Kim Levings

Putting Down What Was Never Yours to Carry We’ve spent three weeks looking at what to amplify, what to reduce, and what to finally get started in our lives. This final instalment is the most personal of the four — because stopping isn’t just a practical decision. For most of us, it’s a spiritual and emotional one. And it begins with a distinction that changes everything. Not everything you’re carrying was given to you by God. Some of it you picked up yourself — out of obligation, out of fear,...

The things that really matter, that you keep putting off There’s a particular kind of exhaustion that doesn’t come from doing too much. It comes from doing a lot — and still feeling like something essential is missing. You know the feeling. The schedule is full, the output is tangible, the people around you would say you’re doing well and are very productive. And yet there’s a quiet, persistent sense that the most important things — the things you were actually made for — keep getting...

The Honest Conversation You've Been Avoiding There's a passage in Romans that reminds us of the human-ness of the apostle Paul. Paul – an apostle, theologian, church planter, someone who had, by any measure, figured a few things out — writes this with disarming honesty: "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do." (Romans 7:15) This honest reflection is a powerful example of vulnerability, too. The man who wrote half the New Testament couldn't...