Weekly Newsletters
21 items
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Renovaré WeeklyApril 11, 2025 Student of Suffering God teaches the soul by pains and obstacles, not by ideas. — de Caussade [God] does not enjoy hurting people or causing them sorrow. – Lamentations 3:33 NLT~ ~…
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Renovaré WeeklyOctober 4, 2024 Aching for Resurrection I’m digging out—along with many in the southeast—from Hurricane Helene’s devastation. For us there was only minor property damage. Others experienced…
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Renovaré WeeklyOctober 20, 2023 What Good is Beauty in a Time Like This? But dark hours are not illuminated by dark thoughts. Christ himself was sustained in his suffering by meditating on joy, not evil (Heb. 12:2).
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Renovaré WeeklyApril 28, 2023 When You Can’t Simply “Snap Out of It” Memorizing a psalm—like Psalm 23—and bringing its words and images to mind has a powerful shaping effect on us. And that power increases when it's also on our…
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Renovaré WeeklyMarch 31, 2023 Why We Can Believe Him But he did suffer. He bore our sorrow, and I'm quite sure bears it still. He retained the scars in his hands so that when he gestures the sign of peace to each…
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Renovaré WeeklyJuly 1, 2022 Caregiving For those who are caregivers now, have been, or will be some day—that is nearly all of us—I sense two words surfacing now: Jesus remembers.
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Renovaré WeeklyMay 27, 2022 With Us In Our Suffering Whenever senseless tragedy tempts me to think of God as unsafe, irrational, even irresponsible—"Why create free-willed beings, Lord, when you knew this was the…
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Renovaré WeeklyMarch 11, 2022 The Prayer of Suffering “Our question,” Richard Foster writes, “is not ‘Why is there suffering in the world?’ but ‘How do I enter into the suffering that is in the world in a way…
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Renovaré WeeklyJanuary 7, 2022 Leaning Into Pain It’s normal to want to avoid pain. It’s human nature to want to fix someone who’s suffering. But when you look at the life of Nouwen and Van Gogh, and, more…
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Renovaré WeeklyAugust 20, 2021 Going About Our Day When the World Is On Fire Following his example, we each have work the Father gives us to do. And following his example, that work is best done when we withdraw often for prayer.
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Renovaré WeeklyApril 9, 2021 Can Joy Be Chosen? Like love and peace and patience, joy is a fruit. Produce. It’s produced by another process. That means we can’t choose it directly. At least not very well or…
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Renovaré WeeklyDecember 11, 2020 Why God Delays When we wait for something good and it is delayed for whatever reason, one thing is clear: if we offer our waiting to God, if we accept our current state…
Podcast Episodes
5 items
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Podcast EpisodeWalter Strickland II — Formed by SufferingMarch 28, 2025
Nathan talks with Walter Strickland about his new book Swing Low and the way that the African American Christian experience adds crucial wisdom to living a… -
Podcast EpisodeWinn Collier — Hope that Won’t DisappointOctober 4, 2024
Winn Collier, director of the Eugene Peterson Center for Christian Imagination, talks with Nathan about hardships that shatter false hopes and the one reality… -
Podcast EpisodeTish Harrison Warren — Prayer in the Night
January 26, 2021
If we cannot trust God to keep bad things from happening to us or to those we love, how do we trust God at all? Author and Anglican priest Tish Harrison Warren… -
Podcast EpisodeTrevor Hudson — Meeting Christ in Our Tears
March 24, 2019
When Jesus finds Mary crying at his tomb, he doesn't try to cheer her up or change her. He simply asks, "Why are you weeping?" In this moving talk—interspersed… -
Podcast EpisodeMimi Dixon — Julian of Norwich
September 3, 2017
How can a woman whose family and community is ravaged by the Black Death say, "All shall be well?" Pastor and Renovaré board member Mimi Dixon opens up the…
Articles
13 items
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ArticleWho Am I? In this moving poem, Dietrich Bonhoeffer seeks to know himself as God’s beloved in the midst of his imprisonment.
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ArticlePrayers for Times of Calamity When we have no words, short written prayers can help us bring our heartache to God. From David Taylor's _Prayers for the Pilgrimage: A Book of Collects for…
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ArticleHow to Be with Those Who Suffer In this excerpt from his book Holy Spirit Here and Now, Trevor shares wisdom about coming alongside those who suffer, and invites readers into the spiritual…
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ArticleThe Prayer of Suffering Richard Foster invites us to "voluntarily take into ourselves the griefs and sorrows of others in order to set them free" in this chapter from his book…
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ArticleA Liturgy for a Time of Widespread Suffering Douglas McKelvey's liturgy helps us to pray honestly as we hold the tension between our sorrow over suffering and our hope for God's redemption.
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ArticleSongs In The Key of Life From Letters to a Young Congregation In this letter to his congregation, Pastor Eric Peterson reflects, "Jesus didn’t come to deliver us from our humanity and its accompanying heartaches, but to…
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ArticleSitting with Suffering How do we address the suffering of others? What can we say or do to alleviate their pain? Richard Foster offers some wise words on the spiritual practice of…
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ArticleThe Day God Died Richard Foster digs deeply into the meaning of Jesus' death on the cross and the healing it makes available.
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ArticleLessons From the Trees Nathan Foster explores how trees teach us how to grow slow, root deep, and wait with patience for the resurrection of spring.
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ArticleThe Outraged and Insulted Optimist As we look at Wisdom literature in the Bible this week, one book comes particularly to mind: The Book of Job. G.K. Chesterton joins us to share his inimitable…
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ArticleThe Bittersweet Longing Sept. 19, 2017 marked the 20th anniversary of Rich Mullins's death. In a new book, many of his writer, musician, and other friends have collected their stories…
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ArticleIn the World You will have Trouble "In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Basil the Great echoes Christ's assurances in this piece by…
