Weekly Devotionals and Blogs
Finding a New Personality? Or Uncovering the One That Got Buried?
I’m a Christian and am also newly in a recovery program. But I’m confused about some of the terminology of the spiritual life that seems to me to be more similar to the faith I found before recovery than I had thought, but still different. My question is: In the...
A Message from the Past
How do you deal with sad things like missed opportunities or things you regret in your past? I have some incidents from twenty years ago that periodically come up in my dreams. I wake up filled with sadness, but since we can’t undo what happened in the past, how do...
What Does It Take to Begin?
Dear Keith, I don’t know what the matter with me is. I have a good job and a caring family, but inside my head when I’m alone I seem to have some sort of secretive and self-defeating mental/emotional disease. I find myself drinking and eating too much, and...
What Was it About Hank—That Changed Our Lives?
Saturday at Riverbend Church here in Austin, TX, a large number of people gathered to say a formal “Goodbye,” and “We love you, Hank!” to our dear remarkable, unpretentious friend, Francis Leo “Hank” McNamara. It was a strange mix: some 50 or 60 family members; many...
Finding a Vocation after Surrendering to God
Keith, After I decided to surrender my life to God, how should I go about finding my vocation? Good question. At first I didn’t know what to do. I was a land man for a major oil company. It was a good job but hardly considered to be a training ground for...
How to Get Out of Pain
Keith, what does Jesus say about the fact that good Christians often have serious pain? I don’t know where the notion came from that committed Christians shouldn’t have pain. But for me pain has been the most important way that I find my way back to God—again and...
Faith: Transaction or Relationship?
Keith, as I have watched you from a distance for the past twenty-five years, you have not been a Christian who just made up his mind to be a Christian and just relax and be one. You seem to keep wrestling with the faith as if it is a continuous process after you are...
Real Time Experiences—Lessons in Loving God and Others
This is a response to the second question of a two-part question that came up after John Burke (Lead Pastor at Gateway Church) interviewed me last month. I responded to the first of the two-part question on last week’s blog. Last week’s question was about why I...
Jesus’ Teaching Laboratory
Keith, a few weeks ago I watched as John Burke interviewed you at Gateway Church. I am an emerging leader at Gateway and have a few questions for you. First, specifically, why do you think the kind of small group you described is so important? (You can watch...
