Mid-Days with Doug

At the end of it, when your faith becomes sight, you'll never hear a word about your success from Jesus. You'll never hear about your level of influence or how hard you worked. In the kingdom, what success boils down to is surrender and faithfulness. Well done, good and faithful servant.

I'm going to go ahead and guess no one has said this to you today, but I'm going to say it because it's the truth: You are beautiful to God. Even in your weakness and your shortcomings, God loves you.

Today, let's keep the bigger reality in mind. Let's choose our words wisely.

Jesus's last words as he was hanging on that cross were not "make it worth it." Nope. They were "It is finished." Our guilt is finished. Our unworthiness is finished. Our sins are finished. It really is finished and that is THE good news for you today!

I've got a dentist appointment next week and whenever I’m scheduled to go to the dentist, I spend extra time brushing my teeth. I try to do a good job so I will make a good impression. So I do extra scrubbing, extra flossing, and extra work to make myself look good to the dentist. The only problem is that when I arrive, the dentist is not satisfied with my good works.

This wonderful story told by Max Lucado brings me a lot of hope today. I pray it also does for you.

Hurt never feels good. I would never recommend it, but without, we never truly come to appreciate the joy of healing.

Maybe you're just doing your best today and don't feel like your best is enough with all that you're dealing with. If that's where you're at, let me introduce you to A.M. Overton.

Hope it was a wonderful Mother's Day weekend for you but I know it's filled with a lot of mixed emotions for a lot of people, including our family. Though it was an tough day without mine or my wife's moms, something really interesting happened that turned a sad day kind of sweet.

I think all of us are looking for connection. Some of us will try to find that on social media. Maybe these days, that’s the most common way we try to connect with others. But, there are a few things that can get in the way of real connection. One happens on social media a lot. If I put a veneer or gloss over myself to hide what I really don’t like about myself, or what I think YOU won’t like – if...

Myabe you're facing something that feels scary. Maybe in that thing you feel like you're walking into it alone. Here's a truth that will never change: You will never go where God is not. Plain and simple. It's a 2,000 year old promise.

Some reflections to encourage you on the loss of my mother, and how I used it (by God's grace) to share a blessing with my children (her grandchildren). You can do the same.

Now that my kids are bit older, I look back on my years of parenting fondly for the most part, but there's of course a couple of regrets. This one sticks out above the rest. -Doug

Our bad things will turn out for good. Our good things can never really be lost. And the best things are yet to come. -Jonathan Edwards This week, as I buried my mother, I thought a lot about the question, "How do people deal with death if they think this life is all there is?" Just about the ONLY thing that has kept me from breaking down (other than just God's sheer mercy even when I couldn't see...

I hope you are OK today. If you're not - that's understandable...and OK. Our entire community is shaken to the core, and rightfully so. It is in these times of shock, sadness, confusion, and frustration, that I CLING to words like these.

My mom's funeral is tomorrow and in the month that she's been gone, there's something I've found that I've just clung to when I thought the grief was going to swallow me up.

Is there something you're praying for right now that feels unrealistic? Too big? Well, in the presence of the King, that's something you don't need to worry about.

Have you ever been listening to someone talk and you feel like they're speaking specifically to you? That happened to me recently at church in one of my pastor's sermons and I think the challenge he issued is something you could benefit from, too. -Doug

People ask me how I'm doing since the death of my mother. I'm planning the funeral for this Saturday. The answer is: I'm thankful for everything I have and all the people in my life. But, I am also barely keeping my head above water and terribly, terribly sad. Both are true. And right now, that's okay. Thanks for your prayers. -Doug