Kevin Seguin Well, it has happened again. Somebody said something, tweeted something, wrote a cartoon, produced a piece of art, or otherwise presented an opinion. Then their world exploded. It's an all too common story these days and a recent personal experience gave me a new perspective on the issue. I was recently involved in a discussion which, while it remained civil, didn't seem to produce much fruit at the end of the day. The specific topic doesn't matter so much because I think we've all had similar experiences. Out of the whole experience, the phrase that stuck out to me the most was this one: "Your intent doesn't matter nearly as much as the impact it has on [others]." This phrase crystallized a thought I had been having for a while but couldn't quite put my finger on. I had, like many of you, been frustrated by the new cultural reality that "No matter what you say, SOMEBODY is going to be offended." This competition between a speaker's intent and the impact of their words helped me to understand something profound about our culture. We have become truly intellectually lazy. We are confronted with so much information and data these days, that it is much easier to simply be offended by something that we disagree with or that challenges our worldview. It's simpler to be blindly offended than to try and dig into what was said, interpret it correctly, and gain an understanding of the other person and their thoughts. We still might be offended, but at least it will be offence at what the author meant to say. When I was a young boy my mother used to tell me not to "judge someone else until I've walked a mile in their moccasins." These days she'd be accused of cultural appropriation. Her intent however, wasn't to appropriate native culture, but rather to teach me the importance of understanding the other side of an issue before coming to a conclusion myself. In my experience, this is something that vast swathes of people are no longer interested in doing. Words have power. Nobody who is being honest denies that. Words also, however, have many meanings, and their meanings become even broader when we see the context in which they are written. Additionally, we communicate more and more in text form, even though we know that most of our communication and meaning comes from non-verbal cues and body language. It's much easier to read words on a page and decide what they mean to us rather than spending the time and effort to figure out what the writer meant to say. The power of words is almost immeasurable. A misinterpreted statement can lead to someone's entire life being ruined. Remember Justine Sacco? How about the meme one dumb tweet spawned #hasjustinelanded? For the unfamiliar, Sacco was a PR rep who tweeted a really poorly thought-out joke that went super-viral while she was on a plane. Jon Ronson wrote a great piece on the whole affair. Ronson raises a few great points about public shaming, its history, and punishments fitting their crimes. I really encourage you to read it. We ought to take the time and care to read things well, to suss out the meaning that the writers intend, to make sure we get the intended meaning right before we get offended and call down the wrath of the internet on people. Am I defending the Sacco tweet? Of course not, it was (and still remains) a stupid joke that went beyond its intended audience. Someone in PR really ought to have known better, but should she really have had to lose her job over it? Does that punishment fit that crime? The impact that our words have matters, it matters a great deal. But does it matter more than the intent? Allow me to submit that it does not. Intent matters more. Intent ought to matter much more! If we get the intent wrong, the impact we feel, especially when we are wronged or offended, is manufactured by us. It isn't real. It's "fake offense." There is a lot to be offended by in the world today. We have much more power to effect change through the Internet today than ever. Let's not misuse that power. Let's make sure we get offended for the right reasons, and let's seek justice for the truly wronged.  As a Biblical conservative, a cultural Liberal, a husband, a dad, and a pastor, I want to see the church act differently in the world. My big passion in ministry is to see how believers can bring the Gospel into the world around them while pursuing the lost art of winsomeness. It is what fuels me and drives me to write. Engaging culture with the truth of the Gospel in a way that is winsome, wise, and as Colossians 4:6 directs us: “seasoned with salt.” It’s my hope that what I say here helps you not only in your own faith, but helps you share it more effectively and fruitfully.
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Steven Mccurdy Religion is Absurd Have you ever considered how utterly ridiculous faith traditions are? Faith is an irrational experience and no believer is immune, we just think we are because It’s easy for us to see the silliness of other religions while holding fast to the objective truth of our own. To us, our faith is normal while others appear strange, but the truth is that ours is no less weird. Religious practice is a profoundly complex phenomenon and will always appear bizarre outside of its immediate context. Whether it is a monotheism or pantheism, most cultures have developed intricate ideas about a higher power because people are simply trying to make sense of existence with incomplete information. It's not surprising that we develop unusual ceremonies in an effort to worship God better. If we’re not careful we can develop a tendency to look upon other religious traditions with apathy, pity, or even contempt because it doesn't fit nicely within our theology. We don’t understand the significance that the specific practice holds, or the meaning that these rituals have for their adherents. We are too caught up in our own weird beliefs to be concerned with understanding the beauty and truth that other faith traditions may offer. At this point I would like to offer a caveat: embracing the potential goodness of other religions also includes accepting that sometimes they may be wrong as well. Finding the beauty in faith traditions does not mean we need to be blind to evil. As always, please use discernment when evaluating faith claims. Religion is Complicated On an excursion in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico my wife and I endured a time-share presentation to get tickets to a city tour. We visited downtown Vallarta and saw the arches on the Malecon, we toured a local Tequila distillery and had lunch at a restaurant in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by forest and a beautiful creek with large rock bluffs. It was a very serene environment, but there was more to it than meets the eye. Exiting the bus, we were first greeted by some sales kiosks selling obsidian knives and dream-catchers (because even remote Mexican villages aren't immune to capitalism). As we walked past, our guide informed us that the shaman would “cleanse our spirit” so that we could enter what I assume is a sacred spot. We walked past as the shaman chanted, shook some beads and engulfed us with incense. We were then instructed to pick up a stick adorned with strings and feathers that would “give us a dream”, then we were to walk along the creek and stick it into the mud where the shaman was spreading the incense and chanting again. From what I understood, putting the stick into the mud was supposed to take away the dream that we had been given. At this point we were free to enter. I determined that the whole ordeal was absurd. Was there anything about this ritual that actually affected the physical world? Did this experience change anything for non-Huichol people? Maybe it's just my skepticism but I don't see how it would. It wasn't long before I remembered that we aren't immune from the absurdity of ritual either. Most Christians practice the sacrament of Holy Communion (Eucharist, Lord's Suppers, Mass, etc) but, when viewed from the outside, it is just as ludicrous as any Huichol dreamcatcher ritual. The body and blood of Christ, are you serious? I'm not even going to mention belief in the virgin birth, resurrection of Jesus, or baptism and miracles; Non Christians don't have a monopoly on peculiar religious belief and practice. The true meaning of the Eucharist has been fought over for many years without ever achieving a consensus. Massive groups of Christians still can't agree on the objective meaning of it and it is one of the sacraments of the Christian Church! Regardless of orthodoxy, it still holds a profound significance for those that practice it and has the power to be internally transformative. Outsiders may not even be aware that different interpretations of our rituals exist and that we think the others way of practicing it is strange, too. But, strange as it is, it is still meaningful to us. Just as ancient Jews misunderstood the significance of the Lord’s Supper to Christians, maybe we misunderstand the significance of a Native American sweat lodge or a Sikh Kurpan. We aren't even aware of that which we don’t know; it is possible that we misunderstand more than we actually know about other traditions. As western Christians we generally don’t even take the time to comprehend religious events of other types of Christians—like Meskel which is performed by Ethiopian Orthodox Christians—nevermind understanding liturgies performed by adherents to other religions. We disregard them because they seem peculiar and unnecessary, but we haven't taken the time to try to understand their beauty and significance. Maybe we should take the time. Religion is Beautiful It is my suggestion that religious rituals are meant to produce something within us, rather than affecting the world around us. In that way the presence of God can be found even in the practice of non-Christian rituals (yes, evil can be found within other faiths, just as it can within ours). I’m sure that makes many Christians uncomfortable as I can't say that I am entirely comfortable with the statement either but please bear with me. God is everywhere, if non-Christian rituals produce fruit like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control then they are doing God's work. It is my view that requiring an exclusive reference to Jesus (as the literal man that walked this planet), could limit the work of God if He is truly omnipresent. Maybe understanding Jesus in a more cosmic way would be healthier and maybe it will let us truly see the God that works everything out for good. Don't panic! These words are controversial enough to require more clarification: I am not attempting to speak about salvation here, only praxis. But, since we are on the subject it is my belief that attributing the saving power of Christ to an acknowledgement of a very limited understanding of an omnipresent God is a weak presentation of the gospel. If Jesus is the best representation of God and God is good then Jesus, and His Kingdom impact, can be found anywhere there is good. So, religious practice doesn't actually accomplish anything. Religious practice becomes something that is meaningful to the practitioner and no one else. It becomes a way to commune with God in a way that isn't defined by the world. It's meaning is only derived by the change affected in the heart of the worshipper. It becomes a way for communities to bond over common beliefs. So, maybe I’m wrong, religious practice does accomplish something, it changes us so that we change the world. Maybe it isn't absurd after all.  I write about my story. The story about how I became a pro-life (womb to grave) liberal, confident arminian, reluctant charismatic, cautious progressive creationist, tentative conditionalist, utterly wretched without Christ, corporate complementarian (individually egalitarian), clueless pre-millenialist, and most importantly, a follower of Christ. I am a blue collar tradesman. I am a victim of post-modern society probably due to my secular upbringing.
I serve on the editorial team of boldcupofcoffee.com, I am married to a wonderful woman and have two sons. They are the very best of me. Brian McNarry In my experience as a pastor, I’ve witnessed many of the different ways that people choose to leave a church. Sometimes it happens with an honest conversation and a blessing on each other as the ways part, and sometimes it happens in what I can only call a ‘spectacular’ fashion. Usually these are ways of leaving a church that include some type of a parting shot that is lobbed at the church and its leadership. Most of the time these parting shots are fired with an intention to cause wounds, but there are times when it simply comes from being unaware of the effect their actions will have on the church they are leaving. Although the variety of creative ways people "spectacularly" leave a church still surprises me, I've noticed that there are often very similar underlying archetypes. One of these types I’ve informally named the “You’re a bunch of heretics!” option. This particular exit strategy is characterized by focusing on a particular theological item and declaring that the church, its elders, and the pastor have got their theology all wrong and need to be included in Jesus’ warning that “It would be better [for you] to be thrown into the sea with a millstone hung around your neck than to cause one of these little ones to fall into sin” (Luke 17:2 NLT). Essentially the “You’re a bunch of heretics” way of leaving a church is designed as the nuclear option. It’s meant to cause maximum damage, end conversation attempts, and leave the person walking away firmly planted on the moral high ground. Why is throwing the heretic label around such an effective way of damaging a church while you’re already on your way out? I think this comes down to all the baggage and junk that comes with the label of heretic. When we think of the term heretic—or people who are acting in divisive ways—we often think of Paul’s instruction to Titus to give two warnings to a divisive person and after that have nothing to do with them (Titus 3:10), or we go to Proverbs 6:19 where “a person who sows discord in a family” is included in the list of seven things that God hates. On top of that there’s also the fact that in times when the church has had enough political power it often took the approach of exiling and executing people deemed to be heretics. When scripture gives such strong rebukes of heretical behaviour and we have the historical baggage that goes with the word, there’s no wonder that none of us want that label thrown at us But this leads us to another question: what actually qualifies a teaching as heresy or a person as a heretic? Is it just something we disagree with? Is it anything we find uncomfortable or too hard to follow? It’s obvious that if we put any two followers of Christ in a room, we’re going to find some places where they disagree on how we interpret and apply the teachings of scripture to our lives, but those differences do not mean that one of the two people has to be a heretic. In light of this, I think we need a better way of defining what actually is heresy and what is not. Here’s what I would like to propose: I think that when the early church councils got together to try and make collective decisions about what would define Christianity, there were a few things that they got exceptionally right. One of these being the Apostle’s Creed. Sure there were people who disagreed with some of the wording and what was included or not, but overall it’s the best and simplest description of the core beliefs and theology surrounding who God is, what he has done, and what we believe at the foundational level. In this way I would call the Apostle’s Creed the defining list of what is “small o” orthodox, or in common words, what is the foundation of ‘right belief’ about our faith. (Note: I use the words “small o,” because the use of “big O” Orthodox is typically reserved for speaking of the actual faith traditions that use Orthodox in their names.) What is beautiful about the Apostle’s Creed, is that it is foundational enough that it can be the defining list of what is true belief in God as revealed by Scripture, but at the same time it is general enough that we can accept that different faith traditions can practice these articles in different ways. For example, we can accept that different expressions and practices of our faith have different understandings and ways of practicing the communion of the saints, but we all believe it is important and foundational. At the same time, the first line “I believe in God, the Father almighty” is declarative enough that we cannot pervert its meaning into something that it is not. If we want to call something heresy—or call someone a heretic—then a quick first step is to run it past the Apostle’s Creed. If it is in outright and undeniable contradiction with the actual lines of the creed, then by all means, label it heresy. This works as a test because of how well the Apostle’s Creed summarizes God’s word as revealed by the Holy Scriptures. But if you cannot say it is an outright contradiction with the Creed, then you need to do a lot more careful study of scripture, and time in discernment and prayer before pulling out the red inked heresy stamp. This is the step where things start to get more complicated, so I hope you can venture into this with me. I do believe that there are teachings about God that often are repeated, shared, and lived out in the church that do not meet the criteria of heresy, but they definitely fit the category of being dangerous theology. What I mean by dangerous theology is that these are teachings and ideas that do not outright contradict the items of the Apostle’s Creed, but when these teachings are lived out and applied they can cause spiritual damage and abuse to people. These dangerous theologies take people further away from God and even into places of sin. When it comes to dangerous theologies, I often see them as very similar to how scripture presents idols. Idols are good things that have been elevated to the status of becoming ultimate things that replace God in our lives. The most classic example of this is Aaron creating the golden calf for the Israelites while Moses is up on the mountain. Calves were common idols of their time period, because they represented the birth of new livestock. In an era where most people’s sustenance relied on their livestock reproducing and crops growing, a newborn calf was a symbol of prosperity. When Moses was up on the mountain, the people assumed Moses and God had abandoned them and turned to what they knew of their culture. They took a desire for prosperity and elevated it to the place of becoming their god. This is idolatry in its simplest form; a thing that is good elevated to become an ultimate thing. Idol worship connects to dangerous theologies because these are beliefs and practices that are almost always based on something good in scripture. Then these good things from scripture are elevated and enlarged until it becomes the ultimate belief that reframes a person’s entire way of understanding who God is, and it distorts the truth of what God has done, and what he is doing. One example of this that I’ve encountered several times has to do with spiritual gifts. I’ve had people tell me that if every follower of Christ is a “true believer” they will have this one specific spiritual gift (and before you jump to conclusions, no, it was not the gift of speaking in tongues). Now spiritual gifts are a good thing. Paul says that “A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other” (1 Cor 12:7). It is true that exercising our spiritual gifts is a great thing and how God designed us to live in relationships with each other that build us up and help us get closer to God. But when we take one of God’s promises and elevate it to become an ultimate thing, we’ve now crossed a line by taking a promise of God and weaponized it by turning it into an idol. For the previous example of a certain spiritual gift, this is dangerous because it says that anyone who does not have that spiritual gift is not a true believer. Usually this gets accompanied by some type of admonishment that the person in question needs to do something more in order to receive the specific gift and prove that they are faithful to God. Let me summarize it this way: Heresy is something that directly contradicts who God is, whereas dangerous theologies are good teachings and beliefs that have been elevated to the place of becoming ultimate teachings that skew how we see God. Now that you know this difference, you might have the urge to ink up that red heresy stamp and start labeling some people or teachings, but just hold on a second before you do that. Every one of us has the ability to travel into a place of being a heretic without realizing it. That’s why Paul told Titus to give a divisive person two chances to try and restore them back into harmony with the teachings of Jesus. In addition when it comes to some of our doctrine, we need to recognize that every one of us is a little bit of a heretic by default. Take the Trinity for example: we believe that God exists as three-in-one, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Exactly how this works out is impossible for us to know with our finite human minds, so every attempt to explain the Trinity, will contain a small amount of heresy in it. Does that mean we need to stop talking about the Trinity entirely? Absolutely not. It just means we need to be humble enough to recognize that we many not have it all right. That’s why I called this article “Heresy and Me,” because we need to recognize our own tendencies to venture into heresy without knowing it. When we forget how to be humble we can reach for that rubber heresy stamp, or maybe we’ve even played the “You’re a bunch of heretics” card ourselves at one point. It is a sad truth that the evil one is searching for any opportunity to cause harm to the church and distract us from our true mission, and getting us wrapped up in fights around heresy and dangerous theologies is highly effective at this. No one ever wants to admit that we’ve been used by the deceiver to distract the church, but it certainly happens more than we recognize. The truth is that a lot of heresy and dangerous theologies appear to be very comfortable at first encounter. It is attractive to see a version of God and faith that has all the messy bits worked out into a neat package. We want everything to line up in pretty rows that can be easily understood, but that’s not how God works. God wants to meet us in the searching, to love us in the mess, and yes, even in our confusion, God is still there. God still loves the heretic, and I for one am deeply grateful for that.  Brian's whole understanding of faith and Christianity changed when he started to encounter what it means to live life with God instead of for God. One thing that Brian is passionate about is walking with people as they explore their faith in Christ and learning how to honestly seek God in the midst of our doubts and fears. Brian is the Pastor of Grand Valley Community Church in Brandon Manitoba. He is married to Nikki and they have one daughter named Olivia. When Brian isn't working on a sermon at a Starbucks or at home with his family, you can usually find him fly fishing or building model air planes. To read more of Brian's articles, click here.
Drake De Long-Farmer I was praying with someone during the worship service as they felt off spiritually and distant from God. The key word used was cloudy. Like they were in a haze spiritually and couldn't really get into the service. A lot had been going on in their life at that point and they were extremely busy juggling so many things! As we were praying I saw a picture of hard soil that was dry and tired. When you would pour water on it, it wouldn't soak up into the soil. The conditions of the soil did not allow it to get the nutrients of the water it needed. What he needed in the moment was a monsoon of God's Spirit and presence to soften the hardness he was feeling. Then it hit me, he needed to get in the middle of the worship service, raise his hands, belt out the words (even if he didn't feel like it) and let the work of God start there. He needed to position himself to receive from God. Because God wasn't withholding but he needed to get in the eye of the storm to have the soil replenished and made soft again. So that is exactly what he did, and what a difference it made. Even though every part of him didn't feel like worshiping in the moment, he positioned himself in a mindset and posture to choose to receive. It makes me wonder how many of us this is the reality of our spiritual walk with God. We long for His presence and power in our lives, but many times the very thing we need to choose to do is the very thing that will position us to receive what God is wishing to give, do and do through us. If we wait for when we feel like worshipping, following Jesus or growing it may never happen. But if we choose GET IN THE MIDDLE of the storm of what God’s presence and what He is doing, it is in this place that the work of softening that dry and tired soil can happen and the work of His Spirit can transform our lives, our circumstances and our faith. So my challenge is this: Get in the middle of His love! Get in the middle of His plan! Get in the middle of His work!  Drake currently serves as the Editor-In-Chief of boldcupofcoffee.com and the Executive Pastor at gateway.ac as well as an avid speaker, writer and leadership coach/consultant. Drake is passionate about seeing people thrive and come alive. To BELONG, wrestle with what they BELIEVE and BECOME people FULL OF LOVE, FUELLED BY FAITH, and ADDICTED TO HOPE. Drake is also a life learner and loves being challenged to think deeper and grow further. One of his favorite things to do is spend a good amount of time in a good café or coffee shop with a good book or engaging conversation. To be able to share in someone else's journey and experience is always a pleasure and honor. You can also connect with him at your personal page at drakedelongfarmer.com. To read more articles by Drake, simply click here.
CHARLOTTE O “I am someone who goes to the gym,” I told myself as I self-consciously walked down the street in my neon orange shirt and too-new running shoes. I barely believed it, and there was a voice screaming in my head that I should just turn around and go home. That I would stand out, wouldn’t belong, had no business being there. But it was a healthy habit I’d decided to incorporate into my life. A habit that still gets me out the door, even on rainy nights when a cup of tea and a TV show sound much more appealing. But I’ve come to believe that the reason this habit didn’t fall by the wayside like so many other good intentions is due to one thing: Identity. You see, the words I was saying to myself changed how I thought about myself. I didn’t say, I want to go to the gym every day, or, I should try to go to the gym, or even, I hereby promise that I will go to the gym a minimum of three times a week. No, it wasn’t about what I would do (or aspire to do) but about who I was deciding to be. What we say and believe about ourselves matters. And for that reason we shouldn’t be afraid to label ourselves. Normally we view labels as bad, but in this context I think they can be not only positive but also transformative. I’ve never met a vegan who was tempted to cheat on his diet. In fact, vegans wouldn’t consider it a diet: it’s just the way they eat. I’ve heard this strategy at play with my friends as they teach their children too. Instead of saying, “No, don’t do that,” they might say something like, “We don’t do that at our house.” I’m not sure how effective it is, but I’d like to believe that it also teaches values rather than behavior modification. For good or ill, much of our identity forms at an early age. It seems like people can spend a whole lot of time and energy trying to figure out who they are, and trying to escape or embrace who they were raised to be. There are so many adages in popular culture that seem to confirm this: I sound just like my mother. Women tend to marry someone like their father. etc. There are so many things rooted in our identity that we didn’t choose. But there are things we can choose. In the same vein, we should strive to remove negative self-talk from our lives. So often we talk about or to ourselves in ways we would never speak to a close friend. Now, I’m not trying to say we should live in a world of rainbows and daisies pretending we are perfect. But I think it’s important to remind ourselves of who we are. Ephesians 2 gives us a great example of that balance. Who are we? We are God’s workmanship. Adopting this identity doesn’t make us prideful, but inspires us to do God’s work in this world. I think reading these familiar words in the Message is helpful: Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing. (Eph 2:7-10) In his book, The Good and Beautiful God, James Bryan Smith suggests that identity is key in our struggle with sin. When we reframe our spiritual lives in terms of being a new creation, it empowers us with God’s strength to overcome. He writes, “The New Testament approaches the Christian life by telling us who we are and whose we are, and then it encourages us to live in a manner worthy of that identity.” The Bible is full of declaration of who we are in God: adopted as children, highly favored, beloved, but until we believe these things, until we use them to name ourselves, I think we will struggle over and over. It’s not a matter of saint vs. sinner. In a world of false dichotomies, we could feel like if we don’t fit clearly into one category, we must be the opposite. Someone might be hesitant to call herself a leader because she experiences self-doubt, has a hard time voicing opinions strongly, or is indecisive. However, she might be the exact person needed to lead in a specific group or situation. What if she chose to label herself as a leader? Maybe choosing to say those words – I am a leader – would spur her to take responsibility, develop leadership qualities, or find a way to lead by example, even if that doesn’t look like the kind of leadership taught in seminars. A simple exercise to try is to give yourself 5 minutes to write out every word that comes to mind when you think about how you define yourself. Then you can rank those things by what percentage of you they make up. It can be very eye-opening to see what kinds of negative and positive things come to mind, and a valuable reality check to see that things we so often get hung up on are such a very small part of things that truly define us. There might also be things on the list that it’s time to reject. You can symbolically start to do this by crossing it off. My list includes some titles given by birth: sister, daughter, given by others: teacher, foreigner, and some that I’m still aspiring to: writer, leader, peacemaker, and yes, “person who goes to the gym” is on my list, just under worshiper and adventurer.  Charlotte is on the Editorial team at boldcupofcoffee.com and currently works with a non-profit organization in Taiwan where she teaches, leads English Bible studies, writes educational materials, trains teachers, poses for pictures, and a bunch of other stuff too. She is originally from Canada, spending significant amounts of time in all three westernmost provinces and the idea of home has become quite fluid. She has learned that life overseas is not as exotic as people may think, but life with God is a daily adventure. Read more article by Charlotte.
BRIAN MCNARRY In a previous article, I talked about the importance of learning how to give yourself a break. The basic gist of it was that we all have limitations, and when we bump up against our limitation of energy, focus, and time, the healthiest option is to choose to take a break and rest instead of crashing into a place of burnout or breakdown. This time I want to talk specifically to people who are employers and team leaders; those of us who work with teams of people who work or serve under our leadership, whether that is in a non-profit, business, or government sectors. Let’s start by asking this question of ourselves: Do you know when the last time your staff or volunteers took a break? If you can answer this question without a lot of thought, then you’re probably already on the right track. But if it’s hard for you to think of the last time each member of your team took a break, or did something to recharge themselves, then that can be a warning sign that your team might be reaching a breaking point. As countless leadership articles, summits, and conferences will tell you; organizational health needs to be on the mind of us who are leading. If you start to see that your team is nearing a breaking point, or if your organization’s health is in decline and dropping, then you already know that this means your ability to reach the goals and vision is severely hampered. So take a moment and ask this question: What is the health of the team I am leading? I don’t mean if you’ve hit your quarterly goals or if your financial statements are showing a positive at the bottom, I’m talking specifically about the health of your team members. Maybe it helps to break the question down further: How is the physical health of your team? What level of stress and anxiety are they carrying on a regular basis? How are they doing as a person, not just how they are performing as an employee or a volunteer? These questions are important because they reveal the parts of your organizational health that can’t be quantified by numbers or data. They reveal the intangible parts of your team that shapes whether your organization is in a place of health or needs an injection of time and effort to regain a healthy status. When there needs to be an improvement of health, remember that the culture and ethos of how an organization reaches a place of health flows from the top and moves downwards. There is the rare instance where an organization can be changed and shifted as a grassroots movement from the bottom up, but this is not the norm and changes that come this way tend to get squashed before they make a lasting impact. This means that when it comes to your team members learning to become healthy and take breaks when necessary, then it’s up to you as a leader to model what this looks like and set the pace for how this will happen. The added benefit for this is that it also addresses the simple truth that an organization’s health will never surpass the health of the primary leadership. If you’re incapable of taking a break to rest and recharge, you are telling everyone else that they’re not allowed to take a break either. I don’t think I need to go into what this means for retaining good team members and helping them reach their potential, but the simple answer is they won’t stay, and they won’t reach what they are capable of. Maybe you’re reading this and you’ve realized that you aren’t able to come up with the answers about where your organizational health is at right now. If that’s the case, then there’s a few steps you can take to train yourself how to look for the warning signs in your team members. The first step is to pay more attention to the emotions of your team members. I don’t mean sending random emails asking them to rate their stress or happiness levels on a scale of 1 to 10, I mean take the time to get to know your team members enough that when circumstances change or something is happening to upset them you will be able to recognize when they are down, when they are frustrated, and also when they are happy. Often your team members already know when they need a break, but they might feel a sense of duty or obligation that prevents them from taking a necessary break. When you encounter this, remember that your role as a leader is to both model how to take breaks, and to give permission for your team members to do this. The second step is to recognize the seasons or circumstances that push people toward burnout in your organization. Every organization has some sort of normal ebb and flow to the year where there are busy seasons and slower seasons. For example; in the church realm these busy seasons tend to be the months leading up to Christmas, Easter, September launches, and whenever you have your annual meeting. When you know that these busier seasons are coming up, try suggesting to your team members that they take some vacation or banked up hours pre-emptively to recharge before the busy season hits. Don’t forget that time off after these critical times is just as important for the overall health of the organization. Lastly, I want to take a quick moment to talk about the team member who always seems to be in a state of perpetual crisis and burnout. This is the person who will constantly be in a state of anxiety around their role no matter how often they take a break, change their responsibilities, or alter their work environment. They might even be someone who appears just as—or even more—stressed after their break than they were before it. When this is the case, a starting point can be to talk about what they do during their breaks. Maybe they need to rest and recharge themselves in other ways than what they are currently doing. Chances are this won’t be a situation that gets solved in one conversation, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth trying. The potential benefits of helping a team member go from critically stressed to a positive and productive part of the organization are too high to pass on easily. (If you don’t know where to start in having a conversation like this with a team member, I recommend checking out the book Crucial Conversations by Patterson, Grenny, McMillan, and Switzer.) Learning how to lead a team well means learning how to advocate and motivate your team towards a place of organizational health. This isn’t something that will just happen on its own, and if it’s neglected for too long it takes exponentially more effort to regain a place of health. Are you up to the task of modeling, promoting, and advocating for the health of the whole team? My advice is to start on this as soon as you can. What’s your experience with this as a team leader? Do you have further insights about how to help your team take the necessary breaks and build rest into the regular routine? If you do, join in the conversation and post a comment below.  Brian's whole understanding of faith and Christianity changed when he started to encounter what it means to live life with God instead of for God. One thing that Brian is passionate about is walking with people as they explore their faith in Christ and learning how to honestly seek God in the midst of our doubts and fears. Brian is the Pastor of Grand Valley Community Church in Brandon Manitoba. He is married to Nikki and they have one daughter named Olivia. When Brian isn't working on a sermon at a Starbucks or at home with his family, you can usually find him fly fishing or building model air planes. To read more of Brian's articles, click here.
Ken Boone We live in an age of offense and disagreement. Some will probably disagree with that statement, and be offended by it. The rise of social media platforms has given us a broader platform in which to voice our opinions, and to respond to the opinions of others. These exchanges lead us down an endless road of responses that have about as much effect on changing a person's ideology as painting a house changes the neighborhood in which it was constructed. There was a time I enjoyed the rigorous debate that was brought on by a “friend’s” outlandish Facebook post that needed desperately to be corrected by my insight on the subject. To be honest I’ve since grown tired of the endless back and forth that produces nothing more than frustration, and deletions from a friend list. Lets face it, people’s minds will never be changed through a Facebook post, a tweet, or any other social media post. There are several universities that have recently come under fire for what some see as an attack on free speech. These same universities that, just a few decades ago, were demanding all voices be heard, have now been accused of silencing voices that are either too offensive or that disagree with the general population of the student body. There have been calls for the dismissal of faculty and staff, cancellations of guest speakers, and “safe spaces” created on campuses all in the name of protecting students from offensive rhetoric. This can only lead to isolationism, the extermination of free speech and the loss of open exchange of ideas. I’d like to propose a question for us; even though we may disagree with the actions of these universities, are we guilty of the same thing? Let’s be honest for a minute. We don’t know everything. We have opinions, thoughts on a subject, and inclinations. But if we are brutally honest, much of the time that’s all they are. I would never suggest that it’s impossible to become an authority on a subject. After all we are hoping that our surgeon certainly knows what he or she is doing when they pick up the scalpel. Even in Christianity there are certainly those who have given themselves to the study of theology and have become scholars. Still, this creates a vacuum in the area of personal knowledge because if I give myself to one area of study for eight years there is still an enormous amount of information in other fields of study that I will be ignorant of. You may trust your surgeon with fixing you, but chances are they wouldn’t be able to fix your automobile. We tend to isolate ourselves based on what we know. Perhaps this is one reason the Christian faith has tens of thousands of denominations. We really don’t seem to like the free exchange of ideas within the church. Even though we are Christians, there is a plethora of topics we disagree on. Do you know for instance that the book of Revelation alone has at least four different views of interpretation? I was only ever taught one. There are different views on the Trinity, hell, baptism, healing, grace, prayer, the wrath of God, and an endless list of other topics, yet we are all still Christians. We still read the same Bible, yet we separate into camps desperately trying to create a space where everyone agrees. Allow me to burst your bubble: the people sitting around you on Sunday morning that you think agree with you, don’t. They do not in fact agree with everything you believe, and you do not agree with everything they believe. It simply doesn’t work that way. The real exchange of ideas doesn’t come through social media, it comes from real relationship. It’s difficult to understand a person’s Facebook post without understanding them. Without knowing their history, the culture in which they were brought up in, and how they came to develop the ideas that form their way of thinking. Certainly not everything they believe is true, but you’ll have a difficult time changing anyone’s mind outside of real relationship. Perhaps instead of a reply full of facts, opinions, and scripture on a post we disagree with, we should first discover the why of what they believe and perhaps look for an opportunity outside of social media to explain the why of what you believe. You could even do it over a bold cup of coffee.  Ken Boone currently serves as a co-host on Bold Cup of Coffee's The Brew Podcast and founding pastor at Alabaster House as well as a public speaker, travelling equipper and writer.
Ken and his wife Christa are the proud parents of four children. They have been married for more than 15 years. And have been in the ministry for more than 17 years, They have dedicated their lives to preaching the "Gospel of the Kingdom", and to living a life in partnership with Holy Spirit. Their desire is to see believers equipped to live a lifestyle that brings the realities of Heaven to the world that we live in, to see the culture of the Kingdom of God replace the cultures around us. And to fulfill the mandate from Jesus to: "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, freely you have received freely give." Drake De Long-Farmer Is it possible that the dream team we wished we had was right in front of us? Part of our calling, as leaders, is not simply to call people to do, or worse, do it all ourselves. Instead, we need to recruit, empower, and release people. This is a huge topic, so for the sake of brevity, here are some ideas to hopefully spur on some inspiration for you. To hear a deeper conversation on this very topic, check out this podcast I did with ProChurchTools.com and my previous article on the topic. Recruit We, much too often, never find the team we wish we had because we don’t ask. This means going up and ‘giving the ask’ to the people who are passionate, willing, and able to start walking on mission with us. Maybe you feel guilty to ask people to help. Let me let you in on a little secret: people are waiting to be asked and many have the gifts and passions to fill the dream team you wish to create. Even the things we hate to do, someone is wired to love it. We simply need to ask and connect those dots. For some of us, it isn’t that we are not asking, but we need to ask better questions. People need to know they are needed, that they are gifted, and that you value their time. Start with them as a person, their dreams, their passion and dig deep. I know this is possible because I recruited 60 volunteers in 4 months by getting out there and asking people. For some of us, it is the fear of sharing. Let me ask a hard question: What would happen if you found people who could surpass you in your role? Would you be willing to take the risk to build that kind of team? A big step in all this is we cannot view ourselves to be the expert, solo person who does everything. We need to move towards the idea of being the leader who gathers the experts and empower them to excel in their passions and giftings and in many of ways become a slingshot for people to succeed. Empower Secondly, we need to empower the people we have recruited by both matching their passion with what we are calling them to and also equipping them with the tools to accomplish the role and be successful in it. It is in this stage that we find ourselves investing into people and building them up. This involves modelling for them what it looks like, equipping them with the tools to succeed, and empowering them by drawing out of them their abilities, gifts, and strengths. This of course looks different for each person and every role we are calling them into, but ultimately our role should be focused on growing the person over and above the role we are calling them to. If our main focus is filling a need instead of the person who is filling that need, we will not only fall short but miss the opportunity to do the greater work of mentoring and discipling someone and moving towards the mission together. This stage is such a crucial step, because it is the bridge point of going from simply finding people to being able to resource and release those people to do what they are passionate and gifted for. In turn, we become free to do what no one else can do. Too often when we have recruited enough people we stop short as though we feel our job as leaders is done, this couldn’t be further from the truth! People need to be empowered! This involves developing their gifts while also equipping them with the tools to accomplish the vision and mission you are inviting them into. Maybe you think you don’t have the time to invest in people or a team for that matter. The reality is if you want to see your ministry or mission grow and you don’t want to be doing this solo forever, you don’t have the time not to. If you hope that your dream team will simply happen, you may find yourself becoming very disappointed. But let’s address this concern more closely. Maybe you are in a season where you don’t have a lot of free time and adding more to your plate means taking away from things like your family. This can be a very hard place to be in. Let’s say for argument sake that this isn’t due to a time management issue, then it could be possible your next step is to find some team members who understand your situation and wish to carry the burden with you. Some people don’t need a lot of maintenance and being on mission with you could be the major investment they need. Many times, the problem we face is we are waiting for the ideal time to invite people into the mission and that time never comes. Ultimately, if we never get to this stage and work through it, we will never find ourselves in the place we truly wish to be; having a team we can rely on and release them to do what they do best. Investing in people takes time and effort, but from my experience, that time and effort is never a wasted investment. Release This leads us to releasing people to do what they are gifted to do and what you ultimately hope they can do. Of course, this last step is the biggest step of trust and requires letting go. Letting go of control, letting go of people, and letting go of jobs you love to do. In a lot of ways, this whole process is about working yourself out of a job. What I mean by that is that as you slowly give things away for others to take on and you have equipped and empowered them to do so, you will find yourself slowly not being as needed as you once were in the tasks you had before. Sometimes this means giving away the stuff we were once good at or even love so we can focus on leading a team. This can be extremely hard to do, because this means sharing the enjoyment of the vision and mission, giving away the things we once loved to do and sharing the glory. This involves a lot of self-awareness and being willing to shift into the background, being the cheerleader of the people you are building up and realizing you don’t always need to be the expert in the room, but your role is gathering a team of experts into one room and getting them to march together in a unified direction. This will only happen if we have recruited the right people, empowered them to succeed, but also release them to do what the mission and vision called them to. If all we do is give people tasks and not also responsibility and authority, we will rarely see investment from those people. Repeat Lather, wash, rinse, repeat! This is the beauty of this whole process; it is repeatable. We see a pattern and cycle in all things. This might look like you starting with another wave of leaders, building into them to build up your team further. Or possibly you have worked yourself out of a position and now you are building another area of your department or even a whole new area of the organization. Or something that is even cooler is when you find yourself watching the leaders you have recruited, empowered, and released doing the same thing with other people. This is the process of raising up leaders who raise up leaders who raise up leaders. This is the core of what we see in mentorship, discipleship, and apprenticeship, (or whatever else you wish to call it). It is building into people, multiplying yourself, and seeing others grow into the leaders they are meant to be. Recruiting, empowering and releasing is a delicate balance of allowing people autonomy with the support of empowerment and equipping. It is all about finding a balance between creative freedom and quality control. This is what it means to empower people through equipping them with the tools, confidence, and maturity to become the people we can release.This involves both trust and competence. You need the right people on your team—both chemistry and gifting—and this also involves trusting people to accomplish what is asked of them and assuming they can succeed. If you are worried that people will take the role off the rails, then the answer to this is equipping. Give clear instructions on the overall vision of the ministry (or task at hand) with the end goal in mind and intentionally build into them, but give loads of freedom in how they get there. The biggest challenge in this is just to get yourself started on the path of recruiting, empowering, and releasing. Don’t let this just stay as a theory, put it into practice. Start by making a list of people who you could take on this journey. Make the ask and begin the process of empowering until they can be released.  Drake currently serves as the Editor-In-Chief of boldcupofcoffee.com and the Executive Pastor at gateway.ac as well as an avid speaker, writer and leadership coach/consultant. Drake is passionate about seeing people thrive and come alive. To BELONG, wrestle with what they BELIEVE and BECOME people FULL OF LOVE, FUELLED BY FAITH, and ADDICTED TO HOPE. Drake is also a life learner and loves being challenged to think deeper and grow further. One of his favorite things to do is spend a good amount of time in a good café or coffee shop with a good book or engaging conversation. To be able to share in someone else's journey and experience is always a pleasure and honor. You can also connect with him at your personal page at drakedelongfarmer.com. To read more articles by Drake, simply click here.
Anonymous In the first part of my story, I talked about my quest of inner peace, despite the season of life I was in. It has been directly influenced by my closeness with God and my sense of identity in Christ. To be honest, a sense of belonging and fellowship and defining the term “church family” is something I still struggle with and pray for. I still feel nervous before and after church, that uncomfortable feeling of going into a building not sure if you or where you belong and feeling alone in a crowded room. And although there is a sense of connectedness with worshiping beside other believers, my quest for where I belong in a church family is just beginning, with new eyes and an insightful more open perception. As Psalm 130: 5-6 says: “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord”. There is a lot more for me to understand and learn but hey, if I got this far into this journey than I can only imagine how much more I will learn and grow with my persistence, eagerness and time. Proverbs 3:5 urges us to trust in the Lord with all your heart and as Beth Moore points out, “if you love the Lord with all your heart, it’s only natural to trust him with all your heart”. I had no idea how much growing my faith had to do until my tough season. It took just that to open my eyes to the difference in believing in my head and truly living it out in my heart within the trenches of raw life.
I had to put my baby under surgery and it was one of the scariest things I’ve done. The baby I almost lost multiple times during pregnancy, who was so fragile that any time he cried for more than two minutes, had a temperature or spit up more than a tablespoon would require a page to the surgeon and priority trip to the Stollery. Going through the risks and benefits and letting go and giving it - my son's outcome - to the Lord was one of the toughest things I’ve done. Through this process, I wrote down every promise God had made to stick with us through the hardest of seasons, to never abandon us and prayed over these promises with intense agony wrestling with my lack of control over life and the real raw faith (which is a lot different to feel when life takes worrisome twists). While the operating room was getting him prepped and under general anaesthetic, I sang his favourite song to him - Jesus loves me - and the peace and strength from God flowed through me as he fell asleep so sweetly in my arms. Total surrender, fearlessness and faith in the rawest of seasons was my only hope, the only thing that I knew would get us by. My mom’s encouraging words, “this too shall pass” were something I told myself sometimes every day. Feeling utterly alone, no one to help (or at least that I had the ability to see and accept), I learnt to look to the one and only hope I truly had, Jesus. I had definitely skipped too many daily bible readings to count and the fear of not deserving his love and grace after neglecting to foster a closer relationship with him, to expect his love and grace to actually extend to me despite all of this was a fearful and almost hopeless thought. But through this fear of not being good enough I learnt he is just and he is always faithful, despite my weaknesses or undeservingness. Sandra Wilson wrote “that as we increasingly experience God’s mighty power at work within us, we will understand that the issue is not our inadequacy. The real issue is His adequacy. And as we continue to draw closer to Christ, we will have an ever-deepening assurance that the answer to the question of our identity is this: I am the beloved child of my Abba God”. Just over a year ago, a tragedy put me at the ICU with extended family requesting me to pray for a dying loved one. They didn’t want a pastor, their deep heartbreak made it almost impossible for them to think of words to pray. I have been on the streets, meeting, helping, and praying for people - and I never felt the fire of God more so than at that time. But this was different, I felt completely empty still, felt unable, underqualified and asked God to give me the words as I wasn’t sure how useful I could be to him in this situation. He gave me the peace, love, words and strength to be there for that family that day but it took me a while to process it all. Shortly after that, it occurred to me that just as a caterpillar goes into its cocoon before transforming into a butterfly, God wanted me to be fulfilled in him first, be brought from my rock bottom, wrapped in his love and strengthened my identity in him first and then my paths would be set straight. To focus on my foundations inside myself first. To my surprise, this journey has propelled me back to my childhood and present, with a greater insight into my identity in Christ as influenced by my family of origin, past relational experiences, my perceptions of God as a father, the Holy Spirit as a powerful inner edifying force and as a loved daughter who is accepted just as she is and where she is and loved, who is more precious than rubies. It seemed like every week, the church sermons I would here would contain the same words I’d been speaking and praying in my heart. To me, it felt like God was winking at me, but it also filled me with emotion and confirmed that I am accepted and loved and with Jesus as my saviour, and no one can snatch me out of my fathers hands. Throughout that season, as I took my time reflecting on my own relationship with God and healing from some old deep wounds, I did have a long absence from church and church-related activities. I know that sounds really bad, an oxymoron in itself. But I felt that it was a healthy decision to take time and really reflect on growing a healthy and real perspective on my own relationship with God and why I felt so uncomfortable at church. I prayed so much about that and when I decided that I was strong enough to embrace my unsettled confusion on the topic, the first sermon was about just that. In fact, the very direct and courageously honest pastor who was very passionate about his church and his flock, spoke bluntly about a healthy church. He outlined what Jesus’ church should look like and related to people not feeling like they could offer anything but should be accepted nonetheless. He encouraged the people of the church to take a stand and also be willing to have grace with another and be vulnerable enough to reflect on their own accountability to the body of Christ; to be brave enough to keep trying to connect and get involved. His determination and vision of what the bride of Christ should be in accordance to the bible was so inspirational; I decided to start trusting God’s will and his timing for my place and sense of belonging in the church, Jesus’ church, my church. I started praying for the leaders of my church, for the congregation of my church, and for the strength, willingness, trust and patience to wait upon the Lord for that sense of belonging. Ephesians 3:17, 19-20 says, “I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvellous love… may you experience the love of Christ, though it is so great you will never fully understand it. Then you will be filled with the fullness of life”. This has been a powerful raw first hand lesson for me and although God hasn’t caused these trials for me, he has brought good out from them. As Romans 8:28 says, in all these things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. We all have a purpose and in the darkest of times when we feel alone, when we know we are alone in this world, know you are not truly alone with Jesus. With a new season of my life, now free from postpartum, medical stressors, and more profoundly with a courageously honest inventory of how my perception of God, others and myself have been influenced by past or external experiences; I am excited to reach a new season of my life. With a fresh deep foundation in my own identity and the strength and confidence I have gained through the relational impact of my experiences; I feel patient to trust the Lord and be still in Him (although I’m still learning this). I think this is something that will take time to get better at, but realizing the power in it is a pretty empowering start. Sandra Wilson urges us to “continue to draw closer to Christ, we will have an ever-deepening assurance that the answer to the question of our identity is this: I am the beloved child of my Abba God. I am good enough, my worth is precious to Him and perhaps the joy in connectedness will come as I wait on Him. I’m approaching church with a willingness to be vulnerable and put myself out there when it feels awkward to be in a room full of strangers. I write this not as someone who has it all together but as someone who is humble of my journey, of stumbling in amidst a tough season who is just starting to scratch the surface of some big deep-rooted questions. I feel the Holy Spirit whispering to my heart and getting excited for this new season of our lives. Brian mcnarry In my first few years of ministry I was constantly told that I needed to be aware that there would always be more work and things to do than what I had time for. Usually this came with a lesson about how to recognize when I was approaching burnout, or a reminder of the need to recruit and equip other people to be involved in ministry. I don’t believe this is unique to my role in pastoral ministry. Anyone who is in a work environment where they carry the primary responsibility for a non-profit, a business or an organization will be in the situation where the work required is greater than the time available at some point. When this situation hits, there’s lots of advice and recommendations that will get thrown at you; delegate more, recruit more, hire more, equip more, prioritize more, go on vacation more, streamline more, balance more, or maybe even the unhealthiest advice that says work more hours. But sometimes there will be times in life where none of these seem like valid options, but the truth is every one of those is a valid option! You can choose to do any one of those options, and chances are you’ve tried each one of them at least once. But remember that just because it is a valid option that you can choose, it doesn’t describe if they are good options or bad options to take. So the question still remains, how will you pick the good option when everything piles up? First let me say this to you: I don’t know the exact situation that you’re in as you’re reading this, I don’t know your mental state or how many things have piled up on your to-do list. But what I can tell you is that you’re not alone in feeling the pressures of everything piling up on your shoulders. Other leaders have been there before, and other leaders will be there afterwards. One of the best things you can do is find ways to connect with other leaders who have been where you are, or have been in similar situations. Having a real person you can call up and talk through a decision with and be there for each other is a complete game changer when it comes to leadership. One step you can take right now is to give yourself a break. That’s right, take 10 minutes to just step back from your desk or whatever the task is at hand and walk away for 10 minutes. Listen to some music, call that old friend or a family member you haven’t spoken to in a long time, go walk around the block or something. Maybe try a mindfulness exercise where you only focus on your breathing for a couple of minutes. Trust me, nothing is going to completely fall apart in ten minutes. Taking a couple minutes to clear your mind and then come back at the situation you were working on will help you see things with a new perspective. So after you’ve given yourself a physical break, take some time and give yourself a break on your to-do list. Just over a year ago, one of my mentors told me that I needed to intentionally create a “to fail” list. That’s right, he told me to create a list of the things that I would intentionally choose to fail over the next week. Pick the low priority things and decide now that you’re going to fail those until a future date. If you use a to-do list app or project management tool, make a list called “To Fail” and shunt a bunch of things from your main list over to that one. Set a weekly reminder for the start of your work week to go back and review that list and pick a few (and I mean less than 3) items to bring back to your main to-do list. If something is on the to fail list don’t let yourself feel guilty when they don’t get completed because that’s why that list exists in the first place. After your short physical break and the break on the to-do list, then it’s time to start planning for a larger break. Hopefully your role has some type of ebb and flow to your yearly routine, and start scheduling longer times to take breaks during the slower seasons or in advance of your busier season. Maybe this starts off as just being a day or two where you can disconnect from the office and focus on the things that help you to relax and be energized, or maybe you have the ability to use up some vacation time and spread it out throughout the year. The need to have a routine to your breaks is especially true for those of us who are in salaried positions where you are largely in control of your own schedule. Remember that taking vacation time and resting is part of your responsibility to keep yourself at a place of health and remaining sustainable for the long run. It’s your responsibility to rest and recharge during your vacation time and breaks, so try not to fill them right up with other projects and responsibilities. Here’s the bottom line to all of this: If you’re constantly running with only 10-20% of energy in your reserves, sooner or later you’re going to burn out, and it takes a lot more work to recover from a burn out or blow out, than it does to avert one before it happens. Don’t buy into the lie that you haven’t done enough to deserve a break, and simply take a break. It might be one of the best things you can do for your long term health.  Brian's whole understanding of faith and Christianity changed when he started to encounter what it means to live life with God instead of for God. One thing that Brian is passionate about is walking with people as they explore their faith in Christ and learning how to honestly seek God in the midst of our doubts and fears. Brian is the Pastor of Grand Valley Community Church in Brandon Manitoba. He is married to Nikki and they have one daughter named Olivia. When Brian isn't working on a sermon at a Starbucks or at home with his family, you can usually find him fly fishing or building model air planes. To read more of Brian's articles, click here.
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June 2017
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