Category: Interior Life

Letting Go Of The False Self So We Can Grow

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Discovering our false self is very important for spiritual growth. God wants to reveal our falseness and destroy our false or ideal self. Our false or ideal self is the “self” we created since childhood in order to avoid being rejected and instead be accepted by others. It includes all the inauthentic strategies we develop to cope with our world. Some people create a false self that always smiles and cooperates and agrees with everyone. Others create a false self that prefers to oppose and fight others; their false self is the “tough” self. Some create a false self that escapes rejection altogether by hiding behind hobbies or studies or career. There are endless varieties of false self and we all have our own individual version. One very common version of the false self for Christians is the religious false self. This false self pretends that everything is okay inside Continue Reading →

listening, contemplation

What is Contemplation and Why Should I Do It?

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Contemplation is simply gazing on something in order to absorb it, not to analyze it or figure it out. Other words that describe contemplation are attentiveness and watching. An example of contemplation that many of us do is watching a sunset. Usually, when we watch a sunset we just gaze and enjoy. We don’t need to analyze the physics of a sunset or really think about anything; we are just observing and absorbing. Contemplative prayer is simply contemplation directed at God. It is not meditation, which is ruminating over something and trying to gain understanding. Meditation is good but it is different from contemplation. In contemplation we simply become attentive to God or whatever we sense God might be doing inside us. In the Pentecostal/Charismatic tradition people sometimes use the phrase “being in God’s presence” to describe their contemplation. In contemplative prayer, we invite Him to do whatever He wills, Continue Reading →

Walking through desolation.

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Most Christians will face seasons in our lives when we cannot sense God anymore. We’ll feel like He left us, or maybe doesn’t even exist. This usually happens after we have overcome most of our major external sins and then made considerable progress in loving God and others. But in spite of our progress, we still can’t connect with God. We think back to times when we felt God’s presence or could clearly see His activity in our lives. We remember the pleasure we had with God, especially during worship, or reading scripture, or prayer. But suddenly our spiritual life seems dry or even dark. We don’t feel the enthusiasm for God we had before. This stage of the Christian life has been experienced and written about by many of the great Christian teachers since the earliest centuries. Some have called it “desolation”; in the 16th century John of the Continue Reading →

Responding To Conviction Of Sin

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Conviction of sin can lead to destructive attitudes as well as constructive sorrow. Seeing our sin may lead us to self-condemnation or rejection, or to imagining that God condemns or rejects us. We may begin to hate ourselves or think we are hopeless. These are all strategies of Satan. He knows that if we reject ourselves (for any reason, not just sin) that it will create a wall between us and God. Self-rejection may be Satan’s number one strategy in every person’s life. It cuts us off from the grace and power we need for healing. Instead we should treat ourselves the way God does: with grace and forgiveness. We do not have permission from God to contradict what God thinks about us. We are His saints and His children. His Son died in our place so that nothing could ever separate us from His love and acceptance. If He Continue Reading →

The Church is Like an Exploration Expedition

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We are a team continuously learning, becoming more disciplined, supporting each other. We embrace the training that hardship brings because the satisfaction of the expedition is so much greater. We get injured and we heal each other’s wounds. We fight off the elements and wild animals. Our mission is to bring blessing, truth, freedom and friendship wherever we go. We are ambassadors after the example of Jesus . Thus we are a family, a school, a hospital, an embassy, and an army. God Is Our ProtectorFebruary 9, 2026Discerning The Voices In Our HeadFebruary 6, 2026God Guides The Humble – Weekly Words Of EncouragementFebruary 2, 2026