The psalmist describes a time when he called to God “My foot is slipping!”—a sick fear and anxiety constricting his throat and churning his insides. And what steadies him? God’s unfailing love.
If I try to be intentionally humble I can go pretty well—to a point. But the second I think “I can feel myself changing, I think I’m getting more humble”, I’ve blown it.
A disparaging view of young adults is not biblical.
God’s covenant with his chosen people is referred to as a covenant of salt only three times: Leviticus 2:13, Numbers 18:19, and 2 Chronicles 13:5.
“A problem shared is a problem halved”—but sometimes a problem shared is a problem now two people have.
“Wouldn’t it just be easier to be gay?” “Of course it would be easier. But once you know the truth…”
Our society tends to act as if there are only two types of friendships, besties and Facebook acquaintances. There is nothing in between. You can’t be besties with all your acquaintances, so you deliberately keep them in the shallow end of the friend pool.
Sometimes it feels like it would be easier to be non-Christians with the freedom to just ignore annoying people. As Christians, however, this ‘freedom’ to cut people off is replaced with a call to treat people with love, honour and respect. But it’s hard work!
Proverbs 25:28 says: “A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls”. Without self-control we are without defences and are easily overwhelmed by the stresses of the moment, because there is nothing to stop the army of negative thoughts.
As Christians, we believe a child is a child from conception: inside or outside of the womb doesn’t matter. So we need to let grief be grief, and treat miscarriage accordingly. Most of us are also not professional counsellors, but as pastoral carers, here’s some ideas we can think about.