in the character and competence of God. No matter what we’re facing, we remain suspicious that God is up to something good. Because when we look for the goodness of God, we will find him.

Feat. the Daughters of Shallum, who helped repair a section of the walls of Jerusalem (Nehemiah 3:6-12). These women defied the cultural norms of their day to follow God wholeheartedly, in effect "hiding" themselves in him. Key lessons: Inherent worth, Integrity, Impact.

Maybe you’re wondering what “surrender” has to do with “grit.” After all,
this study is about NOT giving up—isn’t “surrendering” like “giving up”?
Maybe not. Today, Bianca’s going to teach us about the link between grit
and surrender.

The people of Israel understood what it meant to wait. God had promised through His prophets to send them a Messiah. But generation after generation, God’s promise did not come to pass. Yet, this didn’t mean that God was doing nothing while they waited.

The first event at which Yeshua reveals His identity is a wedding. Why? Because the final event in Revelation is the marriage of the Messiah
to His people (see Revelation 19–22). Yeshua is the ultimate bridegroom. John 2 gives us a sneak preview of this ultimate wedding celebration.

The greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God, and love your neighbor as yourself. This is the heartbeat of this study. Do you want to live your life in line with his priorities? In the greatest commandment, Jesus tells us how to start living the life he wants for us, a life rooted in his...

Shortcuts are tempting. God does not operate on our preferred timelines, so when we see an opportunity to take matters into our hands, we often do. But there are consequences for not waiting...we typically only end up bringing misery on ourselves and on the people we love.

Community Temperature Reading is the building block for the rest of the relationship skills that follow. Use it to discover and express your God-given voice and to build healthy relationships with others. It's about brief sharing in five categories: 1) Express appreciations 2) Use puzzles to avo...

It’s not always easy to move on when God beckons us forward, especially
when things are safe and comfortable, or when we have experienced deep trauma, pain, or suffering. May you be infused with the strength of the Holy Spirit to take the next step.

The type of love that Jesus calls us to have for others is active and sacrificial. It was this kind of love that enabled Dr. King and others in the civil rights movement to see those who were persecuting them as children of God and love them in spite of the evil acts they were perpetrating. Jesus...

Happiness will be ours, joyfulness will be found, delight will be experienced, gladness will be within our reach when we chase God’s joy, His purpose, His encouragement, and His peace. Happy is captured when we chase Him.

Pain is always pounding on the door of our lives and seeking to knock us down. This should not surprise us. The first step in growing resilient is acknowledging our pain, naming it, and taking wise steps to face it head-on.

Regardless of whether our earthly dad gave us his approval and attention or not, we have a heavenly Father who is always ready to offer His presence and blessing to us. When we recognize this, it changes our perspective on everything.

It doesn’t feel great to admit that we’re doing things wrong. But being honest in admitting our need is the first step toward a genuinely fruitful life. When we become willing to stop our efforts and acknowledge that we need God, we’re ready for him to show us his way.

Great faith inspires great dreams. Great dreams require great faith. God is faithful, and what he promises to do, he will do. Where God guides, God provides. But it doesn’t happen overnight. You’ve got to go through all six phases of faith—dream, decision, delay, difficulty, and, finally, dead en...

God isn’t looking for ability among his people, he’s looking for availability. When Jesus gave the assignment to the seventy to pave the way, they could have said, "I'm not equipped." But he wants us to step out in faith and do what he’s calling us to do. He wants us to carry the flame of his lov...

The first name for God in the Bible is Elohim, meaning strict justice. He created the world according to his attribute of justice, holding us accountable for our actions.
Feature: "Jehovah Elohim" performed by Danny Gokey

The God who determines how and when all things in Scripture will take place is also concerned about where these things will take place. Why did God choose that particular piece of land? What is the significance of this place that we call Israel?

Fear is an emotion that can use some recalibration in the church. Many of us have been taught that fear is always negative—always something to be avoided. In reality, fear is an essential element of life. This is especially true when we consider what the Bible says about the fear of the Lord.

Jesus wanted to do more than just raise the dead. He wanted to show us that he cares and that he can. But he also wanted us to know that he comes. He comes in the form of encouragement. He comes in the form of help. He comes in the form of kindness.

Reconsider the way you parent and determine your north star. Regardless of the age and stage of your children, consider where and how your family will end up if you continue parenting in your present direction.

The Priority, Place, Plan, Power, and Person of prayer.

This session helps couples to strengthen the connection between them by looking at what it takes to keep nurturing their relationship and by growing in their understanding of each other’s emotional needs and desires.

This session looks at the importance of communication within marriage—through talking and listening—and helps couples to identify and overcome barriers to effective communication, particularly any hindrances to listening to their partner.

In this session, we look at how couples can increase their intimacy by expressing appreciation to each other, recognizing their differences, learning to negotiate disagreements, and supporting each other (either by praying together or by offering support in some other way).

This session addresses the ways we will inevitably hurt each other and how to resolve these issues. We look at the process of healing through talking about the hurt, saying sorry, and forgiving.

This session focuses on helping couples to recognize how their family backgrounds affect the way they relate to each other. They also consider how to build a good, healthy relationship with their parents, in-laws, and wider family and how hurt from childhood can be healed.

Sex isn’t just the icing on the cake of a marriage; it’s a vital ingredient of the cake itself. In this session couples are encouraged to talk about their sexual relationship and to recognize where they could make changes for the sake of their partner and their whole relationship.

Drawing on the work of Dr. Gary Chapman, this session looks at five main ways of expressing and receiving love— through words, time, touch, presents, and actions. Couples discover which expression of love is most important for their partner and how they can put this into practice.

Today we are facing a global crisis when it comes to families. There is an urgent need to invest in marriage and family life, for strong societies are built on strong families, and strong families are built on strong marriages. Marriages today are under more pressure than ever, and with the amoun...

Today we are facing a global crisis when it comes to families. There is an urgent need to invest in marriage and family life, for strong societies are built on strong families, and strong families are built on strong marriages. Marriages today are under more pressure than ever, and with the amoun...

Today we are facing a global crisis when it comes to families. There is an urgent need to invest in marriage and family life, for strong societies are built on strong families, and strong families are built on strong marriages. Marriages today are under more pressure than ever, and with the amoun...

Today we are facing a global crisis when it comes to families. There is an urgent need to invest in marriage and family life, for strong societies are built on strong families, and strong families are built on strong marriages. Marriages today are under more pressure than ever, and with the amoun...

Today we are facing a global crisis when it comes to families. There is an urgent need to invest in marriage and family life, for strong societies are built on strong families, and strong families are built on strong marriages. Marriages today are under more pressure than ever, and with the amoun...

If prayer unlocks our intimacy with God, why don't we use it more? Prayer is a practice with God, not a performance. The more we practice our prayer, the more natural our conversation with God will be. Prayer requires confidence in God and consistent discipline. Try practicing *breath prayer,* wh...

In a world of no second chances, one shot, and better-get-it-right-the-first-time, it’s hard to conceive of what it could mean to be born again. Nicodemus may not have understood it in the moment during that most famous conversation, but what he received from Jesus that night was hope. A hope to ...

In the opening chapters of Mark, we see the meteoric rise of Jesus. We then witness conflict when the religious leaders decide they do not like what Jesus is teaching and how the crowds are drawn to him. Jesus is helping the people of his day understand who he is and what he expects of those who ...

If we place our ultimate belief and trust in finances, health, people, or anything else, in time we will end up disappointed, and the sheer weight of life will bring things crumbling down. In the beginning of John’s Gospel, we are offered a place to put out trust, belief, hope, and life. Well, it...

There is a problem that every human being faces called sin. It leads to consequences that are bigger than we realize. Try as we might, our attempts to solve this problem on our own amount to nothing more than hedonism, judgmentalism, or legalism. Thankfully, God has a solution called grace, and i...

Many people see the church as primarily a human-led organization. Countless others think of the church as dying or dead. Some see the church as a remnant of the past. But don’t let anyone fool you. The church is still God’s plan to bring the love, grace, and truth of heaven to our broken world.

Sometimes we read the words of God and forget how counter-cultural and shocking they were at the time they were written—and how shocking they still are today. In the opening Ephesians, we read that *God chose us* before the foundation of the world and *adopted us into his own family.* He is birth...

As followers of Jesus, we have heard the call to love God with all that is in us and to love our neighbors as ourselves. In this letter, we get a vision of how we should feel about other followers of Jesus and how we should express these feelings openly to them.

Two millennia after the incarnation of Jesus, more than 2.3 billion people practice some form of faith based on the teaching and life of this one man. The question is not, “Is Jesus the true center of all things?” He is! The real question is, “Will I let him be the center of my life today and eve...

What was staggering about the church in Thessalonica is that in a world with no social media, phones, or postal services, the word about their faith and love for Jesus moved faster than the apostle Paul could travel. It seemed that everywhere he went, the story of their bold and deep faith got th...

Anxiety is not so much the onslaught of a storm as the continual threat that one is coming. We have been taught that the Christian life is one of peace. When we don't have peace, we assume the problem is within us, which leads us to feel guilty. But while the presence of anxiety is unavoidable, t...

We’re not just meant to know a lot about God. We can get to know Him personally. Knowing about someone is just the first step toward really knowing them. Thankfully, God has made Himself known to us through His Word and through His son, Christ Jesus.

Of the four Gospels, Luke highlights the outrageous mercy of God most. From the opening verses, we see compassion and tender care on display as God is working in and through the lives of those who feel left behind, forgotten, invisible, and rejected. Jesus readily goes to those on the margins to ...

The gospel is the perfect lens we need for everything. The danger is that sometimes we treat the gospel like we treat our glasses. We take it off when it’s inconvenient; we put it on when it seems to serve our purpose.

When we understand that we are accepted and claimed by Christ, we can confidently walk in His authority. We don't have to conjure up self-confidence or recite man-made mantras. We can boldly stand on the authority of God alone and refuse to seek the acceptance of man, because we are fully embrace...

It's time to walk with your head held high. This means that you walk with confidence and strength in who God created you to be. Embracing that you are chosen changes everything.

Consider this way of thinking about the Book of Revelation: *God is saving the best for last!* Revelation is a survival guide for the suffering, a book of promises for the persecuted, and a banner of hope for the beaten down. If you have ever felt tempted to give up on God, Revelation helps you d...

Jeremiah 6:16 "Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths...and you will find rest for your souls." The primary work of God is finding men who will follow the ancient paths, to whom he can entrust his power. Unfortunately, the story of most men is being entrusted with power and i...

Your decisions determine the direction and quality of your life. If that’s not motivation enough to focus more on the choices you make, consider this. Your decisions also determine the direction and quality of other people’s lives—not just today but for generations to come.

The faith journey starts with baby faith. Most of us don’t like to do anything small, but baby faith is the most important step in starting your journey of faith. Next, you can step out in maybe faith. You don’t have to understand everything to be obedient. Faith begins where understanding ends.

You are in a spiritual battle, and the enemy is trying to wedge his seeds of doubt, fear, anger, and distrust into your consciousness. He is trying to get a seat at the “table” of your mind so he can lead you down paths he wants you to travel on. The good news is that you don’t have to go there. ...

Emotional health and spiritual maturity cannot be separated. It is not possible to be spiritually mature while remaining emotionally immature. We often neglect to reflect on what is going on inside us and around us (emotional health) and are too busy to slow down to be with God (contemplative spi...

Nowadays, we see community as an accessory, not the essential fabric of life as our ancestors did by default. As a result, we are lonely; we are looking to plug a gaping hole. The hole is bigger than a couple people could ever fill, and so we live constantly disappointed, and we further isolate o...

Forgiveness is not made possible by our *determination,* but by our *cooperation* with what God has already done for us. When we refuse to let God’s forgiveness flow through us to other people, it becomes a heavy weight that can cause anxiety, fear, depression. Forgiveness isn’t dependent on anot...

Each of us has dreams for our lives, and it is important for these dreams to be aligned with God’s will. If we are merely chasing after a self-made vision of our own creation, we will never find true satisfaction—even if we make our vision a reality. God has created each one of us for His unique ...

We often don't think about the way we think. We think about the way we *feel* almost every minute. But changing the way we think seems nearly impossible. Thinking indicates your assumptions; assumptions surface your emotions; from emotions, beliefs form; out of your beliefs, actions are taken; an...

The big lie is how technology was supposed to create room in our lives for all those things that we enjoy. It’s done the exact opposite, increasing our workload as we try to keep up to the pace of a world gone completely mad. Jesus is serious about us turning things over to him on a regular basis...

We can’t afford to have the race conversation from just one perspective. We need open-handed conversations about race and opportunities to discuss relevant issues in the church from both a *black* and *white* perspective. Our call as Christians is to love all people, and we can’t do that with *cl...

The purpose of this study on boundaries isn’t so that we can shove love away. Quite the opposite. This is so we can know what to do when we very much want to love those all around us really well without losing ourselves in the process. Good boundaries should bring relief to the grief of letting o...

Sometimes when we need help, we don’t need it from just anybody. We need supernatural help. We need big things to happen. We need our hearts to change. We need the type of help a fellow human cannot really provide and the type of help we can't muster on our own. Enter the Holy Spirit.

Literal, out-of-context readings of some of the verses in the Bible strike us as sheer nonsense, and have spawned many a bizarre meme. But when we read, interpret, and understand the Bible accurately—not just individual verses, but how they fit into the Bible as a whole—our questions and concerns...

The salvation of your family, your workplace, and your city is not all on you. Jesus is the One who saves lives, heals marriages, sets people free from addictions, and makes the impossible possible. Jesus is the subject, the climax, and the main point of the story. We are just the storytellers.

The ARC of Racial Justice includes increasing your *awareness* by studying history and grasping what God says about the dignity of the human person; developing authentic *relationships* with people who are different from you; and making a *commitment* to dismantle racist attitudes, starting with ...

There are three unhealthy ways that Christians tend to deal with pain: *minimize* it, *over-spiritualize* it, or *memorialize* it. Eventually we have to face our wounds if we don't want to feel so broken anymore.

Change comes to us all—there are no exceptions to that rule. We can clinch our fists and fume against it, or we can learn to become our next selves by facing change, by speaking what’s true, by letting what’s dead be dead, by surrendering to find our way through.

The Holy Spirit is known by many names. Wonderful. Helper. Comforter. Counselor. Strengthener. Standby. Advocate. Intercessor. It is important to know the Holy Spirit as a living, thinking, feeling Person. He is another Jesus...Jesus living in us.

What will people think of you when you’re gone? What will your grandchildren know about you? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you are remembered throughout generations to come as one whose life bore unmistakable witness to your faith in God? The choice is yours.

When President Kennedy proposed a moon landing, it was seen as audacious, even crazy. But, the same could be said of a different kind of mission that God announced in a “speech” back in the Garden of Eden. The world’s first humans had just fallen prey to Satan’s temptations and disobeyed God, ush...

Everything God does is meant for good; but, God defines *good* differently than we define good. God's good plans are not exempt from trial. Rather than saving you from trials, God wants to transform you *through* them. Your past will either be Satan's weapon against you or God's most powerful tool.

The entire Old Testament points to the coming of the Messiah in the New Testament. The story of the Creation sets the foundation of the much larger story that will be revealed in Scripture, which focuses on relationship, redemption, and restoration.

**Are you enough?** We aren’t. None of us. It’s a universal diagnosis. But after we absorb the initial shock and hurt of that truth, it’s usually followed by a wave of relief. We understand there is a reason we all feel a deep-in-our-bones problem. Then and only then can we allow Jesus to meet ou...

In this study, we will look at the depression the prophet Elijah faced after he came off the spiritual high point of defeating the prophets of Baal. His story will reveal that we never have to remain in a cave of despair. God is always with us and always willing to lead us out of our personal dar...

When lyric and melody combine to declare God’s Word to his people? Here is *strength.* And when the people of God declare their shared story in song? Here is *power.* Here is a *joy* that heals and transforms. And this is why we cull our songs until we have a hymnbook that embodies who we were, w...

When we ask God for strength, we tap into the the supernatural graces God promises to us; we receive from Jesus the strength that prevails; we experience resilience; we are filled with God's River of Life: God does not let our reserves run dry. (Teaching on the parables of the fig tree and the te...

Before we engage in learning the strategies and tactics we need to survive and thrive in our spiritual lives, we must first fix our eyes on the God who fought for us. The greatest fighters are those who know they have been fought for.

Discover the significance of some of the details of the story of Jesus' birth you may have overlooked: Why was Jesus born in a cave? What is the meaning of the manger in which he was placed? What is significant about his swaddling cloths? In what time of year was Jesus born, and why does it matte...

We each have our own temperament and needs, different ways we get energized, different types of spaces that help us feel connected to God. So it only makes sense that we each need a unique and custom-made pathway to God that fits how God has made us.

God has purposed that every human being on the planet experience singleness for some period of time. So it’s fair to ask the question: Why? If we say the purpose of singleness is simply to find someone to marry, then we’re saying Jesus and the apostle Paul failed at singleness. What does God want...

Every Christian needs to study the tactics and ways of Satan and learn how to stand strong against him and his demonic workers. If we bury our head in the sand, we just become a big target. Ignoring the enemy never makes him go away. Being afraid is natural but turning to run away just exposes ou...

Decisions shape who you are. But what if instead “who you are” shapes the decisions you make? What if your identity, purpose, and faith in God guided the way you prioritized the decisions you make? Take an honest look at your decisions and what’s consuming your time and attention.

The main idea of this study is counterintuitive, and it might even seem a little crazy at first. But here it is—we can choose to be unoffendable. We often try to justify our anger and conflate it with God’s anger. The reality is that there is no such thing as righteous anger in the Bible for huma...

We start with S - Stillness. For those of us who are the frustrated, the disappointed, the irritated and the flat-out exasperated, let’s get really honest about where we really are and what we really want. Let's listen to God’s first recorded question: Where are you? Imagine God asking you with i...

People pleasing brings such detriment to our lives. We make ourselves miserable. We lie. We create more work for ourselves—both physical and emotional work. We lose grasp of our joy. We offer a standing invitation to regret. This is all so profoundly discouraging. But do you know what is the abso...

We have all felt the weight of not measuring up, and responded by trying to be good enough. Some of us feel trapped in the never-ending hamster wheel of approval-seeking. Our obsession with earning favor influences the way we dress, who we try to impress, and the way we interact with God. We were...

You are becoming who the people you are following are leading you to be. Who we follow impacts how we are seen and known. If we aren’t careful, if
we don’t decide for ourselves that we want to be known for being like
Jesus, we risk being known for things we don’t even like ourselves.

What would happen if you were willing to stand naked and unashamed before God? God doesn't take a temporary moment and put it into your permanent record. Too often we rehearse failure when we should claim restoration.

Esther and Mordecai had chosen to create a world of hidden identity. While it’s easy to judge them for hiding the fact they were members of God’s chosen people, it can be just as easy for us to deny our own upbringing, family, or faith. God called the Israelites to be set apart, and he has called...