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Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow

There are things in my life that I look back on and still blush over. There are things said and unsaid in my past that still cause me regret when I recall them today. There’s definitely a sense, at times, that if only I could go back and do that thing over, things would be different.
But do you know what? Things probably wouldn’t be any different. Because that was then and this is now. I’m not the same person I was yesterday or the day before that. Life is changing me.
And perhaps I shouldn’t wish to change the past. Maybe I should be learning to make peace with it. Maybe I should be more thankful for yesterday’s mistakes, as strange as that seems, because of the valuable lessons I learned, not just about life but also about myself.
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/yesterday-today-tomorrow/

Dual Citizens

When we become Christians, we don’t stop being 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯, but we’re well on our way to becoming 𝘢 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘰𝘧 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯. Made spiritually alive in Christ, God sends His Spirit into our hearts as both a seal and promise of His commitment to renew and transform us. We continue to live in the world but we’re no longer of it in quite the same way, belonging now to Heaven’s country.
It’s often a difficult tension to navigate, the halfway space between 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 and 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦. How, in practical terms, do we ensure our primary allegiance as people who look for a city whose builder and maker is God? Yet how are we also to be salt and light, to fulfill our Christian commission, among the communities and people with whom we live and work?
How exactly are we to be in the world but not of it?
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/dual-citizens/

Beyond The Pale

I recently wrote about my separation from the religious community I grew up in and the overwhelming response to my article was both encouraging and thought-provoking.
Many people wrote to me to let me know that the article had deeply resonated with them. Others wrote expressing their distress at my experience (regardless of whether it had been theirs or not) and offering their blessing on my continued journey.
Others expressed dismay that I was no longer part of the community; how would I receive nurture and support? With whom would I now fellowship? Couldn’t I have just stayed to change the culture?
Others still were less complimentary in their feedback, deeming my article slanderous and inaccurate, and my questions nothing but excuses.
Here are my thoughts, in response, about life beyond the pale...
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/beyond-the-pale/
Links On Changing Cultures: https://www.torbenrick.eu/blog/culture/why-is-organizational-culture-change-difficult/

Crossing Over

We will make many crossings in our life, and live several lives throughout adulthood, each one connected to the last by moments and memories, intersecting and joining together like the gossamer thread of a spider’s web. Sometimes we will recognise the echoes of ourselves from another time, another place, but in other moments, our glances backward will both bewilder and astonish; who is that stranger that carries our face?
We will perhaps begin to understand, too, that all of this life, this experience that humans share, is another kind of crossing, a change from this to that. 
Yet it is also a journey through a world that, at its core, will fail to satisfy us, deep within our soul.
We realise we were always meant to change, it’s in our DNA. But into what we wonder. Is all of this life meant for something more? Who am I really meant to become?
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/crossing-over/
Music excerpt: C S Lewis Song (Brooke Fraser)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4RzmlWZ5fU

When God Moved Into The Neighbourhood

The glory of the Lord returns to dwell among His people. But this time it was wrapped in a perishable, temporary covering of flesh and bone.
 
All the narratives of the Old Testament had been simply shadows and markers, one-dimensional illustrations intended to point the world to the real story God had been writing all along, to the reality that God had intended from the beginning. God would dwell, as He has always intended, among people, in people; in a kingdom of priests ransomed to Him by the precious blood of the lamb slain before the foundation of the world.
 
“The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son, Generous inside and out, true from start to finish.” | John 1:14 (MSG)
 
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/when-god-moved-into-the-neighbourhood/

An Easter Tale

The resurrection of Jesus is one of the great theological truths of the Christian faith taught by the early church and written into the earliest Christian creeds. Resurrection underpins the entire gospel narrative, without which all of Christian life is rendered futile.
As author Craig Blomberg comments, “As wonderful as Jesus’ life and teachings and miracles were, they were meaningless if it were not historically factual that Christ died and was raised from the dead and that this provided atonement, or forgiveness, of the sins of humanity.”
At Easter, Christians all around the world remember and give thanks for what Jesus has done and the abundant life that has been won through his death and resurrection.
Here's a fresh retelling of a tale that began long, long ago...
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/an-easter-tale/

[The Church Series] Will Progressive Christianity Destroy The Church?

I want to talk about something that’s been on my mind for a while. Some time ago, I watched a commentary by a ‘Christian pastor’ (link in show notes) that totally shocked me. In fact, I haven’t really stopped thinking about it since.
I found it disturbing; equal parts ridiculous and horrifying, and I really couldn’t believe it was being presented under the guise of legitimate Christianity.
For me, it highlighted a disturbing and, frankly, heartbreaking direction that modern Christianity, or at least a part of it, has taken; a wild trip sideways down the labyrinth-like rabbit hole of progressive Christianity. And I believe this pervasive ideology, left unchecked, could signal the death knell of the church as we know it.
I think the church is facing one of her greatest challenges yet; not through external persecution as in times past, but through subtle, internal perversion. There is a desperate need for discernment and a deep commitment to the gospel of the Bible, in doctrine and practice.
Will progressive Christianity destroy the church?
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/will-progressive-christianity-destroy-the-church/
Show Notes: 
YouTube commentary by Brandan Robertson: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbP7oMte9sk
https://www.bethelbeaverton.org/progressive-christianity
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/05/progressive-christians-abortion-jes-kast/590293/

John Writes A Letter

When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. 
Yet, writes John the Apostle, if anyone boasts, “I love God,” and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won’t love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can’t see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You’ve got to love both.”
John tackles this sensitive yet important area of Christian discipleship, showing the connection between our professed love of God and our love for our Christian family. "First we were loved, now we love", he says, pressing into the realities of what a grace-shaped life should look like.
Grace, perhaps one of the easiest concepts to speak about in the enthusiastic language of a born-again believer is, in reality, one of the hardest virtues to assimilate into our Christian lives. John's letter directs our gaze inward, at our own hearts, where, he says, 'faith, expressed through love' must abide and flourish.
https://www.carrielloydshaw.com/john-writes-a-letter/