What does it mean to have a reactive heart? Some of us are simply more emotional than others... is that such a bad thing? When we look at how Christ reacted to the world around him, it was anything BUT reactionary. Christ lived for his purpose and mission which led him to react in an almost muted fashion. It makes you wonder how much more we think of ourselves when we don't feel the responsibility to safeguard our emotions when Christ himself was slow to react to the injustices and insults thrown his way.

The story of Jacob wrestling with an angel in Genesis 32 is one of those often-overlooked passages soaked in exegesis gold. It has so many topics we could dive into. Many scholars and pastors spend hundreds of hours on this one story trying to understand the total context and meaning. If they can't figure it out, why would we even bother? Sometimes we wrestle with the scripture much the same way Jacob wrestled with another being in Genesis 32. Like Jacob, if we embrace our weaknesses in understand the total scope of God's truth, we allow room for God to show us His blessings and wonders through the Bible.

We all love a refuge story, but the conditions that bring us to the requirement for a refuge are less romantic to discuss. We can be brought to our knees by things that are shameful, things which lace us with guilt, or situations that feel totally out of control. In those moments, it's important to ask ourselves "what are we doing here?" What are we doing praying to God and what type of God do we expect him to be in those moments? That may speak volumes about the nature of our relationship.

When you step back from our typical Christian education, it is wild to think that anything overshadows the glory of what Christ did on the cross. We see images of God's glory in the miracles of the Old Testament and rightfully point out "this is clearly a display of God's glory". However, when we talk about Christ's grace every week, year-in and year-out, we start treating it as if it's somehow less wonderous than anything else God has done. Christ is the radiant and glory of God. He is the embodiment of God's Will, sent to earth for our sins. When we stop to revel in what God has done with Christ, how can we dare to minimize it?

When Jonathan Edwards kicked off the "Great Awakening" in 18th century America, he was facing a public who had grown bored with their faith or casual in their experience of God. He sought to wake them up from their sleep by raising their awareness of their sinful state. Today, we have a public bored with Christianity, but their boredom comes at the hands of forgetting the awesome power of God's grace. They see the lights and ceremonies created by man and forget that the wonders they seek do not come from fog machines, stage lights, ornate masses and services, or from one-off spiritual conferences... it comes from the grace and love of Christ.

Our sense of identity is the hidden idol that often eludes our attempts to root out distractions from God's purpose. Identity theory says that we base our identity on our beliefs, morals, and goals. Many Christians attempt to follow Christ by changing only one or two of these traits without focusing on the entire thing. When we do this, we miss out on the true blessing of Christ's regeneration.

Money is one of the few subjects that is sure to make people feel uncomfortable in church. It is probably the most ever-present worldly thing that we interact with and are therefore the most hesitant to give up. The trap many of us fall in is one where we fool ourselves, suggesting that our wealth comes from our own work and that we have claim to it. We forget that our talents and opportunities were never assured. We are not entitled to our jobs or possessions, and if God's plan found it necessary to take everything away from us we would have no legitimate counter-argument. In many ways, our attitudes on money indicate how seriously we take our devotion to Christ. It's not so much that "if you give more, you are more devoted" as much as "if you're afraid you might have to give to a new or calling, that fear may indicate what worldly things are holding your spiritual growth back."

Some churches brand themselves as houses of condemnation. This leads to individuals with 'church hurt' who walk away from the assembly. Others go the opposite direction by branding themselves as houses of justification, telling people that their flaws and sins are perfectly acceptable because "God understands". This leads to believers who compromise their faith to accommodate the world. Still other churches brand themselves as centers of motivational speaking. This leads to believers who are motivated every single Sunday but have poorly rooted faiths which wither when faced with the harsh realities of this world. Then there are a few churches which seem to stand for truth, understanding that God's truth is ultimately what leads to contentment and joy in our lives. How can we be more like these 'houses of truth'?

Sometimes I think we don't talk enough about the Glory of God and how it moves us to fundamentally see the world differently. The reality is that we live in a remarkably privileged world. Illiteracy was at 79% in the year 1900. Today it is around 13% globally. The average life expectancy from the Neolithic period until 1900 was between 30-40 years of age. Today it is over twice that. One hundred years ago, most of the world population lived in what is classified "extreme poverty". Today that number is down to 8%. We are blessed and refusing to acknowledge it is foolishness. The problem is that our blessings have caused some to become entitled, as if they divined these blessings on their own power. When we realize that nothing is "owed" to us and that we are entitled to nothing, the events of our life start to take on a very different hue.

Something happened in Christianity around 100 years ago. Churches got big, started offering programs and services, then followers started getting lazy. We began tricking ourselves into thinking Christianity was more about what we could consume rather than what role God played in our lives. The situation of the current church is complex since we have some churches steeped in decades-young tradition, others obsessed with public image, and yet others pursuing whatever new programs and fads are making the rounds of religious circles. We can talk all day about the problems with churches, but what impact does this have on believers? More importantly, how does this create Christians foreign to the concepts of Christ's followers we find in the Gospels?