Once I posted a picture of a meal I made on social media. Somebody who saw it asked me, “Don’t you have more important things to do with your time?” More important than delighting my eyes with colorful fresh produce from the Earth? More important than decompressing from the stresses...

Eric Mason (@pastoremase), a prominent Christian preacher and author, recently made a reel on Instagram in which he asserts that the Seventh-day Adventist Church is a cult. The first and primary reason he offers to support this claim is that Adventists generally hold that Christ is Michael the Archangel. From...

When I was a kid, there were only two things I knew with absolute certainty: pain and love. Suffering defined my existence. Horrors haunted our little home—the horrors of rage and drug abuse and, worst of all, the horror of violence regularly inflicted upon my mother. But, then, in the...

I had a couple of big fears as a kid: 1) boa constrictors and 2) quicksand. As I’ve gotten older, though, I’ve happily realized that neither quicksand nor boa constrictors are the everyday struggles of adulthood that I thought they’d be (bills are much worse). When I was nine, I...

Ishmael was a Pioneer Bible Worker for Riverside Farm Institute in Zambia. Justin (Ishmael’s brother-in-law) and Steven (a seasonal worker from Tanzania) were studying Truth Link together with Ishmael. Using the Bible, they referenced the series of questions each lesson asked. God was at work. Ishmael couldn’t believe what was...

“Where sin abounded, grace abounded much more” (Romans 5:20). Every human being is, by nature, obsessed with self. This includes you and me. Self-centeredness is deeply rooted in us, partly by inheritance and partly by cultivation. This condition traces back to the Fall of humankind. When Adam and Eve sinned,...

“This is so dry,” Ellen thought to herself as she looked at her Bible, feeling shame for thinking such a thought about the Bible and the simultaneous urge to let her eyes glaze over the words. Though raised in a loving Christian home, Ellen struggled to have a deep relationship...

“You can do this. You have a good reason to be here,” I assured myself as I walked over to our new neighbor’s house. My family was new in town and my brother Nick, who has the social anxiety of Spongebob, had already made friends with the kids next door....

In May, we celebrated our 10-year anniversary of running the ARISE discipleship program in Australia. The impact has been nothing short of astounding. Much of that impact is measurable. As of this year, 375 students from 19 different countries have graduated from the on-site ARISE Australia program. While we teach...

“Do you really think you can do this work?” His brother-in-law began peppering him—the venom in his words was nearly visible as he spoke. “Do you think you are some kind of pastor? Are you really able to do anything?” After finishing his sharp remarks, Ishmael’s intoxicated brother-in-law waited to...

There’s a joke that says if you speak two languages, you’re bilingual. If you speak three, you’re trilingual. If you speak one, you’re American. During a recent trip to Germany, I saw how American I am. It’s humbling to rely on an app to communicate, to look for signs with...

We used to have a neighbor, Richard, whom we adopted as our “grandfather.” We’d have him over for dinner, bake him cookies, take him to dialysis, and help him maneuver around his house when he was bed-ridden. He joined us for Thanksgiving a couple years, and he occasionally attended our...