A Bright Corner

What do you do if you see a huge need, but you don’t see any efforts to adequately meet that need? Perhaps there’s a growing homeless problem in your city. Perhaps there’s a food desert in your neighborhood. Perhaps there’s a recent natural disaster that has impacted a lot of people in your community. There are many, many, many more examples of commonly under-met large scale needs. You see it. You know something needs to be done. So … do something. I will only suggest a first step, but it’s a good one. Get people together. Bring them into a room. Share your heart with them. Ask them to help. Let’s walk through this by using a food desert as an example. You’re going to need to recruit people. Who? Those who are impacted and those who can help. You need a good grasp of the problem, so talk to people who understand it from multiple angles. Talk to those who live in the neighborhood. Ask them how they’re currently managing and what they would find helpful. You also need p...

Open Hands is a Kindle Countdown Deal! For a limited time, the Kindle edition is $0.99 (normally, $6.49). The paperback and audio editions are still regularly priced. Please consider gifting this book to a pastor, Sunday School teacher, small group study leader, etc. This book was written with pastors/teachers in mind. As such, it can be used for a series of sermons, lessons, etc. A free, downloadable group study guide is available here ->  Open Hands Group Study Guide .

7 cookies + 1 twelve-year-old me + 1 eight-year-old brother = 1 big dilemma. Dad said we could split the cookies. You can bet good money that neither of us were going to accept a 4/3 split. It took us fifteen minutes, a scalpel and a postal scale to equitably halve that extra cookie. Whenever we went somewhere with only one parent, the family rule was that the oldest kid in the car had dibs on the front seat. Being the fourth of five kids, I rarely ever got the front seat. When my older siblings moved out (finally!) and I became the eldest, I held onto that front seat with an iron grip. My little brother never sat up front with me in the car. I had paid my dues, and that seat was my birthright. My older siblings often complained Mom and Dad had grown soft. Apparently, we got away with stuff that they didn’t … and they reminded us of that often. By the time I got into high school, I hadn’t really created too much drama. Unlike my younger brother, my parents never had to pick me...

I don’t want to get nitpicky here, but I’m somewhat disappointed with the NIV rendering of our text. Look at the last verse in two other popular translations: … that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. ~ 2 Timothy 3:17 ESV … that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. ~ 2 Timothy 3:17 NKJV The Greek term is an adjective. Rendering it as “thoroughly” (an adverb) to describe how we are equipped makes “thoroughly equipped” sound like a single thing. There’s a strong case to be made that being complete and being equipped are two different things (as indicated by the comma following “complete”). Yes, the Bible was given to us that we might be “completely equipped” … but it also shows us that we are complete, and it’s important not to lose sight of that. Terms adjacent to the Biblical concept of being complete include mature, full, perfect, skilled, proficient, qualified, capab...

The audiobook edition of Open Hands is now available! Amazon ->  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C2SFNJL4 Audible ->  https://www.audible.com/pd/Open-Hands-Audiobook/B0C78XTKFP?asin=B0C78XTKFP You can listen to a sample using the embedded player below: