Series: Columns

September 1, 2023

Osharye Hagood

'We're Talking About (Marriage) Practice'

‘We’re Talking About (Marriage) Practice’

By Osharye Hagood  Practice is a key principle to having a “winning” marriage. Back when we were learning to drive a car, or playing on a sports team, or perhaps learning to dance, we underwent the repetition of practice. This perspective has been extremely helpful for me in my marriage to Rudy. I wake up each day with the desire to have a great marriage, and I understand this can only happen over time, with practice, by the power of God. Please hear me when I say, the gift of love does not equate to a world-championship marriage. It takes practice.  

September 1, 2023

Megan Rawlings

There Is Hope, and His Name Is Jesus

There Is Hope, and His Name Is Jesus

By Megan Rawlings  The news makes me anxious. Stories that make it seem the world is ending far outnumber positive articles and reports. Wars, division, disaster—it’s too much to process on a daily basis. And social media only adds to my unease. To deal with this, I changed my phone setting to limit my social media intake to 30 minutes a day. Any longer than that and I find I am crippled by comparison, more bad news, and disappointment. I started to wonder why the news and media (social media included) seem mostly to bend toward evil. It turns out,

July 1, 2023

Rudy Hagood

Rudy Hagood

No Perfect Parents . . . Just Real Ones

By Rudy Hagood  We all know that parenting our kids is hard. Yet, I think we forget that when we were kids, we were just as hard on our parents!   I want to speak with you parent-to-parent. Osharye and I are not perfect parents, and our kids are not perfect, and as much as it pains me to say it in print, our grandkids—even though they are perfect to us—are not perfect either. (Ouch, that last admission hurt!) So, let us find comfort in our perfect heavenly Father, who heals and covers our many imperfections! Paul wrote, “For this reason

July 1, 2023

Kent E. Fillinger

Kent Fillinger

Faith Factors

By Kent E. Fillinger  The number of unaffiliated, nondenominational Christian churches in the United States grew by almost 5,000 congregations and nearly 9 million people from 2010 to 2020, thus making it America’s largest Protestant “denomination,” according to the U.S. Religion Census. In 2010, unaffiliated, nondenominational Christian churches had an estimated 12,241,329 adherents in 35,496 congregations, which represented 4 percent of the overall population. By 2020, the number of people worshipping in those churches grew to 21,095,641, and their share of America’s religious population increased to 13.1 percent, representing 6.4 percent of the nation’s population.  How Many Churches Do We

July 1, 2023

Laura McKillip Wood

Laura McKillip Wood

‘If Then Move’ Promotes Healing and Growth in Women

By Laura McKillip Wood  Wendy Fitzgerald has a passion for serving God and for helping others see how God works in their lives.   As a young woman involved in her church, she looked at the women around her and saw many who wanted to serve God with their talents but did not know how to start. Many of the women felt limited in their churches and did not know how to use their gifts in that setting. Some felt overwhelmed with childcare and family, while others felt isolated because they did not have husbands and families. Wendy began to pray

July 1, 2023

Jerry Harris

Jerry Harris

It’s Not About How Much Faith You Have

By Jerry Harris When I came to The Crossing in Quincy, Illinois, 25 years ago, I fashioned a mission statement of helping people find “an intimate personal relationship with Jesus Christ.” The thought that a real relationship with Jesus was even possible was a game changer for many in our church and community, and it shaped our impact on the world around us. If I understand that the “what” of my faith is defined in my relationship to Jesus, and if a relationship is what I want, then the next logical step is the “how.”  I think the “how” of

July 1, 2023

Megan Rawlings

Megan Rawlings

Death by Faith

By Megan Rawlings  It was frigid. The winter break had seemed to last forever. I had just arrived back at the Bible college campus in the rolling hills of Kentucky. My appetite for knowledge was growing. My classes that semester were mainly general education, but the Bible classes I took over those few months truly deepened my devotion to Jesus and his Word.  I entered one particular class and sat midway back, where I would appear neither as eager as the people in front of me nor as uninterested as those behind me.   The professor entered the room and asked,

July 1, 2023

Tyler McKenzie

Tyler McKenzie

Spiritual Formation 101: Three Guidelines for Meeting Our Moment

By Tyler McKenzie  Spiritual formation has become a buzz phrase. It sounds sophisticated, all the influencers use it, and it’s a way to signal my friends that I am one of those neo-monastic types who reads poetry and welcomes strangers into my home. But what does it actually mean, and why does it matter? I believe this is an important discussion in our cultural environment. A spiritual formation mindset can help us reframe the discipleship conversations we are having in our churches to meet our moment. When I’m asked to talk about spiritual formation, I boil it down to three

July 1, 2023

Christian Standard

Jeff Faull

Simple Faithfulness

By Jeff Faull   What makes a good leader? Shouldn’t we who are followers of Jesus and leaders for Jesus want to know? A simple internet search brings up thousands of articles on leadership. Titles like “Five Qualities of a Good Leader,” “The Top Ten Characteristics of a Good Leader,” “Twenty Requirements for an Effective Leader,” and a myriad of similar options appear. Many of those articles lay out the essential components of great leadership. The suggestions are endless. Characteristics like vision, strategic thinking, emotional intelligence, problem-solving, creativity, communication skills, decisiveness, empathy, charisma, and others top the lists. All these are

July 1, 2023

Christian Standard

A Calling Wrapped in Failure

By Chris Philbeck   I recently read an article by Lewis Allen called “10 Things You Should Know About Preaching,” published at Crossway.org. One point in the article stood out to me: “Preaching is a calling wrapped in failure.”   That may seem a little shocking to someone who isn’t a preacher, but let me share a couple things to think about. First, here’s the reality: We are imperfect beings trying to speak for a perfect God. On our best day, we’re going to fall short.   I have sometimes said, “There are things in the Bible I believe and experience, and there

May 1, 2023

Jerry Harris

The Need for Unity

By Jerry Harris  Unity is central to the biblical message. Something special rises up when people from different circles get to know each other by learning, sharing, playing, and worshiping together. Sociologists call it “emergence.” It’s when a group becomes more than the sum of its parts. The Holy Spirit works in that unity, that oneness.   We are called to be one. The church is the hope of the world, and we can do far more together than we can apart. God has repeatedly shown us how unity can empower us to accomplish things that seemingly are impossible for individuals.

May 1, 2023

Michael C. Mack

Humility, Unity . . . Revival

By Michael C. Mack  “Jesus loves this. He loves humility. He loves unity.”  A leader at Asbury University spoke these words amid what some have called revival.   I visited Asbury in February and witnessed what I would call a gentle moving of God’s Spirit among people both young and old—but led by the young (Gen Z). Several things were noticeably missing at the college, however. Not once did I hear anyone refer to the denomination or tribe they belonged to or the name of the preacher at their church. I heard no arguments about worship style, Bible versions, or any

May 1, 2023

Christian Standard

5 Sources for Illustrations to Enhance Your Sermons

By Chris Philbeck  In the 1990s, while serving a church in Oklahoma, I took all my elders to the Leadership Conference at Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky. During the opening session, our church was awarded a yearlong subscription to SECC’s weekly tape ministry for being the church that came the farthest with their entire board of elders. So, over the next year, I had the opportunity to listen to weekend messages delivered by Bob Russell and Dave Stone.   I still remember many of those messages, including one from Dave about the urgency of reaching lost people. To illustrate the

May 1, 2023

Tyler McKenzie

Gradations of Unity

By Tyler McKenzie  A recent Love Thy Neighborhood podcast detailed how fake news spreads in the church. They told a story from the 2016 election as a case study. On November 5, 2016, just three days before the presidential election, the Denver Guardian ran this headline: “FBI Agent Suspected in Hillary Email Leaks Found Dead in Apparent Murder-Suicide.” The article stated that FBI agent Michael Brown and his wife were found dead in their home. The web article looked legit. It included quotes from the local police chief, comments from neighbors, and links to online sources claiming it was a

May 1, 2023

Rudy Hagood

Unity: God’s Beautiful Original Intent for Marriage

By Rudy Hagood  God desires so much more for our marriages than just staying together.   God’s original intent for marriage is found way back in Genesis—before sin came into the world, and well before “honey-do” lists and such sayings as “happy wife, happy life.”  The secret sauce of Christian marital union is the power of God binding us together in an intimate union that includes Yahweh. And when two become one, the One (God) empowers the two.    Marital unity is restoration of the paradise God created in the beginning. It’s part of the reconciling work of God. It is the

May 1, 2023

Laura McKillip Wood

HASTEN International Continues a Long Tradition of Medical Ministry

By Laura McKillip Wood  Dr. Dennis Pruett was born in West Virginia, the son of a coal miner. During World War II, he served as a naval aviator and received a Purple Heart and Distinguished Flying Cross. When he returned from the war, he became a surgeon; later he and his wife began serving as medical missionaries in Rhodesia, now called Zimbabwe.   The Pruetts raised their family there and had a productive medical ministry. They were convinced they could most effectively share the gospel by partnering with Christian nationals working in the medical field, so in 1985 they began a

May 1, 2023

Christian Standard

Divide and Conquer

By Megan Rawlings   I have a problem. My husband has confronted me about it numerous times. It is beginning to affect our everyday lives. Frankly, I am on the verge of addiction. I cannot resist the temptation when it appears. My toxic trait is that I cannot stop clicking on clickbait. There, I said it. The first step to fixing a problem is admitting it, right?  Clickbait is a nuisance that potentially infects your computer with viruses. But I find it tough to resist because it’s a portal through which I gain access to one of my favorite things on

May 1, 2023

Christian Standard

The Rise of the Nons and the Nearly Gones (and What We Can Do About It)

By Billy Strother  Congregations need one another more than ever. They need a sense of unity for mission in community. As congregational leaders, pursuing a sense of unity in community will strengthen us all and increase our kingdom fruit. Jesus proclaimed, “Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and no city or house divided against itself will stand” (Matthew 12:25, New American Standard Bible).  Ministering to the Nons   Christianity is in retreat in our culture. We are familiar with the rise of the “nones” (30 percent of U.S. adults now claim no religious affiliation). But despite the challenges, strategic opportunities

March 1, 2023

Chris Philbeck

The Listener's Role in Preaching

The Listener’s Role in Preaching

By Chris Philbeck  Recently I’ve been walking through a season of life filled with disappointment. At one point my attitude got so bad I decided I needed to listen to a great sermon on how to overcome disappointment. I’ve always loved to listen to great preaching; I try to carve out time for that each week.   I found a sermon from Dr. David Jeremiah called, “Joseph: Overcoming Disappointment.” I got out a notepad and a pen, clicked the link on my computer, and the first thing I heard him say was, “God takes our setbacks and turns them into comebacks.

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