At the Frontier

It's not polite to talk politics.

I'm sure you've heard the sentiment. Especially in any kind of mixed crowd where people might disagree on the issue at hand.

We live, worship and work in diverse communities, but with politics becoming so tribal in nature, many of us simply avoid the subject. And that does a disservice to us all.

Yet we can get comfortable with being uncomfortable and do it in a grace-filled way, according to Beth Silvers, co-author of "I Think You're Wrong (But I'm Listening): A Guide to Grace-Filled Political Conversations."

She and Sarah Stewart Holland also co-host the Pantsuit Politics podcast. As working moms from opposite ends of the political spectrum, they regularly sit down to talk politics together.

Beth, a conservative life and business coach, spent 11 years as an attorney and then an HR executive before opening her own business. Named one of Cincinnati's "40 under 40" business leaders and as one of Ohio's Most Powerful and Influential Women, Beth regularly speaks to organizations about hard conversations.

She asks us to hear each other's thoughts, to test our own beliefs against each other's philosophies and to better appreciate our own core beliefs by having to articulate and challenge those beliefs.

As Beth says, politics is all about how we live in community with each other. And if we engage in conversation with a goal not to persuade but to be open to personal growth, we're all better off.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

Did you know we have some 50,000 storage facilities in the U.S.? That's more than the number of Starbucks and McDonald's locations combined.

One estimate cites the number of items inside the average American home at 300,000. But what purpose does all of this "stuff" serve?

Joshua Becker believes that a large amount of our stuff serves absolutely no purpose—and in fact, detracts from our well being instead of adding to it.

A former pastor and the founder and editor of Becoming Minimalist—with two books on the subject and an online course—he empowers readers to adopt a form of minimalism that works for them—in effect, optimizing our values.

Because minimalism, he says, isn't about living in a white room with zero belongings, but about intentionally promoting what we most value by removing anything that distracts from it. And in return, we can find more time, more money and less stress.

Joshua is on the show to talk about this purposed-focused journey, which he says comes down to a simple question: What do I want my life to be about?

It's not: What do I need to get rid of? But what can I add to my life? And he shares plenty of practical advice along the way.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

"Conquering addiction is a miracle in itself."

Those are the words of Lt. Timothy Pemberton, who leads The Salvation Army's Adult Rehabilitation Center in Santa Monica, California.

The Salvation Army has more no-fee rehabilitation facilities than any other program in America. For more than 100 years, these Adult Rehabilitation Centers have offered spiritual, emotional and practical assistance to those who have lost the ability to cope with their problems and provide for themselves.

The free addictions recovery program provides housing, food, counseling, community and employment as The Salvation Army works to treat the symptoms and ultimately the root causes of prolonged substance abuse and dependence for some 150,000 people a year.

And while it's no easy feat to conquer an addiction, on this show Lt. Timothy shares his number one indicator of success—and he would know. He went through the program himself 13 years ago and now works every day to bring others out of their addiction too—to say to others on graduation day, you're at a new starting line.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

Men lead. Women follow. The Bible tells us so.

Or does it?

Is there a divine order when it comes to men and women?

What if so-called "biblical womanhood" isn't biblical at all but arose from a series of clearly definable historical moments?

What if there is a better way forward for the contemporary church?

Dr. Beth Allison Barr lays out clear evidence that there is in her book, "The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth."

Barr is a professor of history and former associate dean of the Graduate School at Baylor University.

She's been teaching world history for more than two decades while also a pastor's wife. And as she'll tell you, there's more to the story when it comes to those verses on women's submission and silence.

In this episode, she shares some of the evidence, calls to flip the Christian narrative around patriarchy and offers a vision for a truly biblical view of womanhood.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

We spent a season discovering The Salvation Army's Pathway of Hope—a national initiative to provide individualized services to families with children, addressing their immediate material needs and providing long-term engagement to stop the cycle of poverty.

But let's take a step back. What is hope?

Kierkegaard called it a passion for the possible. Psychologist C.R. Snyder said it's a reservoir of determination. Emily Dickinson said it's the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tunes without the words.

It's hope.

And it's an essential ingredient, part of the namesake of The Salvation Army's Pathway of Hope.

Dr. Suzanne Phillips is a licensed Psychologist, Psychoanalyst, and Fellow and Co-chair of Community Outreach for the American Group Psychotherapy Association (AGPA). She has been a psychologist for more than 35 years and is a newly retired Adjunct Full Professor of Clinical Psychology at LIU Post, a private university in New York.

And as someone in the business of hope, she's on the show to help us better understand hope and what it does psychologically and physiologically—plus how we can recognize it and find more of it in our lives.

It's not magic, she says, but a mindset, a propeller for action and possibility. And, it's contagious.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

As Dr. Gary Chapman says, "No single area of marriage affects the rest of marriage as much as meeting the emotional need for love."

After years as a family counselor, he developed a system to effectively communicate love to the people closest to us. His book—"The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts"—has been translated into 50 languages and has sold more than 11 million copies worldwide.

In it, Chapman acknowledges that while falling in love is easy, staying in love takes work. And he provides a simple map to better expressing love exactly as the recipient needs.

On this episode, he explores the five love languages and offers tips for better living in each one with our spouses, children and even at work.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

This is a good word from the Good Word with Commissioner Doug Riley.

Commissioner Riley is the Territorial Commander of The Salvation Army in the western U.S. You may remember him from previous episodes of this podcast on gratitude and the Christmas story.

Here, he preached at the 2022 commissioning and ordination meeting of The Salvation Army in the western U.S., when the Army commissions those in training as Salvation Army officers or pastors.

And he had one question: What is your purpose?

While we often start with ourselves and struggle through our identity, importance and impact, Riley said we fail to see the answers are found in understanding God's reason for putting us here on earth.

God's purpose, he said, is simple: To know him and to glorify him. Our purpose is found not in what we do, but who we know.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

"The sound of gentle silence."

That's how 1 Kings 19 describes the voice of God.

Which might explain why hearing him speak can be really hard.

But Pete Greig's latest book is meant to help us do just that. It's called "How to Hear God: A Simple Guide for Normal People."

You may remember Pete from Episode 71 of this podcast, when we talked with him about a simple guide for how to pray.

Pete is a writer and pastor who co-founded and leads the 24-7 Prayer movement around the world.

Now, he offers insight and tools to help turn your ordinary, everyday prayers into a real, conversational relationship with the God who is speaking, more than you know.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

Take a quick inventory:

• Do you often feel tired when you wake up in the morning?
• Have difficulty concentrating?
• Are your emotions easily affected by the actions of others?
• Have headaches, muscle aches, or generalized fatigue with no known medical diagnosis?
• Do you depend on quick energy fixes like caffeine or sugar to help you get through the day?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, chances are you're in need of genuine rest.

How can you keep your energy, happiness, creativity and relationships thriving in the midst of never-ending family demands, career pressures and simply the stress of everyday life?

Here's the doctor's orders: Rest is not optional.

Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith is an author, speaker, and board-certified physician with an active medical practice in Alabama.

And she's found seven types of rest lacking in the lives of those she treats: physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, sensory, social and creative. Plus, she knows firsthand the toll a deficiency of rest can take.

She's on the show to share how you can find and embrace true rest today to live the good life we're all after.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.

What are your plans for the New Year?

Will it depend on how things are going in the moment?

It doesn't need to. You really can trust God's plan for your life—in all things, no matter what your life looks like right now.

That's what Megan Fate Marshman explores in her book, a power-packed, biblical look at Jeremiah 29:11-14—a familiar passage that begins: For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, …

So how is God inviting us to practically trust him through Jeremiah 29?

How can we take active steps to trust God regularly?

And how does trusting God's plans for our lives change the way we live?

Megan is on the show to share just that.

WHAT'S YOUR CAUSE? Take our quiz.

RECEIVE A GOOD WORD. Get the daily affirmation email.

STUDY SCRIPTURE. Get inside the collection.

GATHER WITH CARING MOMS. Join the group.

BE INSPIRED. Follow us on Instagram.

FIGHT FOR GOOD. Give to The Salvation Army.