As 2019 begins, I want to hold people tight. I want to live in the moment with the people I love. I want to get better every day loving others well. I want to think before I speak. I want to assume the best of others.

Nearly every day, I’m getting on airplanes and driving through rush-hour traffic. I don’t see my neighbors much. Sometimes the pace is relentless. Sometimes I wish for the quiet.

In my 13 years of blogging, I’ve never written a blog review. Until now.

In one of those moments when just the right words came, I answered, “I belong to a church that throws birthday parties for whores at three-thirty in the morning.” Harry waited a moment, then he answered, “No you don’t. There’s no church like that. If there was, I’d join it. I’d join a church like that!”

And that is my hearts desire, not to see my Waffle House friends as a project or future sermon illustration—but people who are in pain that simply need somebody to love them.

Here’s a startling fact: Many of the things you do to help a small church grow are the very things that will eventually kill the church if you continue doing them. That’s right. A senior pastor who wants nothing more than to see the church grow could, in fact, single-handedly kill its growth.

Occasionally I’ll get asked for advice from a first-time aspiring author. After seven published books, I have some thoughts. Here is how I responded to a recent inquiry…

It takes a daily decision to be people who are different because of our love for others…people who are marked by love. Love can make the difference. Let’s start in our homes.

Here is my confession: I still have lots of questions. The older I get, the less I know.The closer I move toward Jesus, the more questions I have. The more I read my Bible, the fewer things seem black and white. I was sure of a whole lot more when I was eighteen. But now, I just don’t know.

Have you ever driven a car that had its tires out of alignment? You might not know it at first, but before long, you find yourself constantly fighting to keep the car on the road. That’s exactly what happens when you have an individual on your church staff or an entire part of your ministry that is out of alignment with the direction of the vision of your church.

That’s why I don’t want to be known as a conservative. Why I don’t want to be known as a Methodist. Why I don’t even want to be known as a Christian.

No one gets to the end of his or her life and says, “I wish I had spent more time at my job.” But often you will hear people reflecting on poor choices with their families.

Every choice you make today will lead you either toward the path less traveled where you die with your integrity intact or toward a life of regrets. It’s your choice.

Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is stay home from church.

Traditions are part of the glue that holds a fan base together. They are built on from year to year as a program develops. In fact, any school, organization, or even country that wants to develop and secure a following comes up with traditions, logos, hand signals, flags, or other unifying trademarks that people can rally around.

No one is going to put rumble strips in your life for you. That is up to you. Your rumble strips may not be the same as mine, and mine may not be the same as yours. But everyone needs rumble strips.

Leaders who don’t have control of their calendars will constantly be spinning out in the dirt without making much progress. Life will seem frantic and harried, yet it will be difficult to pinpoint what they are actually getting done.

A leader who is successful at work but a failure at home is not a successful leader. The first test of leadership is your ability to love, lead, and care for those who are closest to you.

We live in a society that is geared to make you want what you don’t have. We are exposed to as many as five thousand advertising messages every single day. That number is increasing. And nearly every message’s aim is to show you something you don’t have but probably need.

When we are talking about volunteers or staff leaders, whom we have brought on the team to help others take steps, it is important that there aren’t any debilitating character flaws that will cause others to stumble.