Spiritual Formation
As I reflect on this previous year, I am struck by a constant theme I saw in a lot of the work I did with clients. When people have experienced years of abuse, unhealthy relationships, darkness, and relentless anxiety…they tend to make sense of it all by reducing it to small, bite-size statements of fact…
Read MoreOver the Thanksgiving holiday, my wife and I traveled on several flights and as many of you know, this provides sufficient time for reflection, rest…and people watching. More often than not, I get really excited about flying. I understand why people don’t like it, but I’m pretty content to sit and read or watch movies…
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“…the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit…” Isaiah 61:3 I have been camped out in Isaiah for the past few months working on a paper specifically looking at chapter 61. It has been a good exercise diving deeper into what was happening at the time of this prophecy and how the people hearing…
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Last week, we explored reasons why our sexual desires exist in the first place. They are good, created by a good God, to draw us deeper into relational intimacy with himself and with others. By understanding why these desires exist, we gain a greater framework for understanding how to navigate them. One of my primary purposes…
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This post may disappoint you. Because I think in a topic like masturbation, we are often looking for one of two things: assurance that it’s okay (that essentially we’re okay and normal) or clear Biblical passages on why it’s not okay. What you’ll find instead is my perspective, which is one of many other perspectives on the topic of…
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We’ve got an issue here. And it’s not that sexual desires exist. If you are a human being, you have innate sexual desires. And I want to first normalize them for you. They are God-given and natural; they are not shameful. God created sexual desires and anything God created is good. However, Satan has warped this good gift…
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I’m a single Christian talking about sex. And up until this past year, I thought this was wrong. I believed the lie that sex as a topic made sense for only married Christians to explore and understand. As a single, I had little place in this dialogue. The topic didn’t make me uncomfortable or nervous. I…
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Sex and worship are not often used in the same sentence in the Christian realm. We are told not to worship sex, of course. Our limited minds have a way of taking what is meant to bring worship to the Creator and instead, we settle for worshiping the creation itself. As C. S. Lewis says,…
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This question has put me on a path of exploration and depth as I dive into the Bible. If you’re like me, you didn’t grow up wondering what the purpose of sex’s existence was. I just accepted that it existed and moved on. But, here I found myself, one year into graduate school and 23…
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“To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any…
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