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May 16, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

A friend sent me a copy of Jon Ronson’s book, The Psychopath Test: A Journey through the Madness Industry. He just wanted my opinion of the book, I think. (But it did remind me of another friend who gave me a six-pack of Tic-Tacs for my birthday.)

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May 15, 2013 - CCEF - Blog Post

Don’t go to this year’s CCEF National Conference alone!

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May 14, 2013 - Mike Emlet - Blog Post

“Knowledge is power.” How many times have we heard that phrase? As Christians we really don’t believe it. Or do we? In this final installment of a series using Zack Eswine’s book Sensing Jesus as a launching pad, I am looking at the temptation toward omniscience, to be a “know-it-all” in life and ministry. Ever since the serpent tempted Adam and Eve to be like God by eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we humans have had a skewed view of knowledge.

Where does this come out in our lives?

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May 09, 2013 - Paul David Tripp | Tim Lane - Blog Post

“The goal of my relationship with this person is that I might become more like Christ in this relationship, and that they might be more like Christ as a result of this relationship . . . . That changes everything.”  - Tim Lane

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May 07, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

Dreams are among the great oddities of human experience. They are bizarre juxtapositions of events of the day, personal anxieties, divine intrusions, side effects of medication, and random neuronal firings triggered by a late evening meal. We can rightly interpret them as either profound or meaningless, though it is hard to distinguish between the two.

Like most people, I dream whether I know it or not. A few I remember for a moment when I wake up in the middle of the night, others stay with me longer.

Recently I had two dreams on the same night.

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May 07, 2013 - Mike Emlet - Blog Post

What is your response in life and ministry when things just don’t seem to change? When you labor and sweat and pray, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” and that prayer seemingly goes unanswered? When after meeting months with a struggling couple they decide to divorce? When your friend’s depressed son commits suicide? When a relationship ends without reconciliation? Are you surprised? Undone? Angry? Fearful? How are you tempted to react?

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May 01, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

Resistance seems like an odd thing: someone asks for counsel but then doesn’t listen to it. It sounds like a straightforward case of hard-heartedness. But there may be other reasons why counselees don’t listen.

Here are two.

1. Counselors offer ill-suited counsel

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April 30, 2013 - Mike Emlet - Blog Post

In this series of posts I am reflecting on Zack Eswine’s recent book, Sensing Jesus: Life and Ministry as a Human Being. His thesis is that life and ministry is about apprenticing with Jesus to recover our humanity and to help others to do the same. He notes that too much of life and ministry is spent grasping after those things that only God himself possesses.

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April 25, 2013 - CCEF - Blog Post

What does it take for lasting change to take root in your life?  Is it a formula?  A set of rules? Or rather a relationship with Jesus Himself? Tim Lane, author of How People Change, will be speaking April 26-27, 2013 at Cross Point Community Church in Modesto, CA. Whether you are a pastor, lay counselor or simply desire to grow in Jesus, this conference is for you! Register here.

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April 22, 2013 - Mike Emlet - Blog Post

Sometimes a book grabs you by the scruff of your neck and shakes you around a bit. Or strikes a chord of kindred experience that stirs a poignant ache, a longing for something different. Zack Eswine’s fine book on being a pastor, Sensing Jesus: Life and Ministry as a Human Being (Crossway, 2012) is doing just that—and more—to me. This is an important book for anyone in ministry and I plan to riff off of some of his thoughts in a series of posts over the coming weeks. 

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April 22, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

The recent bombings at the Boston Marathon have been an echo of 9/11 for us. 

Here is the humanity—the reflections of God—that we have witnessed.

Anger

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April 22, 2013 - CCEF - Blog Post

Today Trevin Wax at The Gospel Coalition wrote about CCEF counselor Mike Emlet’s book, Crosstalk: Where Life and Scripture Meet.

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April 17, 2013 - Lauren Whitman - Blog Post

The statistics are staggering: 1 in 6 couples face infertility. 1 in 4 couples over the age of 35 face infertility. Maybe you are struggling to conceive. Maybe you know someone else who is struggling. In either case, this JBC article can help you. 

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April 15, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

I will never forget the first time suicide came close to me. I met with a young woman who was leaving her mission work in Eastern Europe. She was haunted by an experience but could not even talk about it—my guess was that she was burdened by an inappropriate relationship with a young man who lived there. 

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April 08, 2013 - Ed Welch - Blog Post

Counselors have opportunities to see patterns that emerge among people. Here, I think, is a pattern among men—not all men, but more than you might think. 

“When my wife talks about our relationship—or anything else—and goes on for very long, I want to listen, but I go on overload pretty quick and soon don’t understand a word she is saying.”

Many men have their limits.

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