Category: Wesleyan Accent Blog
Karen Bates ~ The Call to Proclaim
February 20, 2019
One of my favorite evangelists is known by her place of
conversion. She is the woman at the well — the Samaritan woman — who
encountered Jesus while she was filling her water pot. She had a conversation that transformed her and moved her to share her experience with others.
Jeff Rudy ~ Third Day Dimension
February 18, 2019
“What do you mean, that’s not my father? Those are the hands that cared for me. Those are the arms that took me up and hugged me. Those are the lips that spoke to me; the eyes that searched for me; the chest on which I fell asleep, knowing I was safe in his care. Everything I have ever known of my father was through this body. Don’t tell me that’s not him.”
A Mighty God for Miserable Times by Kelcy Steele
February 16, 2019
God always delivers a message in your misery and a word for your wilderness.
Michael Smith ~ Of Pirates and Preserving Grace: Jonah’s Reluctance
February 15, 2019
He tells the sailors to toss him overboard, because he believes that his God is acting like all the other gods, punishing him and them in the process. After Jonah says, “hurl me into the sea,” something strange happens. The sailors start rowing to dry land. Though it’s easy to skip ahead and assume that they picked him up and tossed him right in – they didn’t. These outsider sailors are acting in a gracious way.
Aaron Perry ~ Self-Consciousness vs Self-Awareness
February 6, 2019
Good leadership requires self-awareness: a leader knowing herself by acknowledging her gifts and limits to set herself up for success.
Aaron Duvall ~ Wrestling with God
February 4, 2019
I affirmed something that I had said, from the pulpit no less, hundreds if not thousands of times. Something I had quoted in hospital rooms, promised to dying people, swore to college students during pastoral care times, and clung to during some of my darkest and scariest moments. Yet, as I was staring at my wife, who three days before had been diagnosed with what we were told was Stage 3 breast cancer, I no longer had his praise in my lungs, or on my lips.
Edgar Bazan ~ Relaunch
January 30, 2019
God wanted them to know that even though they were suffering, they were not forsaken. God wanted the people of Israel to understand that the hardship they were experiencing would not be the end of them. God wanted to give them a fresh start, a new beginning in their life, a relaunch, so to speak. By telling them, “forget the former things,” God was saying, “it is time to move on.”
Aaron Perry ~ A Grief in Birth
January 23, 2019
I am now learning to grieve. And my Dad isn’t here to teach me. C.S. Lewis noted after the death of his wife that he didn’t know grief felt so much like fear. The fear I have is that I won’t grieve – or that I won’t grieve well. I have had my tears, but what is grief supposed to look like? How will I know I’ve grieved?
Tara Beth Leach ~ Radiate: Transformed into a Holy People
January 19, 2019
“It’s less about being a radiant and holy person and more about being a radiant and holy people. And we become what we behold.”
Elizabeth Glass Turner ~ The Pain of Misalignment: God and the Disordered Body
January 17, 2019
“We are not only impoverished in love; our loves are disordered, out of alignment. We can attempt to cushion them as much as we want; only realigning misplaced joints will relieve the pain, though.”