Jesus is not the man at the top of the stairs; He is the man at the bottom, the friend of sinners, the savior of those in need of one. Which is all of us, all of the time.

Contrary to popular assumptions, the Bible is not a record of the blessed good, but rather the blessed bad. Thats not a typo. The Bible is a record of the blessed bad. The Bible is not a witness to the best people making it up to God; its a witness to God making it down to the worst people.

Between writing, traveling, speaking, preaching, and doing my best to be a good husband to my wife and my three kids, that's about as much as one man or at least this man can do.

I was always in places where I was widely accepted, approved and loved and I was finally in a place where people did not approve of me, did not accept me and did not love me. It was killing me.

The Gospel is not ultimately a defense from pain, it is the message of God's rescue through pain. In fact, it allows us to drop our defenses, to escape not from pain but from the prison of "How" and "Why" to the freedom of "Who?"

I never had an intellectual struggle with the Bible, with the gospel, with the claims of Christ.

Whatever we may mean by 'Christian growth,' it is ultimately this: less faith in me, more faith in God.