Ministries

Many people experience bouts of hopelessness through various stages of their lives. For people of faith who embrace the concepts of faith, hope and love, hopeless seems to be a direct contradiction to the very faith that is to breed hope. Exploring the reasons why we sometimes battle with hopelessness will assist us in discovering where our ultimate hope lies.

Hatred just seems to be inconsistent with God's call for Christians to be known for being loving. However, there is a good side to hatred that Christians are called to demonstrate that is consistent with God's imperative to authentically love (Romans 12:9).

True guilt is what we experience when we do something wrong. But sometimes we feel guilty even though we didn't do anything wrong. False guilt is often tied to a belief that we must perform well in order for us to be loved by the person we're attempting to please.

Lots of people feel guilty. Guilt functions as a warning that there is something wrong with the way you're living and you need to pay attention to it. Too often people want to simply get rid of the guilty feelings. However, whenever there is sin involved, the Spirit of God will convict you of that sin and you will feel legitimately guilty.

There are times when the dark clouds of grief and loss seem to totally obscure any light of the sun. It's even difficult to believe the sun is still shining anywhere because of the gloom and darkness of grief. It's during those times that it's difficult to understand God's invitation through James to "count it all joy," especially when joy seems to be the farthest thing from our minds.

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After the Fall in the Garden of Eden, fear was one of the first human emotions mentioned in the Bible. Our disconnection from God and from one another has resulted in the fear of being alone and on our own, needing to provide for our own protection.

Despair is defined as a loss of hope. Rather than running from despair whenever we experience it, we need to step into it and seek to understand why we feel despair. What we may discover is that we have a demanding attitude towards life that makes us more vulnerable to despair.

Many Christians have been taught that despair for a believer is wrong. The fact is that many mature believers throughout church history have documented that battling with despair is more often normal for those walking closely with the Lord. The question is whether or not you will allow God to use your despair to bring about His good purposes in your heart and life.

Like any other emotion, anger can be good or bad; it just depends on the motives going on underneath the surface that determines whether it's good or bad. Anger that is serving selfish purposes as opposed to godly purposes is destructive to loving relationships and is wrong.

For many Christians the words "good" and "angry" don't belong in the same sentence. But that isn't the God of the Bible's approach to anger. He commands his children to be angry about some things and then to revoke anger about other things. How can you know when it's good to be angry and when it isn't? That is when we're called to follow His lead in handling our anger appropriately.

Because our emotions are often a source of so much trouble for us, we can see them as a nuisance that just gets in the way of efficient and effective living. But what we fail to realize is how our emotions are a unique part of how we as human beings bear the image of the invisible God in our fleshly existence.

The blurring of sexual boundaries and mores in modern life has led to a heightened level of sexual attention towards women today that leaves many women feeling uncomfortable. Learning how to handle this unsolicited attention is vital for a woman who wants to honor God with her sexuality.

Because of our natural self-serving bent, sexuality is often perverted into some grotesque distortion of what God intended it to be. But that distortion is not confined merely to relationships outside of marriage. Sexuality within marriage can also fall far short of God's original design for meaningful intimacy and mutual pleasure.

All too often, people who have been abused often feel like their voices go unheard in the church. But that should not be true of the family of God. A healthy church can teach its members what it means to be equipped as a listening community by encouraging conversations that matter about the difficult struggles of abuse and the hope for meaningful healing from the damage of abuse.

Many who struggle with the wounds from past abusive relationships are often plagued by current anxiety as to whether or not they will ever be normal again. Much of that answer depends on what one defines as "normal." Helping an abuse victim see that if normal means no longer experiencing the pain of a broken world, then that "normal" isn't possible. But if it means becoming a more whole person in spite of the brokenness in this life, then there is hope for a "new normal."

Abuse of power is common among leaders. No where it that abuse of power more destructive than when it's a trusted spiritual leader who is wielding power to abuse and control others. That's why it's imperative that pastors and spiritual leaders have safe guards in place to prevent them from abusing the power that God has entrusted to them.

Unfortunately, spiritual abuse happens more often than we might think in Christian organizations. Addressing the issue is both difficult and delicate. While many choose to avoid it by leaving the church, others lash out against leadership in destructive ways. There is a better way to address spiritual abuse when it occurs that we can learn.

Spiritual leaders have an incredible power to influence others under their care for good. But there are some who exploit their positions of power to control others for their own purposes. This is one of the most heinous forms of betrayal because it is done in the name of God.

Because of past sexual abuse, many victims question whether they will ever be able to freely enjoy their sexuality without shame or feeling dirty. Admittedly, while sexual intimacy will often be a struggle within marriage, abuse can't destroy their potential for delighting in true intimacy that releases a couple to more fully enjoy their sexuality together.