Monthly Archives: April 2015

When someone fails to meet our expectations or hopes, we become disappointed. People may deliberately or unintentionally fall short of what we anticipate or desire from them, but the resulting disappointment feels the same either way. When Job lost his family, received no support from his wife, and became deathly ill, he expected his three closet friends to support him with compassion and understanding as he worked through his painful predicament. Yet just the opposite happened. What he expected and…..

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I am thankful to say this- sometime there are some positive, pleasant, encouraging human interest stories on the network and cable news broadcast – but only a few! Because in general, cynical worldviews and fear dominate our society. Even when we long to stay and speak positive in our personal lives, many of us discover how easily it is to get pulled in to gossip and negative chitchat. It seems as if we are bombarded with negativism on every side, and our focus is on “what is going wrong” not…..

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To be told to “glory in our weakness” doesn’t make sense and sounds quite ludicrous to our “natural man.” Our society teaches us to be strong, get it together, strive for excellence, and be in control of our lives. When we fail to meet these humanistic expectations, we beat ourselves up, feeling disappointed, second-rate, and defeated. Many followers of Christ feel spiritually defeated, because they are afraid they can’t meet some standard they or others have imposed on them. However,…..

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We all have experienced circumstances in our lives that have broken our hearts. The weight of a broken heart hurts and is filled with wounds. Just like an infected sore fills with pus; wounds of the heart are filled with fear, sadness, and anger. Our spiritual Enemy feeds off these negative emotions and uses them to keep us bound and broken. Whether we are carrying these negative emotions consciously or unconsciously, the result will be the same; a tendency to…..

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Being in a state of distress is difficult! Our distresses can be the result of mental suffering caused by grief, anxiety, or unhappiness, hardship or problems seemingly caused by lack; physical pain or discomfort; or great difficulty that needs immediate attention. We often worry that there will be no way out of the problem, and we feel closed in, as our distresses seem and feel like an unending cycle. But at this hard place, we must choose to turn toward…..

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