I’ll never forget the first time my wife told me she wanted to give an offering at church. It’s been several years ago, but I can still remember the gut turning nausea it induced. At the time we were tithing faithfully, both actively involved in volunteer roles, and offering our help whenever possible. In other words, I thought we were doing...
“Tyler… Tyler… TYLER.” No, that line you just read wasn’t me practicing the spelling of my name. That was a direct quote from my wife as she tried to get my attention recently as I was looking down at my phone. I’m not sure if it was email, social media, or a text message from a friend — it doesn’t really matter...
As a kid, my name and the word “shy” was inseparable. Classmates, friends, family — everyone classified me that way. In all truthfulness, I guess I was. I always got nervous speaking in class, I rarely initiated new friendships, and I never went out of my way to talk to someone I didn’t know. I was never proud of being called shy, and I...
As I write this, CNN is playing on my TV in the background and political pundits are offering their projections and estimations for the 2016 election. I’m not sure who the winner will be but I don’t have to be sure about the winner in order to be sure that there will be millions of disappointed people as the winner is announced. That’s the...
Whether we like it or not, we all have to deal with difficult, negative people on occasions. You may work with one, you may be friends with one, you may even be married to one. But the question is, how do you deal with one? It’s not easy, and more often than not, my default reaction is avoidance. But, as my wife recently showed me, there’s a...
Hearing your name is one of the most comforting things in life. It starts as a child, when your mom or your dad calls your name to come inside for dinner. When your best friend shouts your name in the school halls. When your child calls you, “Mom-ma” or “Da-da” for the first time. A name means a lot, especially when...
A couple of years ago I was blessed with the opportunity to go on a mission trip to Nicaragua. It was an incredible experience and one that I will never forget. We spent our time there building a new home for a local pastor – but there was absolutely nothing easy about it. During the trip I became tired, hungry, dirty and began missing the...
Recently my wife and I were having some company over to our home and we began a frenzied effort to clean things up a bit. It wasn’t like the house was a complete mess – we just didn’t want someone else to see our lack of organization and a few things out of place. I’m sure we aren’t the only people who do this, though. It’s part of...
We are officially now in full swing of the Christmas season. I personally love Christmas. I love this time of year and pretty much everything associated with it. Christmas trees, Christmas movies, Christmas cookies, Christmas blend coffee, Christmas gifts, Christmas music… I’m a fan of it all. Not everyone is as big of a fan of Christmas...
If I were to ask you the question – “What kind of work does God want from you?” – what kind of answers would come to your mind? If you’re like me you probably start thinking about a whole slew of Christian virtues and actions. You probably think about healing people, praying for people and preaching the Gospel. Surely, that is primarily...
