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As we stare down the arrival of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, I wonder what it would look like for us to cultivate excitement about what we can give rather than expectation of what we’ll receive.

Over the years, the Lord has done a lot of work in my heart to help me better love my family, dysfunctions and all. Here are a few practices I have found helpful along the way.

At Thanksgiving we are guests at God’s table of healing and grace. As good guests, we receive his grace and forgiveness and carry it out into the world to be agents of healing, even in the places where we have brought the brokenness.

Sometimes God displaces us and sometimes we choose displacement to survive, thrive, or walk in obedience to God. However we end up being displaced, whether through persecution, a natural disaster, or by choice, such as taking a specific job, God uses displacement to shape us and draw us closer to him. 

What we are called says something about our identity and our purpose.

Now more than ever, there is a prophetic call on our lives as children of the Creator God to be set apart from the ways technology can turn art into an idol. I am not advocating that we as Christians walk away from the art of this world. But I do have some suggestions for how we can live responsibly into this call.

Lately, I’ve been struggling a great deal with feelings of disappointment with Jesus. I’m not entirely sure when they started, but I can see the impact they’ve had: I start to distance myself from Jesus. I shy away from taking risks for the sake of God’s kingdom. I sink into my couch.

As the hashtag #MeToo floods our social media outlets to raise awareness for sexual harassment, we need to ask how we got to the point where almost every woman has experienced some type of it. How did our world become a place where so many women are treated with such little respect?

Do I really believe that change would come if I stopped my “actions” and “just” prayed for reconciliation and justice and provision for those in need? And do I really believe, when I am working for justice, that it’s actually God who brings about the change, and not me? Most of the time, I’m not sure I do.

Finding community is hard. We cautiously and optimistically put ourselves out there—we make introductions, learn names, give hugs, take risks, and make invitations like we’re staving off a great white shark in a scene from Jaws. And just like Martin Brody, we’re preoccupied with one question: “Will I survive this?”