The first man was created complete and placed in God’s perfectly designed world. God created man to experience fulfillment in a quality relationship with Him, aware of his value and purpose, active and creative with power, with an eternal spirit. We were made to be both physically alive and spiritually alive. God created humanity with all that was needed to be completely content. With disobedience came a fracture in our God-image. Now there was a problem. We still have God’s image, but its expre...
Jun 08, 2022•44 min
God has been and forever will be, humanity, on the other hand, is confined by time. Our only experience involves time. We have a birth date; we have a death date; we are defined and restricted by time. It is almost too much for our little brains to grasp the concept of eternity.
Jun 01, 2022•24 min
Are you exhausted and worn out? Has your life turned out differently than you expected? Have you run out of answers? Do you feel isolated? Has life lost its meaning? Are you confused? The chances are if you think this way, you are spiritually empty.
May 25, 2022•20 min
Our eventual death is an issue faced by all human beings. For many, the subconscious anxiety caused by a fear of death is behind a lot of their daily anguish. This burden affects us all; we are all going to die.
May 18, 2022•21 min
With the first breath from God, a man received a portion of God’s creativity and power. Humanity is not content being passive. Our God-given nature is to be creative as we interact with the rest of God’s creation
May 11, 2022•32 min
Our life is filled with daily choices – too numerous to count. We choose a path, and the path leads to a result. The result is the consequence of the decision we have made. It is our choice – select the road leading to life or the road leading to death. The decision is your responsibility.
May 04, 2022•22 min
What is the meaning of life? Why am I here? What is the purpose of my existence? We all struggle with the burden of meaninglessness. The struggle with meaning is a cry about our perceived value. The battle to find meaning is the battle to find worth.
Apr 27, 2022•34 min
Hour after hour, day after day, we work our fingers to the bone to feed our hunger. A hunger that never seems to be satisfied. We end up exhausted and unfulfilled. We struggle to find meaning in who we are and what we do. We strive to find meaning, and in the process, lose contact with our value.
Apr 20, 2022•25 min
God’s completed creation was “very good.” Isolation is a heavy weight, and God did not create humans with the intent of carrying that weight. The experience of separation from God and our fellow man was not part of God's creation plan for humans.
Apr 13, 2022•30 min
Do you feel like you are living in a shadow and lack substance? Do you think no one cares about you? So, what is this burden of isolation? How do we recognize it? How do we accept it, and how do we live, so we are not consumed by it?
Apr 06, 2022•24 min
Life is hard, confusing, troubling, and at times, feels impossible. We all struggle with the burden and pain of isolation, meaninglessness, responsibility, mortality, and spiritual emptiness. Our goal during these times of difficulty is not complacency or comfort; our goal is contentment.
Mar 30, 2022•19 min
We have this overbearing weight in our chest, that communicates that something fundamental is not right. This weight has the power to hobble us and prevent personal growth. This weight is experienced as intense boredom, the awful pain of loss or failure, the tension of irresolvable conflict, the anguish of inadequacy, the oppressive darkness of aloneness, the despair of hopelessness, the restlessness of meaninglessness, and the angst of perpetual uncertainty. The source of this angst is the exis...
Mar 23, 2022•15 min
We are all enticed by the same temptation, especially at times of discomfort. The temptation is to turn our backs on God and pursue self-attainable comfort. Unfortunately, contentment pursued is never satisfied; it results in intensified efforts to achieve satisfaction at any cost.
Mar 16, 2022•12 min
We live in an age of abundance. We have a wealth of food, distractions, entertainment, possessions, and an overabundance of information. We have all we could need, but we still want more. With all we have, you would think we would also have an abundance of contentment. Instead, we have a wealth of discontentment. It does not matter if you have a lot or have just enough to survive; we all struggle with the same significant issues.
Mar 09, 2022•5 min
I almost drowned in a sea of bitterness, but for the grace of God!
Mar 02, 2022•4 min
We live in a world awash with bitterness and misery. How do we survive? How do we keep it together? How do we protect ourselves against bitterness?
Feb 23, 2022•35 min
Are you living in misery? Are you exhausted and worn out? Has your life turned out differently than expected? Have you run out of answers? Do you feel isolated? Has life lost its meaning? Are you confused? If you think this way, you are spiritually empty.
Feb 16, 2022•20 min
The power behind all of the roots of bitterness is greed and emptiness. Greed is the passionate pursuit of more, just for the sake of having more. It is an insatiable longing that cannot be satisfied. It is a loud, demanding hunger. A hunger that does not go away.
Feb 09, 2022•10 min
In this category of bitterness, there is no subtleness. These roots of bitterness are seen by all to be expressions of active bitterness.
Feb 02, 2022•9 min
The Not-So-Subtle Roots of Bitterness are more evident than the subtle roots, but they are still subtle in their presentation. With this category of roots, you can start to taste the bitterness.
Jan 26, 2022•5 min
The Subtle Roots of Bitterness are the most difficult to associate with bitterness. These roots are often not associated with a specific agent of offense or injustice, but they are still early roots of potential bitterness, so we need to be aware of them.
Jan 19, 2022•15 min
If we would like to have any hope in stopping bitterness, we need to recognize it in its more subtle forms. By the time bitterness has fully developed, it has become a giant, well-established tree, impossible to bring down. At this point, you are no longer living your life with freedom and enthusiasm; you are living your life, negotiating your path, and conducting your relationships as a victim.
Jan 12, 2022•7 min
Bitterness will steal your health, energy, and emotional stability. It will destroy your relationships, and rob your joy, peace, and contentment. It will kill your potential, purpose, plans, relationships, aspirations, and dreams. If this interaction between bitterness and injustice were a loaded gun, the injustice would be the gunpowder, and the bitterness would be the armor-piercing bullet. The gunpowder makes all the noise, demands all the attention, it fills the room with confusion, and smok...
Jan 05, 2022•7 min
Bitterness is the internalization and personalization of a real or perceived injustice with a persistent and intense rumination about the injustice or the agent of the injustice, resulting in more damage caused by the bitterness than could ever be caused by the injustice.
Dec 29, 2021•5 min
In conclusion, take hold of stress, or it will take hold of you. Categorize your stressors. Is your stress caused by the fear or threat of imminent danger, or perhaps a threat to your sense of self, is it stress from ongoing uncertainty or confusion or are you in the position of caring for someone unable or unwilling to care for themselves, or lastly is the stress because of an offense you have committed towards someone else?
Dec 22, 2021•4 min
As people, we will do almost anything to hide our transgressions, yet, it is the hiding of them that makes them so damaging. We have all done wrong. We have all deeply wounded the people who love us. We all carry the scars of hurting others. To live your life carrying these injuries is stressful.
Dec 15, 2021•8 min
It is hard enough to be responsible for yourself in this ever-changing, confusing world, let alone to have to be responsible for another who is unable or unwilling to be responsible for themselves. This type of stress is part of several different life situations.
Dec 08, 2021•12 min
Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to live a completely worry-free life, with no uncertainty or confusion? Unfortunately, life is not that easy to navigate. Life is filled with times of confusion and uncertainty. So, let’s take a look at this category of the stress of uncertainty.
Dec 01, 2021•12 min
To function in life as a human being, with some sense of meaning, purpose, and direction, we all operate from a platform of self-definition. This platform is a form of ego-intactness; it is how we see and define ourselves and how we think others see us. If our self-definition becomes unfamiliar or not authentic, there will be stress.
Nov 24, 2021•17 min
We are human beings devoid of reason and directed by emotion. So now, when you take a concept of threat and danger and a mix of emotion and fear, you have the ingredients for a toxic soup. Our emotional memory is more robust than our rational memory, and we are governed by a deep-rooted fear much of the time.
Nov 17, 2021•14 min
