7 Marks of Emotionally Healthy Discipleship In recent times I’ve gained a lot from Pete Scazzero’s vision of emotionally healthy spirituality. Essentially, there shouldn’t be a disconnect between our emotional and spiritual maturity. As I get older, and hopefully wiser!?, and with more experience as a Christian and a church leader, I find Pete’s […]
The Four-Sides Model Let me share a simple but powerful tool I’ve found incredibly helpful in navigating everyday conversations. It is called the “Four-sides Model” and it was developed by German psychologist Friedemann Schulz von Thun.(1) The core idea is this: every message we send carries four layers of meaning. Misunderstandings often happen when the […]
Two life experiences The writer and psychiatrist Edward Hallowell in his book “Connect” speaks about the “two most powerful experiences in life.” He calls them achieving and connecting, and he continues, “Almost everything that counts is directed toward one of these two goals.” That’s worth a moment’s reflection. It’s difficult to think of any human […]
All of us have a perspective on God Sceptics often say that the reason for their atheism is that they could never believe in a God who…(fill in the blanks). They think that any God would be a tyrant with little concern or capacity to care about people. So why would anyone want to follow […]
Getting to the Heart of Healthy Relationships! At Relationary we are all about what really matters—good relationships. Whether you are a community builder, an everyday Christian just trying to make sense of it all, or a Christian leader, we hope there is something here for you. We believe the way we relate—to God, each other […]
Loneliness – the crisis of our age It doesn’t take a genius to recognise that we live in a society characterised by fragmentation, loneliness, and loss of community. The loneliest segment of our society is no longer the elderly (though it’s still very real there too). It’s actually the 16-24 year age group – more […]
Starting at the beginning The foundations of healthy (or unhealthy) relationships can be traced back to the very earliest days of our lives. Unlike other mammals, human babies can literally do nothing for themselves. Giraffes, by contrast, can walk within the first 20 minutes of life. All humans can do is feed, poo, and cry, […]