We’ve been talking about how to clarify and pursue some dreams for our lives together with the Lord in really practical ways. Today, I want to offer just a few concluding thoughts to help you pursue your dreams together with the Lord – remembering that He designed you, Heloves you, and He knows the good plans He has for you.…

Imagine that you were standing in a large room, like a big auditorium or gymnasium. You are standing in one corner of the room, and your dream of where you want to be is at the far corner of the room. That dream may be something for your spiritual life, or your home or family, or your career, or some other hope or wish or goal you have... But you c…

God’s journey for us in life rarely looks like a straight line arrow. It often looks more like zig-zagging line with lots of twists and turns along the way. Some of this is our doing; some of it is His; and in His sovereign mercy, He is weaving it all together into an amazing tapestry of faithfulness. Where we sometimes get into trouble in walking …

There’s an important distinction between having clear goals vs. having just good intentions. All the hoping and wishing – and, even praying – in the world isn’t going to amount to anything if I don’t DO something about it. You have a vision for your future. You can see where you want to go. You’ve identified some simple, initial steps you can take …

What’s your dream? What are you dreaming about with God? What are your hopes for yourself? for your character? your family? your future? your legacy? These are ALL great things to have a vision for in your life with the Lord. Depending on the size of your dream, you might be just 10 steps away, or it might be 50,000 steps away. But once you envisio…

Today on Practical Faith, I want to lead you in a short exercise of dreaming with God about your future. You can do this wherever you are right now: in your car, at home, at the gym, wherever. For just a couple of minutes, we are going to talk and think about and practice dreaming together with God, who said, “I know the plans I have for you,” decl…

Today, we are wrapping up our short series on the topic of “Discipleship at Home,” and I want to address one of the most common objections I hear around this topic, and that is this: “It’s too late for me. I missed my chance. My kids are grown. I wish I had known about all this stuff earlier...”بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Welcome back to “Practical Faith” – where today, we will continue in our short series on the topic of “Discipleship at Home.”بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Today on “Practical Faith,” we'll introduce a short new series on the topic of “Discipleship at Home.” The way we grow is by practice. Family devotions for us through the years have been full of trial-and-error, starts-and-stops, and starting back over again. It has not been perfect, but we have tried to remain intentional and consistent in practic…

If you’re like me, then, we don’t want to do what only we can do in our lives. We certainly want to give our very best – but frankly – if this is just a human effort producing human results… then, what’s the point? But the hunger and the ache and the yearning of our souls is, “Oh God!, please come – please come – and do what only You can do among u…

Persecution affects about 200 million Christians around the world today. Imagine the amount of faith in Jesus, and courage from His Holy Spirit it must take to live in a place where your neighbors or the government are openly hostile toward your faith in Jesus… You and I have the opportunity to pray courageous, faith-filled prayers now for our pers…

God has purposes for you in this generation – purposes that He has called you and equipped you and prepared in advance for you to fulfill. Our loved ones – our friends and family – our everyday connections in the world – they are hungering for the grace, the truth, the deliverance, the victory, the identity and purpose which we all know they are on…

God is already at work in the life of every single one of your unsaved friends. Every single one of them! And He is inviting you – He is authorizing you in the Name of Jesus – He is sending you! – to join Him in that miraculous work. Within the past 10 years in the U.S., a whopping 83% of all new church attendees came to church because someone invi…

God has purposes for you to serve right here – right in your very own town – among your very own generation, just like He had for David in the Bible...بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

To become like Jesus, we’ve gotta do three things: do things the way Jesus did them; pray in the ways that Jesus prayed; and believe like Jesus believed. Today we’ll talk about believing like Jesus believed. Believing IN Jesus is of utmost importance. Eternity literally hangs in the balance of it. But it is just the starting point of a life of foll…

Becoming like Jesus means doing things the way Jesus did them. It also means praying the way that Jesus prayed.بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

To become like Jesus, we’ve gotta do three things. We’ve got to do what Jesus did, pray like Jesus prayed, and believe like Jesus believed. So first up is: Do what Jesus did. Sometimes, as followers of Jesus, it can be cool to actually do things the way Jesus did them...بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

The Eternal Son of God – God, who made us in His image – He descended from heaven to earth and become like us in every way except sin. He made us like Himself. And then, after we messed it all up, He Himself became like us, so that He could enable us to become like Him again...بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

In the Book of Acts, we are amazed by the miracles we see there: miraculous healings… resurrections from the dead… angelic deliverances from prisons… All these amazing things happened! But there is a danger for us in thinking that these are the only things that indicate the supernatural in the Bible. That these kinds of miracles are the reason the …

The term “supernatural” simply means, higher than what is natural, above what is natural, beyond the natural. The supernatural is the work of God, fueled by the Presence and the character of God. Today, we will look at Acts chapter 2 and invite the Holy Spirit of God to awaken us to the supernatural in our lives...…

When Dianna and I were chaplains onboard the Mercy Ship, I had a discipling relationship with a crew member onboard. He was a great guy – brilliant mind, fun personality, loved his wife and kids – loved and served the Lord faithfully! He had smoked his entire life, and he wanted to stop. And one day, he asked my advice...…

In Mark chapter 12, the opponents of Jesus set a trap before Him. And, honestly, it’s a brilliant trap. It should’ve worked. Here’s how it went – it says, “Later they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. They came to him and said, 'Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others,…

A dear loved one has just received terrible news, experienced a sudden loss, a diagnosis, a betrayal – and they turn to you for help. How do you comfort a person in those first critical moments of a crisis? In the previous two episodes, we talked about leaning on your Experience and practicing Empathy to support and comfort your loved one in crisis…

What is this person feeling right now, and how can I comfort them in this difficult moment in their lives? Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person.بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

How do we help the people closest to us when a sudden crisis arises in their lives? What do you say? What do you do? How can you help a loved one during their first painful moments of a crisis in their lives? Your three main resources for supporting your loved ones in their moment of crisis are going to be your Experience, Empathy, and Equipment. T…

I want you and me to understand that our status in eternity fundamentally changed when God adopted us into His family! Your identity changed, your name changed, your inheritance & future & rights all changed! Somehow, in some heavenly way, your spiritual birth certificate was updated to show Almighty God as your adopted Father! And in that moment, …

I want you to think about prayer with me in a different kind of way today: Prayer is disruptive. Prayer is how we bring Jesus into our world. In a way, it is an arrival of the Spirit of Christ into the moment in which the prayer is taking place. Prayer is disruptive, in the best kinds of ways!بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Every mighty movement of God started with a call for His people to pray. Prayer revives the hearts of God’s people as it prepares our communities for God’s love, grace, and Word to be spread. Prayer-walking involves us personally taking our prayers to the very places where we desire to see God’s Presence manifested and our prayers answered.…

More than 75 percent of individuals who come to know Christ have experienced salvation as a result of a direct relationship. Oikos is a Greek word that is found many times in the New Testament that can provide tremendous insight and revelation to our prayers and evangelism. Oikos defines an individual’s primary base of relationships and their relat…

Resurrection is God’s specialty – He brings dead things to life. It's who He is. It's what He does! The Resurrection of Jesus changed everything. It represents THE pivot point of history – everything swivels – everything swings into a new direction when the Living Jesus stands up and walks out of the grave, victorious over death...…

We often talk about Jesus in the past tense – maybe because we read about His mortal life on earth in the history of the Bible. But because of the Resurrection, Jesus lives today. Have you ever considered what that really, logistically means? Jesus is a current, living person. Jesus is a present reality – in the world, and in our lives. Jesus was –…

Do you remember the use of the word "non-essential" from covid times? Many people in 2020 were informed – by email, or phone, or in-person – that they were considered “non-essential.” Friends, you and I are not what we do. Our worth is not rooted in our jobs. Our value lies in Something far deeper and more eternal than our occupations...…

If God has called you to something in the past – whether it was to faith in Him, or to a particular task, or to a person, or a place, or a direction – and you responded with a "no" to Him... If God was leading you to forgive someone, or to trust again, or to let go of something, or to pick up something else – but you said "no"... If God was telling…

A friend recently asked me a piercing question that I want to share with you. He asked me right after I had shared about a multi-year journey of breaking free from an addiction earlier in my life. As we talked, I shared with him that the tide-turners that God used in my life to set me free were: #1-telling others, and #2-Scripture memory...…

“Listening prayer” is pursuing the purposes of God by meditating on the Word of God & words of God. Praying to God is great! He wants us to share all our thoughts and feelings with Him – all our needs and desires with Him. But we should also allow Him the opportunity to speak to us. It’s important to create space in our lives to listen to God – tim…

The hope of the resurrection changes everything! Lisa Williams joins us today to share on the topic of the resurrection, and how it can impact our everyday lives as followers of Jesus.بقلم Lisa Williams

We’ve all felt it. A dilemma with no good solution. A situation that has you perplexed, stumped. You’ve tried everything you can think of, and you’re stuck... What if you could separate yourself from the thick of the issue for a moment and evaluate it objectively, in the third person? What if I told you... you can! Here's how:…

Today we discuss the second of three questions we can ask our Father God, which can help us discern His will and pursue continued growth in Him as His children. If you want to grow in some life-role or virtue in your life, ask God in prayer and listen for His answer: "What would someone who is better at this life-role or virtue than me be doing?"…

I'd like to offer you three questions to take to God in your prayers, which if you will ask them of God regularly, and allow Him time to respond, they will produce spiritual growth in your life. The first question is this: “Father, what do You think/feel about…"بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Last time, we introduced the term "lament" as a Biblical expression of our grief directed to God. Today, our guest speaker Lisa Williams will show us the four elements of a lament: Turn, Lament, Ask, and Trust. Psalm 13 will be our example to help us understand how to lament according to the Bible.بقلم Lisa Williams

Our guest on today's episode of The Practical Faith Podcast is Lisa Williams! Today, Lisa shares with us on the Biblical language of lament, what it means, and why it matters.بقلم Lisa Williams

As people of faith, we can sometimes feel like we have to check this bias at the door. As if faith and reason were incompatible, mutually-exclusive worldviews. But they are not! Today, I’d like to appeal directly to this bias of logic, reason, and science, particularly as it pertains to the historical reliability of the Bible.…

Let’s consider something for a moment: why did God choose to relate to us as Father? His creativity is unlimited. e literally could have chosen any kind of relationship that He could think of to relate to those rescued & redeemed by Christ, and He chose that of Father & children. This is not a metaphor or a figure-of-speech. This is literal – this …

Christ shares His own eternal inheritance with those He has saved – and the inheritance He shares with us is so much more than physical properties and possessions. It is amazing to realize all that we inherit from God through Christ Jesus...بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Today, I want to invite you into the lawyer’s office. But don’t worry! You’re not in trouble – in fact, quite the opposite! This is the office of a lawyer who determines the rightful heirs to an estate. This lawyer’s job is to follow the mandates of a written will, and to distribute the rightful inheritance of the estate to the legal heirs named in…

Most of the Bible was written to be understood literally, describing historical events that actually happened. There are some parts of the Bible, though, that were written in figurative language; they are poetic or didactic in nature, describing an indescribable God using the limited words we have, and using allegory to teach us about ultimate real…

Did you know that the truest things about you are the things God’s Spirit says about you? And if I could condense those things down into one, single word, it would be this one: BELOVED.بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

The following is a prayer I wrote in a moment of unique clarity with the Holy Spirit. I had just realized that it takes so much - so much! - for God to really have all of my full attention. It’s a hundred little things that I’m embarrassed to even say right now... All these layers upon layers of external and internal distraction... In this moment o…

We see pain, and experience suffering... We see tragedy, despair, death... We don’t have to pretend like these realities are not difficult. The circumstances of unpredictable life take their toll on us over time. So what’s the answer? What are do we do? Today, I want to talk about telling somebody.بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash

Today, we finish up a multi-episode series looking at the Jesus Way of Discipleship. This was the theme of a spiritual life retreat my family attended a few years ago with a pastor, counselor, and speaker named Barry Brown.بقلم Rev. Dr. Nicholas A. Cash