Podcasts

Columns by Jay

How do we respond as the church in America declines? Get back to the basics of being salt and light.

An important thing to remember about surveys is that one in isolation is of limited value. Are the numbers accurate? Is it showing us an anomaly, or does it signal something wider and deeper? But a cluster of surveys, pointing in the same general direction, can help us accurately identify emerging trends. And there’s little doubt that the Christian church in America is trending downward. Consider these data points: A Gallup survey in August 2019 found that only 36% of Americans said they have...

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From gas to food to childcare, prices are soaring. And my neighbors feel the pain.

From gas to food to childcare, prices are soaring. And my neighbors feel the pain. The numbers just don’t add up for my neighbors. As inflation soars at the highest rate in more than 40 years, many families on the near east side of Indianapolis are struggling a bit more each month to pay the rent, feed their children, buy gas to get to work and back, and even to purchase necessities like soap and laundry detergent. One mother recently told me she now washes her family’s clothes less often at...

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The Great Unsettling: Fast pace of social change leaves us uncertain and uneasy.

The Great Unsettling: Fast pace of social change leaves us uncertain and uneasy. Here’s how we can cope. Journalist Shams Charania accurately summed up modern life in 18 words: “The world we live in now is totally different than it was five, six, seven, eight years ago.” Charania was speaking about his specialty – he reports on the NBA for The Athletic. Yet, he could have been describing how our world has changed in the past two years as the COVID-19 pandemic radically altered how we live,...

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Podcasts

Columns by Jay

How do we respond as the church in America declines? Get back to the basics of being salt and light.

An important thing to remember about surveys is that one in isolation is of limited value. Are the numbers accurate? Is it showing us an anomaly, or does it signal something wider and deeper? But a cluster of surveys, pointing in the same general direction, can help us accurately identify emerging trends. And there’s little doubt that the Christian church in America is trending downward. Consider these data points: A Gallup survey in August 2019 found that only 36% of Americans said they have...

read more

From gas to food to childcare, prices are soaring. And my neighbors feel the pain.

From gas to food to childcare, prices are soaring. And my neighbors feel the pain. The numbers just don’t add up for my neighbors. As inflation soars at the highest rate in more than 40 years, many families on the near east side of Indianapolis are struggling a bit more each month to pay the rent, feed their children, buy gas to get to work and back, and even to purchase necessities like soap and laundry detergent. One mother recently told me she now washes her family’s clothes less often at...

read more

The Great Unsettling: Fast pace of social change leaves us uncertain and uneasy.

The Great Unsettling: Fast pace of social change leaves us uncertain and uneasy. Here’s how we can cope. Journalist Shams Charania accurately summed up modern life in 18 words: “The world we live in now is totally different than it was five, six, seven, eight years ago.” Charania was speaking about his specialty – he reports on the NBA for The Athletic. Yet, he could have been describing how our world has changed in the past two years as the COVID-19 pandemic radically altered how we live,...

read more