Let’s say you have a question about a homework assignment. Who would you ask: your teacher or a student who took that class 5 years ago? How about if you had a question at your job? Would you ask your boss or someone who works at a different store? Let's say you have a question about one of your weekly chores at home. Would you ask your parent abou

What am I living my life for? "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him." —John 3:16-17 "For by grace you have

When most people memorize things, they simply read it over and over until they "program" their memories. Repetition, repetition, repetition. If you ask me, that sounds kinda boring!But memorizing Scripture is a great way to meditate on God's Word (Psalm 1:2)! In my later years at school, I competed in multiple Scripture memory competitions. One yea

[First Posted: May 2020]It's May 2020...there's this thing that's been going on...we'll just call it JEFF. Jeff has been affecting a lot of people—192 countries as of this recording—and although that is impressive, it’s also quite rude. Everything going on with Jeff right now has us asking the question of how to thrive in a crisis.

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek." —Romans 1:16It is so awesome that you want to share your faith and are taking God's command to share the gospel seriously (Matthew 24:14; Matthew 28:19; Psalm 96:3). You are doing exactly what Jesus comman

Educating yourself on spiritual abuse and the signs of spiritual abuse is a critical first step toward recovery. Many spiritual abuse survivors have grown up in communities that deny spiritual abuse exists as a real issue. But spiritual abuse is very real; it is a violation of a person's absolute foundation for trust, value, and worthiness. Such de

Around the world, different cultures have had different views of God and what He's like. Some envision God as judge over all, with lightning bolts shooting from his scepter—like Zeus in Roman mythology. Some have known that God must be powerful, so they worship the most powerful thing they see—the sun. Many agnostics believe that God is unknowable

Depression is a loaded word carrying a variety of definitions. Many people—incorrectly—use the term “depression” interchangeably with fleeting sadness. An example of “depression” being incorrectly applied would be, “I was super depressed that we lost the game this week! I guess there’s always next week.”For depression to be deemed a clinical condit

Bank employees are taught to spot counterfeit money NOT by studying different fake designs, so they won't be tricked. Rather, bankers spend hours studying all the qualities of true, genuine currency. There are so many ways a criminal could attempt to pass counterfeit money, so knowing a few "common" counterfeits may not actually prepare someone for

Describing God as omnipresent isn't as common as saying He is omnipotent or omniscient, but it is just as much a part of who God is as those other ideas. Omnipresent is sort of self-defining: omni means "all," and present means the same thing it would when taking attendance in a class or at work—here. God is everywhere all at once. As David said in

To hold a grudge is to allow ourselves to dwell on anger, bitterness, resentment, or other negative feelings for a prolonged time after someone has hurt us or after we've perceived wrongdoing. When we’ve been hurt very deeply, it's a common response to want to withhold forgiveness from that person. We want to hurt the one who hurt us. Grudges might

When you first ask that question, before anything else, ask why you are asking it. Is it to find how much is too much of an emphasis on physical appearance? Or is to find out if Christians should care about physical appearance at all? The answer can be broken into two parts. First, remember this: you are an amazing creation who was made by the Crea

A teenage girl came into Panera Bread, where I worked in 2013, and ordered a peppermint mocha. When she stretched out her hands to give me a few crumpled dollar bills, the sleeves of her black hoodie slipped up to show bright butterflies sharpied over two week old wounds on her wrists.Self-conscious, she looked away. I smiled at her and started cha

Have you ever blown it? I mean really messed up big time? Like, you're a Christian, and you know God's desires for how you should live, but one day you commit a sin you can hardly believe you are even capable of? And you hate yourself for it. Or is that just me? Of course we all make mistakes—even Christians. I do think, in many ways, we feel much

"Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." —Psalm 37:4Does “delight yourself in the Lord” sound like some shallow Christian meme or something your church-going grandmother says? Well, you're probably right—it does! Sometimes these churchy sayings get so overused that we aren’t even sure what they mean anymore. "Deli

If you have read our article called, "Are there biblical reasons for divorce?", and have found that you didn't quite get the answer you were looking for, you may be wondering if there are more reasons why a couple might divorce beyond these two—specifically, physical, sexual, or emotional abuse of either a spouse or child. We realize that the world

Sometimes figuring out dates in the Bible can take a little investigating because events are not necessarily written in chronological order. You kind of have to dig in, take notes, and pay attention to details to get the big picture. So let's do a little research and see what clues we can find about the length of Jesus' ministry.Clue #1: The Beginn

The internet makes communication fast, easy, and often anonymous. That's great...most of the time. But every good technology can be abused. One of the more common abuses of the internet is a unique species of insufferable jerks: internet trolls.On a fishing boat, "trolling" means dragging a line through the water to see what you can catch. Modern t

For Bible references in this video, check the description on YouTube.God made us in His image (Genesis 1:27), which means we carry His traits within us—one of those traits is the natural ability to recognize good and evil, right from wrong. This "moral compass" is the human conscience, and it is a part of every human being from birth. We feel pleas

Genesis 1-2 tells the story of how God created everything in the universe. The way the Hebrew language is worded, we should look at this accounting of creation as God bringing all things into existence from nothing during the span of six literal 24-hour time periods—with no breaks or time spans in between those days. The context of these passages d