“Inside Out” : Come Ready to Worship Ever find you’ve gotten to church, but your mind is someplace else? “We want to urge people: get your heart and your mind ready before worship so that you can be spiritually engaged when you get there,” says the Rev. Alex Mark. He’s the senior pastor of First …

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What do people mean when they say “Christian Nationalism”?   Christian nationalism is in the news, but what is it? Nationalism is different from feeling patriotic or making sure to vote every November. Part of what defines nationalism in general is its goal to reserve privileges for only one group in a country that has …

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Cancel Culture A Christ-centered vantage point, from the “Inside Out” podcast In a culture without agreed-upon standards, people across the faith and political spectrum sometimes hold others accountable by “cancelling” them. Christian attorney and apologist Abdu Murray believes the impulse to correct a wrong is natural and biblical. “What Cancel Culture has become is the–I think …

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God Uses Long-Lasting Friendships “Inside Out” with Martha Manikas-Foster We need long-lasting friendships. But political divisions, our self-reliance, and the failure to prioritize time with friends all work against sustained relationships.   “Intimacy, trust, and vulnerability–which at least to me are all really important factors in friendships—take time. Like years,” says photographer, marriage coach, and …

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Hope for Widows (and their friends) “I rest in who God is to get me though my day. And that, I think, is what the hope for widows is.”  — Marilyn Nutter  Twenty-eight hundred women a day are widowed in the US. For those women, everything changes.   “A widow has not only lost her husband, …

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Gen Z is Looking for Friends Gen Z has a reputation for being tech-addicted and anti-social, but it makes sense that many are looking for friends. “We were designed by God to experience Him when we’re in fellowship with other believers—believers of all ages,” says Kirsten Franze, author of The Gospel Coalition article “Gen Z …

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Parenting: Taking the Long View We want to raise our children well. Because of that, we look for instructions. That was true for parent and educational consultant Laura Spaulding.  “It seemed to be that there was always just a right way presented to you, and some of it came from the Christian culture, and some …

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The Gift of Thorns “We have to very careful to distinguish between ‘did God let me down?’ or ‘did my expectations of God let me down?’   What if not getting what we want is one of God’s great gifts? “God knows what is good for us when we don’t,” says the Rev. Dr. A. …

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Living your faith, from the “Inside Out” If you’re having trouble helping your kids negotiate their emotions, you’re not alone.    “We always fall into kind of two ends of a spectrum,” says writer and Bible teacher Courtney Reissig. “We either want to protect them too much from experiencing hard things, or we don’t want …

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Little Girls, Adult Pressures  Even the youngest girls feel the pressure to be sexy. Adult pressures on girls begin early. Dr. Danny Huerta talks about ways parents can help their daughters know that their value is deeper than their appearance. Huerta is a father, a licensed clinical social worker, and the vice president of Parenting …

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