Les Pensées Archives
Category Archive for "Mission"
1Jan 15, 2024
With 2024 only days old, here are my predictions for the Evangelical church in America this year. My predictions are not presented as prophetic (we have enough of those), but as my read on the future based on present trends. There is no “God told me” in the thoughts below so you can put away […]
2Jan 1, 2024
CAST ADRIFT IN STORMY SEAS My wife, two young daughters (seven and four years of age), and I had just moved to the city of Tours, deep in the heart of the celebrated châteaux region of France. As first-term missionaries, we had left family, friends, and ministry in America to make a new life in […]
3Dec 1, 2023
As we turn the final pages of 2023, I again offer my list of favorite reads for the year. As always, this is not a list of my favorite books published in 2023, but books read in 2023. If a book is on my “Best Of” list, I recommend you give it a read in 2024. Of interest, the publishing […]
4Aug 15, 2023
It was a Sunday I’ll never forget. As a staff pastor, I had just finished leading worship in our morning service. As I did every Sunday, I exited the platform through a door to the right, descending the steps into our office suite. Closing the door behind me, I turned to my right, entering a […]
5Jan 2, 2023
A new year. With the dawning of a new year, we are prone to make New Year’s resolutions designed to improve us or our lives in the year ahead, or maybe even for the rest of our lives. Among the more common are: reading our Bible and praying daily, exercising, and losing weight. But, unfortunately, […]
6Sep 15, 2022
Over two hundred fifty feet in the air, standing at the intersection of four 12-inch steel beams, I froze. The sky above me and open space below me, I was completely unable to move. BEAM WALKER What was I doing standing on a 12-inch beam, more than two hundred fifty feet in the air? It […]
7Nov 15, 2021
When I left pastoral ministry to become a missionary, a few pastoral colleagues told me I’d “left the ministry.” Their thinking was that pastoring is “real” ministry, while missions is less than ministry. It’s difficult to believe people can think like this, but some do. But even my denomination unknowingly reinforces this idea. For decades […]
8Aug 1, 2021
There are those who regard mentoring as only personal or ministry development. Others see it as a hand-holding exercise. During His earthly ministry, Jesus was not of either camp. He saw mentorship as much more. Personal and ministry related? Of course. Developmental? Absolutely. But more importantly, He saw mentoring as global in its reach, eternal […]
9Jul 15, 2021
NOTE: This article is a part of Journey’s Summer Sabbatical Series, a follower-favorite article from the past that we’re posting again. In this article, we present the results of a Journey survey of pastors in which we asked them about the fundamental or DNA-level challenges and changes that COVID has caused in the church. The […]
10Jan 1, 2021
INTRODUCTION During December, Journey asked pastors, their spouses, and ministers who work with pastors to reflect and project: reflect on the health and strength of the church and pastors in 2020; project the health and strength of each in 2021. We asked respondents to consider the American Evangelical church as a whole rather than their […]
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