Marriage

How Vacations Can Save your Marriage (AND your Kids!)

Marriages don’t fall apart over-night. The initial cracks that eventually crumble a marriage often start long before. And it’s easy for these cracks to start when the kids are young. Here’s why: When you’re dating, the relationship is all about getting to know each other. The relationship is all about dreaming together and treating each…
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Address the Mess – God’s Plan for Sexual Brokenness

Over the last year, we’ve heard a lot about the “Me Too” movement. I’ve honestly LOVED the national conversation on it — mainly because we been avoiding the topic of sexual brokenness for too long. Indeed, we live in a culture that has essentially said: “There’s no such thing as sexually broken. Indeed, that’s ‘who…
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Thoughts on Marriage on My 20th Anniversary!

I married Carolyn 20 years ago today. It almost doesn’t seem real. When I think about how blessed we are compared to most people, I almost feel a little sad. Our culture is robbed by the toxic idea that marriage can fill our God-shaped voids. To many, marriage has been reduced to a ‘right’…a tool…
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2 truths & a lie about finding your spouse

When you pastor a church that has a huge number of twenty-somethings, almost every month you get asked the question: “How do I know if he/she is ‘the One?’” Well, before I dive into the specific details, I want to make sure that the foundations of your marital worldview are solid. To be specific, it’s critical…
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Surviving the Fall Rat Race: How to Keep Your Family Sane in Back to School Season!

By popular demand, I wanted to repost a prior blog on how to survive the Fall Rat-Race! As I sat outside my kid’s school last week, it was amazing to see all of the parents scurry here and there.  Everyone looked exhausted… like I was watching the finish line of a super-marathon.  Kids fumbled in…
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Dog statues and Jerry Springer: What I’ve learned about Godly conflict

I used to live on a street where people loved to call the police for everything. If someone forgot to grab a bag of leaves from their front lawn, it suddenly became a public safety hazard. I like to think of myself as being a great neighbor. Yet, I’ve had my share of municipal violations—usually…
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Fix Me: Dealing with Sexual Brokenness

All of us have sexual brokenness. The question remains: How do we deal with it? Thankfully, we serve a God of redemption. Our church is filled with people from every imaginable background who’ve been restored to a lifestyle of joy. Indeed, repentance is actually a joyful process – the gateway to “refreshment” (Acts 3:19). Unfortunately,…
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Dating Without Dying (Pt.1 of 3) – Solid Tips for Christians who are Starting to Date

Every time my wife and I go to a wedding, we always chuckle a bit watching all the single people frolic to and fro.  Actually, chuckle isn’t the word.  We laugh and shout, “Suckas!” and think smugly: “Man, it’s great to be done with that season of our lives.” Don’t get me wrong:  Young love…
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Crazy Research on How to Fall Back in Love (Or stop hating someone)

The Bible says that the “The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit” (Prov. 18:21).  Interestingly, certain studies have proved this to be true when it comes to love and romance. In the October 2011 issue of the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, it explained…
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