Unhurried Living | Helping Christians Rest Deeper & Lead Better

I’m sharing a recent conversation with Lore Ferguson Wilbert about her book A Curious Faith . In it, she talks about questions God asks us, questions we ask God, and question we wish others would ask us. We are sometimes uncomfortable with questions unless we quickly figure out an answer to them. But growing deeper in trusting God often involves “living the questions” rather than merely answering...

I’ve enjoyed the treat of having many mentor-like people in my life who were ahead of me on the journey. They knew more than me and readily shared their knowledge and wisdom. They believed in me and my potential, and were willing to help draw me into the next season.   Maya Angelou once said, “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will neve...

Here in the states, it’s Thanksgiving week. And it’s easy to become stressed or overwhelmed during the holidays. Every year we tell ourselves that we won’t get caught up in the scurry of the season, but difficult relationships and over-extended schedules press in. Then we find ourselves enduring the season rather than enjoying it. Wrapped up inside all this is another lovely dynamic: decision fati...

Today, I’m happy to introduce my latest book A Year of Slowing Down: Daily Devotions for Unhurried Living , and it releases in two weeks on December 6.  This book captures a lot of what we’ve been talking about here at Unhurried Living. It is the third book in the unhurried trilogy, following An Unhurried Life and An Unhurried Leader. With the overwhelming pace of life, many of us struggle to stop...

Today I’m talking with Dr. Alison Cook and we’ll be discussing how to discover the BEST OF YOU (also the title of her latest book). Dr. Alison delivers life-changing strategies for helping women develop their voices, forge healthy relationships, and embrace the holy, sacred work of becoming their true selves in God.  I’m sharing with you a portion of the conversation I had with Alison for our Repl...

Today, I’m sharing a recent conversation with Tom Nelson about his book The Flourishing Pastor . Many of you who listen regularly to this podcast are serving in church leadership. Many of you aren’t. This isn’t an episode only for pastors. We’re talking about how we can flourish in our roles and relationships of influence. In fact, flourishing is one of the ways we best serve others. We have an ab...

Have you ever experienced a moment when scripture came to life? More than just words on a page or a passage that you memorized, I’m talking about a time when reality-wisdom bowled you over. Well, today I’m sharing a time when scripture leapt off the page and overwhelmed me with the felt reality of its truth.⁠ ⁠This week on I Can Do That! Podcast, I share how a reading in church changed how I view...

Today, I’m sharing a recent conversation with James K. A. Smith about his latest book, How to Inhabit Time . The moment I saw this title, I knew there would be some wonderful intersections with our core idea here of learning to live and lead in the unhurried way of Jesus. I wasn’t wrong about that. There is a depth of thinking and a beauty of language in this book. It really was a pleasure to read...

Today, I’m sharing a recent conversation with Matt Tebbe and Ben Sternke about their book Having the Mind of Christ . In it, they talk about what they call eight axioms for cultivating a robust faith. In a day when so many are disappointed with the faith they were given by the church of their early formation, we need a more vital vision of the life to which Jesus is actually inviting us.  Too ofte...

Today, rather than sharing an author interview or a leadership conversation, I’m going to share a daily practice that has been an important element of my unhurried life and work rhythms for a while now. It’s rooted in some of the insights I wrote about in the last chapter of An Unhurried Leader , which is titled “Working with God.”  By the way, episode 205 of this podcast, “Working for God or Work...

A few years ago I was reading a book by Mary Pipher, entitled, Women Rowing North . In it, a notable epiphany is had by a woman named Sylvia, whose life took some unexpected turns. Pipher writes, “Sylvia in Austin has learned that she is in control not of life , but of the story about her life.“  The same time I was reading this book, I ran into some very unexpected and unwelcome travel issues. An...

Today, I’m sharing a recent conversation with Andrew Arndt about his book Streams in the Wasteland . In it, he shares the ancient wisdom of the desert fathers and mothers who journeyed to the wilderness to seek a closer journey with Christ. Andrew shares some of the parallels between their experience with Rome then and our experience today.  I was first introduced to the desert fathers and mothers...

The voice of the inner critic is another voice from my new book Hold That Thought . The inner critic has an opinion about everything and she will be sure to tell you. The inner chatter produced by this voice leads to thoughts that can feel judgmental and can even lead to resentment. Here are a few of her choice thoughts: Why can’t you get this right? Couldn’t you have done better than that? Why do...

The voice of the stressed achiever has much to do. She likes to focus on accomplishments and she cares about the opinions of others. Never allowing a break, the stressed achiever keeps you driving forward. She’ll have nothing to do with laziness. But what hums underneath is a fear that she doesn’t exist apart from her accomplishments. These are her mantras: Staying busy proves my worth. The more I...

This week Alan interviews friend and fellow author, Steve Macchia, about his latest book The Discerning Life . When we use the language of “discerning” in popular culture, we often mean something like having good taste—like knowing good wine from average. As a spiritual capacity, it’s much more than that as you’ll see.     In more particularly Christian contexts, we may use the language of discern...

Today on Unhurried Living Podcast, Trevor Hudson shares wisdom he gained in a long mentoring friendship with Dallas Willard, and long practice in the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. He talks about the reality of how the life of the kingdom of God is a different sort of life. It’s a life that meets us even in our places of hardship, weariness, and pain. I think you’re going to find a lot...

Most of the women I connect with have an interesting connection with their bodies. And that’s putting it mildly. It seems we either love her, hate her or ignore her. (Notice I didn’t call my body an it, but rather her ). I know I’m playing around with semantics, but personalizing my body helps me not keep her at arms distance…like an object . Our bodies are God-created and given.   Many of us have...

Today, we come to the final episode based on our book What Does Your Soul Love? The final chapter is titled: “Process: Staying on the Path of Change.” One of my key learnings over the years has been that to remain a person of spiritual influence in the communities where God has placed me, I must remain engaged in the transforming journey into which God has invited me. Letting myself get stuck, but...

Today I’m sharing with you a very special story. It’s actually an excerpt from my new book, Hold That Thought . It’s my description of a pivotal scene from the movie Wonder Woman. I know…what can you learn from a superhero movie, right? Well, it turns out you can learn a lot. When you are open, aware and willing, there is no telling from where your next life lesson might emerge.   Connect with Gem...

Nearly ten years ago, I wrote my first book, An Unhurried Life. It’s subtitle was “Following Jesus’ Rhythms of Work and Rest.” Discovering and following those rhythms of life and work have been a primary focus for Gem and for me in this last decade.  So you can perhaps appreciate how glad I was when I saw that Ruth Haley Barton’s next book is titled, Embracing Rhythms of Work and Rest: From Sabbat...

On today’s podcast episode I’m sharing a little bit about each of the seven unhelpful voices that sometimes take the steering while of our lives. At its core, each voice does not believe it already has what it needs. So, it finds a way to whisper (or yell) in your ear to get your attention. When they feel backed into a corner these voices may lash out. Here’s an example from each voice. See if you...

We are continuing our series on Alan's book, What Does Your Soul Love? .  Today we are talking about the chapter on "Joy.” In other words, the question, “What does your soul love?” is a question of where do we find deep joy?     In the book of Nehemiah, we hear him telling the people that “the joy of the Lord is their strength.” It is God’s joy over us and in us that empowers and energizes us. It...

Today, my guest is Jennifer Dukes Lee . Jennifer’s most recent book is entitled, Growing Slow . I placed her here right up front on purpose. Her message is one I deeply believe in. How could I not? We are Unhurried Living after all. The excerpt I chose for you this month is about wintering. If you think about the seasons of the year, most people don’t appreciate the view of a leafless tree, standi...

Today, I’m sharing with you one of the mentor conversations from the first month of Replenish . You’ll get to hear from me, Brenda Renderos and Larissa Marks as we talk about some of the central paradigms of the formational life. This is the kind of content you can expect each month in Replenish. Real life conversations about important and profound matters. Brenda Renderos is a soul care coach, an...

Today Alan talks with author Dr. Todd Hall about his new book The Connected Life: The Art and Science of Relational Spirituality . In it, he talks about the reality of how isolated so many of us feel. The pandemic seemed to amplify and accelerate a sense of disconnection many of us were already feeling in some way or another.    But God invites us into relationship, and connection is a great way t...