Sterling Griggs

Yes, we need each other.  Community in Christ is so important and no one needs to be a lone ranger Christian or leader.  But we can be a bit too needy... "Tom" was a young youth pastor, fresh out of Bible college and considering seminary training in his near future.  He was plugged into the Methodist church near his college, volunteering with the students there for four years as a very active and positive presence.  As graduation drew near for Tom, the church leaders discussed among themselves the possibility of bringing him on staff to work with the students on a part-time basis.  When they presented the idea to Tom he was simply ecstatic.  He believed that God was calling him into student ministry and when this opportunity was offered to him it was very confirming.  Add to that the fact that Tom had already established a healthy relationship with these students and their parents, this position could not have appeared any more perfect for him. Tom...

At the ripe young age of 41, I find myself in the midst of seeking to discern God's next destination for my life and ministry.  This doesn't mean that I'm sitting on the couch each day in my pj's watching cheesy soap operas while waiting for the phone to ring or an email to appear that will whisk me away to my next destination.  Part of what makes each of us unique is that none of us are called by God to do the exact same thing, but all of us are called to do something.  Many of us - myself included - can spend a lot of time trying to figure out just what that something is. There is no doubt in my mind that God gives each one of us a vision for what our future will contain.  Most vision begins with a burden that something should be different than what it currently is and it causes us to dream about the possibilities of what could be.  Andy Stanley, who is a pretty sharp dude in his own right, wrote in his book Visioneering , "Dreamers dream about things bei...

If listening is an art form, then I am a pretty lousy artist at times. Oh, I may hear what you are saying but because I'm a "fixer" I'm focusing more on the solution to your problem that I'm going to give to you once you stop talking - that is if I haven't interrupted you by now. Listening is one if those skills that I have been working on becoming more proficient with and thankfully I've run across some good resources to assist me in my quest. Steve Ogne and Tim Roehl's collaborative effort Transformissional Coaching includes a chapter devoted entirely to the art of listening. Their core premise is that, "When you listen to people, you gain a great deal of credibility in their eyes. Empathetic listening makes a major contribution to a person's emotional bank account. People want to be heard." There is certainly truth to the old saying, "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care." When we list...

As someone who loves summer and hot weather, I don't particularly care for the transition to colder weather.  Fall is beautiful and not too brisk, but I know what lies beyond and it makes me shiver, literally.  However, college football serves as a wonderful buffer for a guy like me to make that unwanted but inevitable transition into the depths of what we call winter. Let me go ahead and throw this out there from the beginning: College football is so much better than pro football.  While I still watch NFL games, if it's not the Panthers or the Steelers then it's hard to keep my attention.  When I look at the lineup for the television lineup for college football each Saturday, I get a little bit giddy about many of the matchups that I get a chance to see.  With all giddiness aside, here are the reasons why I love college football and why it's way better than pro football: College football is pure - Unless they play for Miami, Ohio State, or some other crooke...

No offense to shows like CSI, I'm pretty sure it isn't always so easy to determine exactly what it is that has caused the death of a crime victim or even one who has died from "natural causes" (at least not in a one hour frame of time).  I remember the story of a 14-year-old in North Carolina whose death was a baffling mystery when he was first found dead.  He had a friend over to spend the night and, at around 4:00 in the morning, the friend frantically called out to the boy's mother to come quickly.  When she arrived in her son's room, she found him lying dead in his bed.  There was no sign of injury and no health issues that could explain his sudden passing.  Unfortunately, he had been dead for a few hours and so there was nothing rescuers could do to resuscitate him. Whenever someone who has a known history of illness passes away - or if it's obvious that some form of trauma is the obvious culprit - then the book is usually closed pretty quickly on t...

With four children in our home, my wife and I are bombarded with the constant need for activity and entertainment.  Up until this past week, expanded digital cable television has filled much of that demand with ESPN, Disney Channel, Nick Jr., and the various children's on demand channels cycling in high rotation.  Not to mention that since our televisions are high definition, I can watch all of my sports in stunning HD.  Sometimes it's hard to switch back and forth to five different football games! But lately I've sensed that something had to give.  We were spending far too much time in front of television screens being entertained with mostly mindless material.  So, I pulled the plug on the cable company.  Well, not entirely.  We went from having hundreds of channels that skyrocketed into the upper digital tiers to now a basic 16 channels.  Our HD signal draws in a few more channels and we can still enjoy the channels we now have in that same s...

Lately I've developed a fascination with big wave surfing (thanks to The Wave by Susan Casey ). I've never surfed in my life and would probably fail miserably if I tried to stand up on a surf board on a one foot wave, but the guys that go for the big waves truly fascinate me.  And when I mean big, I'm talking 50+ foot waves in places like Teahupoo in Tahiti, Mavericks outside of San Francisco, and Jaws which break on the north shore of Maui.  Laird Hamilton is a surfer who, at age 47, still defies the odds and defines the sport when it comes to big wave surfing.  His uncanny ability to predict when and where waves will be breaking without the aid of weather instruments along with his legendary history of riding the biggest, baddest waves all over the world has many (myself included) believing that he's one of the best big wave surfers of all time. As I've read about the lives of some of these big wave surfers like Hamilton, I've been impressed by their dedic...