The ear that listens to life-giving reproof will dwell among the wise. — Proverbs 15:31 Listen to your father who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old. — Proverbs 23:22 I was counseling a twenty-one-year-old man regarding his strained...
True repentance does not stop with a change in our thinking, but continues with a change in our behavior. We have all experienced people in our lives who apologize to us over and over for the same offense, and yet their behavior never changes. After a while, the...
In Hebrews 12:14–15, God tells us, “Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no ‘root of bitterness’ springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become...
The COVID-19 pandemic has put extraordinary pressures on marriages and families. I was speaking to a family attorney yesterday who told me that he has received more calls to initiate divorce proceedings in the last three weeks than in the past two years. While we do...
Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? — Romans 2:4 Family conflicts start very early in life. Ray (9) and Milly (11) were working on cleaning the kitchen...
Forgiveness and reconciliation is a three-phase process, and I will summarize it here. I don’t want you to be overwhelmed. What can be written in just a few pages may take years for the Lord to accomplish. In the chapters ahead, we will consider the small steps God...
When I am in the middle of a blowout conflict with one of my sons, I am squarely focused on his disobedience, his bad attitude, his irresponsibility. Obviously, the entire reason why we are in this situation is that he dropped the ball or was disrespectful. Rarely is...
When a family member does something that hurts our feelings a couple of times, it may not feel like a big deal to forgive them. What if they do it ten times? Fifty times? Now it is a different story. You may remember that Jesus’ disciples asked Him about this. “Then...
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. 2 Corinthians 5:17–18 Your family is like a...
Every family experiences conflict, hurt, and brokenness. There are two big reasons for this reality. First, each of us struggles with sin and character problems. Therefore, when multiple people with character problems live together under the same roof, you get lots of...
