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I’ve been thinking lately about how to raise Christian children. Recently, an influential sociologist of religion named Christian Smith released a new body of research examining how religious parents pass on their religion to their children. He didn’t just study Christians, but also interviewed and surveyed Catholics, East Asian Buddhists, South Asian Muslims, and Hindus. And across his wide-ranging research, he identified a few key factors that strongly contribute to the success of raising children with faith.  Isn’t that something that we all deeply desire as parents? Don’t we all want our children to grow up with genuine faith? Don’t we want them to own their beliefs? To truly know Jesus, to love God, to have a real relationship with God? And don’t we want them to go to church, not because they are forced to, but because they truly belong to the Christian community?  This is my deepest desire for my kids, and from the bottom of my heart it is also a great fear as well, tha...

I have been a pastor for 14 months. From time to time, I’ve felt like I was in way over my head. A couple of times a week, I have moments where I feel I don’t know what I’m doing and who am I to even be involved in something so consequential for so many people. I fear failure. I don’t want to fail. I don’t want to make mistakes that end up hurting others, and I don’t want to let people down. But the thing is, I’m just a student pastor, by a long shot the youngest and least experienced pastor on a big team. And I joined in the middle of a lot of changes that have been a long time coming. A lot of these changes are being engineered by other members of the church that have been around for way longer than me. So I don’t want to be overly dramatic about how important I am to what’s going on; I’m just a small cog in a big machine. But, see that’s the thing! That last paragraph is true, but also a powerful way to absolve myself of responsibility if things end up going belly-up. “How is this m...

When it feel like livin's harder than dyin' For me givin' up's way harder than tryin' One of my favorite sermon illustrations was told by pastor Simon a few years ago back in our GracePoint days. It was about a slightly obnoxious work friend who was also an obsessive sports fanatic. The day after his team won some important match, he would come into work wearing the team colors and loudly boast, “We won! We’re the champions!” Everyone’s got a friend like this. It would be a perfectly fair response to ask, “We? What do you mean, we? What did you do to help your team win?” You don’t have to be a sports fanatic to talk this way. “Just when our defense got good this year, our offense starts sucking.” Excuse me, in what way is it your defense? Did you draft key players? Draw up strategy and plays? Train and coach the players? Did you fill any wax cups with gatorade on the sidelines during a game?” Why is it that fans of a certain sports team are allowed to count their te...