As the church in Germany and in the West in general struggles with secularisation and decline, Lausanne reminded me: the Church is alive and vibrant.

Anyone who puts his faith in himself has a short future. One of the biggest dangers of our day is pride.

All the energy we waste looking outwards should be used more productively looking inwards to check what our failings are and seek to rectify them.

 If my heart is concerned about what people think of me, I may well be blind to the truth of the text I claim to understand and then proclaim to others.

Read the second part of an in-depth report about the 2024 World Without Orphans global forum held in Chiang Mai.

We need to be careful not to let our egos creep in and turn an opportunity to serve others into a self-patting exercise.

Humility means depending on God alone in every situation, always being ready to learn from Him.

Wonderful enrichment for life and haunting warnings await us if we just travel into the Bible with our hearts open and ready to learn.

On many occasions, we think that we serve and obey God, but in fact what we are serving and obeying ourselves.

The Bible says  God used a thorny bush which burned without being burnt up to manifest himself to Moses, as no human being could look at the Almighty directly.

Being around Christians and using Christian language is not enough. Without a vital personal relationship with Christ, they are merely running on the fumes of Christianity.

Let’s continue to read His Word and be gripped by who He is. We could rejoice in the reality that far surpasses all our dreams and yet opposes all our fleshly pursuits.

The Chinese legendary speed skater finds inner strength in the Bible, which she carries everywhere, even to the skating rink. An article by the United Bible Societies China Partnership.

Only those who know they are completely powerless before God, and accept what God did for them, can be saved.

We find ourselves on a mission frontier, on the periphery of world Christianity. That should cause European Christians to be humble but also hopeful.

There are people who believe that they can do without God in their lives. Others say that God only speaks through them.

We can speak of the meaning of God’s Word with gracious attitudes but also with boldness.

We need to include humility in our hermeneutics as a foundational attitude. The Bible is not subject to us, we are subject to it.

We have shifted from authorities being respected, to not being respected, to being distrusted and even opposed.

The felt gap between ‘what is’ and ‘what should be’ is a powerful prompt to return to God and cherish the best parts of life—our relationships with others—over other idols.

There is nothing worse in approaching God than to go in a proud way.

The church is God’s agent of reconciliation. It will seek for ways to reconcile the people with God and with one another and lead them into God’s kingdom.  

God knows what is coming; He always has, and we never have. Maybe this can stir a greater humility in us all, even when restrictions ease.

Leaders who have the character and resilience to thrive in the midst of adversity are not born; they are formed by the choices they make.

In all walks of life, we run the risk of performing for those watching us.