Zondervan Inspire

A Place to Belong

From the Editor: Today’s photo reminds me of when I was back in college and attending a small group for college and career singles. That was an important part of my life then, just as being part of a community of believers is an important part of my life today.

Wishing you blessings today,

Keith 

We desire to be included in fellowship with God and with others. We long to belong. This desire is about community. We long to be a part of something larger than ourselves. It helps us feel that we are not alone and gives us a sense of well-being.

God includes us in fellowship with himself and with his Son Jesus through the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said, "Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother" (Matthew 12:50). He also said, "Where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them" (Matthew 18:20). Jesus tells us to include and welcome each other: "Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me" (Mark 9:37). The apostle Paul tells us that we all have different talents and gifts but that we are part of the same body and that we belong to each other (Romans 12:5–6).

From The Seven Desires of Every Heart

by Mark & Debra Laaser

Avoid Drawing Blood

From the Editor: Good advice for us all.

Wishing you blessings today,

Keith

Author Catherine Johnson wrote a book fifteen years ago titled Lucky in Love. She's a PhD who was determined to figure out what deliriously happy married couples were so deliriously happy about. So she interviewed them — about a hundred couples in all. She found that at some point along the way, every happy couple had come to a critical point in their relationship where they would vociferously disagree but refuse to destroy each other in the process. "When we quarrel (and we will!), we're not going to do the kinds of things that will damage this relationship long-term," Johnson quoted these couples as saying. "When we disagree, we will not draw blood."

The moment I read that phrase, I decided to put it into practice in my work as well as in my marriage. Because I have deep feelings about so many kingdom issues, I have been known to express myself very passionately in meetings. And as you probably know, passion can beget passion. Effective leaders do not fear passion. They welcome it. But from time to time passionate discussions digress into personal attacks, and real people get really hurt. In my view, leaders must head that off before it happens.

From Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs

by Bill Hybels

Any comments or testimonies today?

Acting on Renewed Priorities

What Jesus teaches takes just two sentences to say but a lifetime to put into practice: Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. That's it! Jesus teaches that we must replace our old set of values with a new set — and we must then begin to act on this new set of values. First we renew our priorities, and then we act on those renewed priorities. When Jesus taught that love for God and love for our neighbor are to come first, he showed us which values are to have first priority in our lives. Then he described how to live out the priority of loving God in the words "with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength" and the priority of loving others in the words "as yourself."

From The Relationship Principles of Jesus

by Tom Holladay

Any comments or testimonies today?

I Want to Be Heard

God wants us to talk to him, and we want him to listen. The Psalmist says, "I cried out to God for help; I cried out to God to hear me" (Psalm 77:1–2). In addition, God wants us to hear him: "Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live" (Isaiah 55:3). In order to connect with God and with each other, we must talk to God and to each other — and we want to know that both God and other people hear us, because being heard is a clue that we are fully known.

From The Seven Desires of Every Heart

by Mark & Debra Laaser

Any comments or testimonies today?

Path to the Greatest Life Possible

God created you for relationships. He made you to relate to him and to others. Miss out on relationships, and you're missing the core reason for which God put you on this planet.

Jesus knows full well that the swirling wonder and pain of our relationships tempt us to move them down our priority list. "Who needs this?" we say, and so reduce our lives to simple hobbies, tasks, and entertainments. That's not the answer! When I try to make less important that which is truly most important, it only causes more confusion. A life without relationships may well be a simpler life, but it is also an empty life. The path to the greatest life possible and the greatest joy possible is found in the priority that Jesus taught us to keep at the top of the list: Place the highest value on relationships.

From The Relationship Principles of Jesus

by Tom Holladay

Any comments or testimonies today?

Listen with Your Heart

Sometimes, the people we care about the most are often the ones who seem to have the hardest time hearing us. (Conversely, sometimes we have a difficult time listening to those we love the most.) To complicate the issue further, really hearing someone always involves more than just understanding facts or issues. Listening involves hearing the heart of someone — hearing someone's feelings. In our counseling practice, we've found that very few people have the skill to identify, much less share, their emotions. Learning to listen to others' feelings and thoughts and to share our own will increase our intimacy with one another.

From The Seven Desires of Every Heart

by Mark & Debra Laaser

Any comments or testimonies today?

Upset the Apple Cart

If community involves things such as knowing and being known, serving and being served, loving and being loved, and celebrating and being celebrated, then most relationships, psychiatrist M. Scott Peck asserted, are constantly devolving into pseudo community. It's the great temptation for small groups of people to slide into a state where they're not quite telling each other the truth and they’re not quite celebrating each other. Instead, they tolerate each other, they accommodate each other, and they settle for sitting on the unspoken matters that separate them.

In order to move from pseudo community to genuine community, you have to endure a little chaos. To break free from falsehood, someone has to upset the applecart and say out loud, "As far as I can tell, we're not experiencing real community here. We're not where I want for us to be, anyway. Frankly, I’m holding back. I’m not giving you the final 2 percent of what I'm thinking. And I'm not really hearing what you have to say, either."

From Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs

by Bill Hybels

Any comments or testimonies today?

How Are You Doing ... Really?

In American culture, when you ask people how they’re doing, they’re nearly always "fine." So if you want to convey that you are actually interested in hearing the truth about what’s going on in that person's inner world, and if you want to give the other person permission to answer you honestly, then you have to pose the question just a bit differently: "How are you doing ... really?"

In Galatians 6:2, the apostle Paul says that we fulfill the law of Christ when we agree to "carry one another's burdens." The people you lead have to know they're part of a burden-carrying team. They have to know there's an avenue for them to convey whatever personal or professional calamity they face. They have to know they can trust their colleagues to hear them out. Simply put, your followers have to know it's legal to admit that while they may be sitting across the conference-room table wearing a smile and a trendy outfit, nothing is fine or fitting quite right on the inside.

From Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs

by Bill Hybels

Any comments or testimonies today?

Love Makes You Do Crazy Things

Love makes you to crazy things. Who do you love? Do you love people who don't know Christ? But honestly, many so-called Christians don't. You don't have to look far to find churches full of people who are insulating themselves from the world, hunkering down, avoiding PG-13 movies and secular music. These inward-looking religious types keep their distance from anyone who drinks beer, cusses after a bad golf swing, smokes anything, has a tattoo, or wears designer jeans with holes in them. They avoid homosexuals. They criticize rock stars. They stare disapprovingly at purple hair and Mohawks. And they're afraid of MTV. Too many believers are avoiding "that kind" of person. And they've forgotten that Jesus came for that kind of person.

From It: How Churches and Leaders Can Get It and Keep It

by Craig Groeschel

Any comments or testimonies today?

Try This Powerful Healing Agent

A caring community is a powerful healing and growth agent. An African proverb says, "It takes a whole village to raise a child." Your struggles cannot be worked out in isolation. A group of caring people is needed to model and foster healthy relationships.

Life's toughest struggles are eased in a caring community of loving people. While relationships admittedly cause us problems, they also bring us our greatest joy. Make an effort to involve yourself in a group of positive people. Join a club or attend a class in your church or neighborhood. A caring community will help you come to a place where you will recognize that other people may complicate your existence, but life without them is unbearably desolate.

From Trading Places: The Best Move You'll Ever Make in Your Marriage 

by Drs. Les & Leslie Parrott

Any comments or testimonies today?