From my home office window, I can see the final fruit of an exceptional pumpkin patch here on the Iowa prairie. It’s not commercial quality or quantity, no state fair winners, but it has been very rewarding and lots of fun. The grandchildren, ages 3 to 6, planted the carefully purchased seeds with no rhyme […]
When I heard that best-selling author and Christian counselor Larry Crabb had passed away last week, I got to some remembering. I recall seeing in the summer of 1989, a video series based on Crabb’s book Inside Out, in which he argued, if we are going to take seriously Jesus Christ, then we need to move […]
God plants inside every human being a desire to know him. It’s how we were made. Every. Single. Person. I was reminded rather poignantly of this a few weeks ago when I got to sit on the participant side of the VP3 training table while I enjoyed the leadership of one of our VP3 Coaches, […]
I recall in my mid-twenties sharing my faith story with a very wise man. After listening attentively for 20 minutes or so, he responded with a few affirmations and observations and prayers for me. His one observation that still lingers with me today is this: “Rob, seems like growing up you knew all your answers […]
When people have recently asked me this question –“Who is The Journey for?”–I have found myself responding by pointing to this Christian developmental path diagram we have been using around our offices. We’ve found it helpful (without prescribing a rigidity) to show where our VantagePoint3 Pathway fits within a broader understanding of a person’s growth toward maturity in Christ […]
20 years ago I read an excellent book that I still reread every two or three years – Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians by Eugene Peterson. At the tail end of a chapter on the friendship between David and Jonathan Peterson writes: It’s not unusual for any of us to […]
Like many of you, I’ve worked through The Journey a few times with groups of wonderful people. I’m in my fifth go round, still learning, still working through my personal journey, this time with a new group of friends. Today I read something I’ve read before (at least four times, anyway), and it spoke to […]
“The church is always more than a school… but the church cannot be less than a school.”[1] Historian Jaroslav Pelikan included these critical words on the first page of his five-volume history of Christian doctrine. Around VantagePoint3 circles, we would tweak Pelikan’s language a little bit by saying—the church is always more than a […]
Things were very different just 500 years ago. The Bible was available in Latin – ordinary people like you and me did not have access to the Scriptures. That didn’t seem right to William Tyndale. We all recognize his name – the man who defied the King of England to translate […]
An important question we all need to be asking ourselves is, “How deeply rooted am I with God?” How blessed is the man Who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, […]