Things don’t always work out the way we want them to, or the way we think they will. Sometimes we don’t even see it coming. We get hit with some form of pain out of nowhere leaving us feeling desperate and helpless. That’s the way life is. Still, it makes us wonder how God can let these things happen to us. How God can just stand by and watch us suffer. Where is God when it really hurts? Maybe God is actually closer to us than we think. Maybe it’s when we’re in these situations, where everything seems to be falling apart, that God gets an opportunity to remind us of how much he really loves us. Topics: Pain, Loneliness, Lost, Confusion, Comfort

I love those shoes. Really? The same way that I love my wife? What's up with the word "love"? It doesn't have much meaning when we use it so loosely. Maybe we don't really get it. Maybe we don't understand what real love is. What it involves to really love somebody. What it means to give yourself to someone else. We mistake things like friendship, commitment, or lust for love, but God wired us a certain way to experience all that love was really meant to be. Not to hold us back or to make us miss out on the best that life has to offer. God created love, and wants us to feel it all in the way it's meant to be felt. Topics: Love, Passion, Beauty, Marriage, Sex

We want to know why we are here. If our lives really matter. How our religion is relevant to this life. Today. We want to understand what significance this minute, hour, week, month, and year has to our lives. To our world. We need a God who cares about this life, in this world, right now. We want to understand why everything we think, everything we say, and everything we do matters. We don't want to just sit back and wait for something to happen or someday to come. We want to know if all the choices we make now will shape our world and lives for eternity. Because we want our lives to have meaning today, and our lives today to have meaning forever. Topics: Life, Significance, Meaning, Eternity, Redemption

Why do we do the things we do? Why do we go to church or give money away? Because we're supposed to or because we think God needs it? Do we honestly put on our best clothes for an hour once a week, stand and sit at all the right times, and sing all the appropriate songs for God's sake, or because it'll make us look better to the world around us? We're tired of all the empty rituals and routines. And so is God. God hates it when we call ourselves Christians but ignore all the things he really cares about. He hates it when we go through hollow religious routines out of some feeling of duty or obligation. God doesn't want the meaningless rituals. God wants our hearts. Topics: Routine, Church, Actions, Hypocrisy, Religion

In the Hebrew scriptures there is no word for 'spiritual.' And Jesus never used the phrase 'spiritual life.' Why? Because for Jesus and his tradition, all of life is spiritual. But what does that really mean?

Where did the first caveman or cave-woman get the idea that somebody, somewhere existed who needed to be worshipped, appeased, and followed? And how did the idea evolve that if you didn't say, do, or offer the right things this being would be upset, agitated, or even angry with you? Where did religion come from?

When we speak, lead, teach, and preach sometimes very destructive can happen over time, small at first, and then it grows... Filmed live at the Poets, Prophets, and Preachers seminar in July 09' in Grand Rapids, The Poets, Prophets, and Preachers is a five part film series devoted to reclaiming the ancient, beautiful, provocative, healing, inspired art form known as the sermon. Over the five talks Rob explores the theological, conceptual, practical and personal dimensions involved in giving a talk, sermon, message, or teaching.

When we speak, lead, teach, and preach sometimes very destructive can happen over time, small at first, and then it grows... Filmed live at the Poets, Prophets, and Preachers seminar in July 09' in Grand Rapids, The Poets, Prophets, and Preachers is a five part film series devoted to reclaiming the ancient, beautiful, provocative, healing, inspired art form known as the sermon. Over the five talks Rob explores the theological, conceptual, practical and personal dimensions involved in giving a talk, sermon, message, or teaching.

When we speak, lead, teach, and preach sometimes very destructive can happen over time, small at first, and then it grows... Filmed live at the Poets, Prophets, and Preachers seminar in July 09' in Grand Rapids, The Poets, Prophets, and Preachers is a five part film series devoted to reclaiming the ancient, beautiful, provocative, healing, inspired art form known as the sermon. Over the five talks Rob explores the theological, conceptual, practical and personal dimensions involved in giving a talk, sermon, message, or teaching.

When we speak, lead, teach, and preach sometimes very destructive can happen over time, small at first, and then it grows... Filmed live at the Poets, Prophets, and Preachers seminar in July 09' in Grand Rapids, The Poets, Prophets, and Preachers is a five part film series devoted to reclaiming the ancient, beautiful, provocative, healing, inspired art form known as the sermon. Over the five talks Rob explores the theological, conceptual, practical and personal dimensions involved in giving a talk, sermon, message, or teaching.