The Titus 2:4 Project

Do You Know Where You’re Going? When I was a kid—maybe eight or nine years old—my mom thought it would be a good idea to put me in piano lessons. I loved it! Until I didn’t. During my short-lived pianist days, I picked up a few simple melodies that have stuck with me over the years— Camptown Races and London Bridge, for example. I also learned some “modern” hits like Ben and Theme from Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To?). Oddly enough, that last one still tumbles around in my head more than it probably should. I can hear Diana Ross crooning: Do you know where you’re going to? Do you like the things that life is showing you? Where are you going to? Do you know? No, Diana. In fact, I don’t know. But let’s pretend, for the sake of this post, that I do. Setting the Destination —where do you want to go? What’s your goal? In life, we all have things we want to achieve. Dreams. Goals. Successes we hope to realize. And those things take planning. A road map, if you will. Imagine p...

I was born and raised in the church. I've been a Christian since I was nine years old. My earliest memories are of Sunday school in the basement of a small, country church with the flannel boards and Bible characters, an out-of-tune piano playing Jesus Loves Me, and countless Sunday potluck dinners. But somewhere along the way I had drifted. Life happened. Mistakes and heartaches happened. Pride and shame happened. And for more than a decade I hid from church.  Then last November, I walked back into a sanctuary for the first time in about 12 years. I slipped into a seat as the worship music started and thought, "This feels familiar...but different."  And suddenly my Garmin watch vibrated. I glanced down and the screen said "Your stress level is unusually high..." That's weird. I felt fine. Maybe it was the coffee. But the following Sunday it happened again - at almost exactly the same time - as the worship music started.  It was as if my heart couldn't c...