I love Christmas time. Snow, fires, hot chocolate, baked goods, and family are only a small number of the reasons why I get extremely excited for the Christmas season. However, I like many have to do my best to focus on the true meaning of Christmas, Christ!We live in a world that is full of busyness and distractions. A person just need only look down at the smartphone in their hand to know that d...  Read More

Prayer is something that we have been thinking a lot about at Heartland Church overthe last several months. It has been a great blessing to work through “A Praying Life” byPaul Miller and to focus for 5 weeks on the subject of relational prayer in our weekendgathering. I have become more convinced than ever of the overwhelming necessity ofprayer in all things, especially in the building up of God’...  Read More

The changing of summer to fall is my favorite time of year. I love fall. It is the beginning of deer season, pumpkins, harvest, apples, bonfires, chili, football, shorter days, and the list goes on. These things bring up so many memories for me. For families each year this time also brings about the return to school and its related changes.  For us at Heartland this fall brought about the start of...  Read More

What age do you think about when you hear the word, "old"?  Well, if you are 16, it might be 30; if you are 30, it might be 60; and if you are 60, it might be 90.  But if you are 90, you know you are old!  In the Bible, we learn about Methuselah, Noah's Grandpa, who lived to be 969 years old.  Living to that age is almost incomprehensible.  But, being as old as I am is also almost incomprehensible...  Read More

What do you think of when you hear the word conflict? I would imagine most people get an uneasy feeling. They likely recall broken relationships and words they wish had not been said. Because conflict can mean different things to different people, I would like to define it for us. Conflict is “a state of disagreement or disharmony between persons or ideas; a clash." The truth is that we all experi...  Read More

Ever feel like the weight of the world is on your shoulders? Like you are struggling just to tread water? Like despite all your greatest planning and efforts, you just can’t get ahead?I’ve been feeling this way lately as we are planning to hopefully launch a new work of the Gospel in a new city, and reading Ecclesiastes has been a big help. In the first three chapters, Solomon claims that all of o...  Read More

Trust is the foundation for almost everything we do! We trust that our automobiles will start in the morning, that the roads will be open in order to get to work, and that our employers will pay us on the appropriate day.  Trust is also the basis upon which relationships are built, especially with those individuals close to us, as well as, the various institutions we regularly interact with and de...  Read More

What comes to mind when you hear the word hospitality? I think most people envision extending an invitation to people, an immaculately clean house, fancy table settings, an elaborate menu, entertaining guests, and then sending them off on their way home. But what if we treated hospitality as deeper and more relational than that? What if there was a constant open invitation into our homes and the m...  Read More

What a testament the death and resurrection of Christ are to the intentional love He has for those whom He has called. As we move forward from Easter and the celebration of Christ’s resurrection I cannot help but reflect upon all that led up to this moment. Furthermore, my mind is shattered to think of all the emotions that our Saviour, who is fully human, was experiencing fulfilling His calling, ...  Read More

Ps 130:3-4 1 cor 4If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,    O Lord, who could stand?But with you there is forgiveness,    that you may be feared.The last word of this passage has been giving me pause. Is that the right verb? Our gut level intuitions would think that our response to God’s forgiveness would be something else. “With you there is forgiveness that you may be…honored; loved; thanked; p...  Read More

When I was 7 years old I got my first pair of glasses and I hated them! I didn’t like the way I looked. I didn’t like the jokes and name calling. I didn’t like the inconvenience. I didn’t like being different than most of my classmates. What I DID like was that I could see! Those new lenses gave me new vision and put things in focus. I could read better and see the ball coming more clearly. I coul...  Read More

I was cleaning up recently after all of the holiday festivities and I picked up a stack of conversation cards that I have. On one of the cards is the question, “Is there something that you feel God might be calling you into this next year?” This got me thinking about my own calling. Heartland just installed elders and the question of “calling” has been a topic of extensive study for me personally ...  Read More