Outward living for the sake of the Gospel can be hard. It can uncomfortable. And for some, even dangerous. This is why we tend to avoid it. We stay in circles of people who are safe. We keep ourselves in…
The biggest encouragement I recieve in keeping my heart and mind focused outwardly is when I pray Gospel-centered prayers with other Christians. Right now in my life, I gather with a group about 15 people on Thursday mornings for the…
One of the biggest hurdles that keeps us from living an outward life for the sake of the Gospel is the fear of being asked questions we do not have the answers to. Our mind quickly races to the debate…
In the account of the call of the first disciples in the Gospel of John there is an interesting theme that occurs. Jesus calls one disciple and then that disciple goes and tells another person about Jesus. After Andrew started…
No matter who you are–living an outward life is challenging. It doesn’t matter if you are a missionary or a pastor, a people-person or an extravert, when we turn our lives outward for the sake of the Gospel we are…
Jesus did not call the disciples into an inward life with Him. He could have easily set-up his ministry headquarters in Nazareth and spent 3-years training his disciples in a classroom. He could have avoided the large crowds and the…
One of the conversations that church leaders will sometimes find themselves in is how do you create a balance between ministry to the church family and ministry outside the church family? We tend to divide our ministries into these two…
When I think of the church, the body of Christ, I think of us as a family on mission. As with any family, the church has the privilege of being in life with each other in a manner that we…
“I want us to be a church facing outward.” As a pastor, that is a statement that has been on my mind recently. I want us to be a church that is living our lives through the outward lens of…