As Timothy Keller concludes Chapter 1 of Walking with God through Pain and Suffering, he notes that, in contrast to older cultures that sought edification through their sufferings by looking inside, Western people often simply are outraged by their suffering and seek ways to control or prevent it. This happens when the sense of God’s […]
Timothy Keller titles Part One of Walking with God through Pain and Suffering “Understanding the Furnace”. In this part of the book Pastor Keller looks at suffering from the outside, taking particular note of the various ways different cultures, religions, and eras in history have attempted to help people face and get through suffering. The […]
“In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of you faith- more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire- may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus […]
“Each new morn New widows howl, new orphans cry New sorrows strike heaven on the face.” -Shakespeare (Macbeth) “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” -Psalm 34: 18 In the Introduction to his latest book, Walking with God through Pain and Suffering, Timothy Keller notes that no matter how […]
Healing Your Church Hurt (Tyndale/Barna, 2013) Author and former pastor Stephen Mansfield bases this book on the loss of his ten-year pastorate “amidst conflict and uproar”, chronicling and modeling his journey from woundedness to subsequent healing with refreshing candor. Mr. Mansfield compares church hurt to a splinter in our souls working its way to the […]
“But we had hope that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since thing happened.” -Luke 24: 21 Commenting on Luke’s account of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, Stephen Mansfield (Healing Your Church Hurt) states that “we had hoped” is a […]
In Chapter 6 of Healing Your Church Hurt, Stephen Mansfield humorously notes that he has a friend who always is threatening to write a book titled “Demons I Have Known and Loved”. Stephen’s friend is greatly gifted in helping people get free from their bondages, so there is more than a grain of truth in […]
“O my God, in you I trust; let me not be put to shame; let not my enemies exult over me.” -Psalm 25: 2 Stephen Mansfield continues Chapter 6 of Healing Your Church Hurt by noting that wounded people often live afterward with a deep sense of shame. While we tend to define shame as […]
In Chapter 6 of Healing Your Church Hurts, author Stephen Mansfield states that it would be wonderful if pain simply was pain and that was the end of it. Reality is much different. When it comes to emotional pain, the greatest damage often is what continues to resonate in our soul when the feeling of […]
“It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees.” -Psalm 119: 71 Stephen Mansfield states in Chapter 6 of Healing Your Church Hurt that we should have the same attitude as the psalmist because that attitude is rooted in the truth of God. Moreover, there are three wonderful benefits that […]
“For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” -Ephesians 2: 10 In Chapter 6 of Healing Your Church Hurt, author and former pastor Stephen Mansfield states that Paul’s words ignite our passion to do the good works God has planned for […]
Stephen Mansfield begins Chapter 6 (“Truths for Getting Whole”) of Healing Your Church Hurt by drawing on Jesus’ cleansing the ten lepers, as found in Luke 17: 11-19. Stephen notes that the Greek word for “cleansed” is katharizo, meaning to “make clean”, to remove “physical stains and dirt, as in the case of utensils.” In other […]