You don’t need me to tell you that the United States finds itself in one of the most challenging moments in our history: COVID-19 killing tens of thousands, devastating our economy, isolating us, and unearthing our dangerous desire for personal freedom at the expense of the common good (wear a damn mask!). Of course, the…
Category: Leadership
Lessons In Endings and New Beginnings
Every new beginning comes with some other beginning’s end. – Semisonic / Closing Time. Just a few months ago I preached my own take on that line from Closing Time that went like this: God is always writing new beginnings into the endings of our lives. Maybe not as cool as the Semisonic lyric but…
Ignite The Church Conference 2019
Thankful to have the opportunity to present again this year for the Ignite The Church Conference. This conference is one of the projects of my dad, Jeff Linman, who is so passionate about encouraging, inspiring, and challenging the church to bring about renewal. It’s fun to celebrate with him as we welcome about 70 people from…
7 Ideas To Elevate Your Preaching (Or Public Speaking Or Writing)
Don’t write this post off just because you don’t preach regularly! If you communicate in public in any way: presentations at work, teaching students, training co-workers, writing content, speaking to organizations and groups, I think these ideas can help you. Think about these realities we live with: TedTalks and easy access to millions of speakers…
That Time Jesus Told A Woman To Preach To Men
I’ve had a post about women as preachers and leaders in the Church in my drafts folder for a few months now. Laura and I moving to Georgia had me focused on other things. But then a pastor/writer/speaker from Minneapolis named John Piper said some things and gave me the inspiration I needed to finish! Cliffs Notes…
Team of Rivals
I just finished “reading” Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. I use quotes because I listened to the book on Audible…all 41 hours of it!! While the subtitle of the book is “The political genius of Abraham Lincoln” you could easily replace ‘political’ with the word ‘leadership.’ Lincoln was an incredible leader. The book…
MLK And The State Of The Church
I read a great post today from Mike Breen: “Obituary for the American Church.” In it he talks about how celebrity, consumerism and competition have led us off course, away from the things we (the Church) are called to focus on. At the end he lifts up a quote from Martin Luther King Jr. and…
