Imitators of Those

“And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.”

Hebrews 6:11-12

Category: Life Lessons

  • The Bridling of Death

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    Why are we, in the West, so uncomfortable with death? Last year Dee and I took a short break in Portugal. It was outside of tourist season, so it was easy to relax. In this Atlantic coastal area, there was plenty to do and see. One day we hiked along the cliffs, as the sun…

  • The Master of the Nets

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    On a lakeshore in Northern Israel stood two men; two experts in their respective fields. One, a fisherman who could mend a net with his eyes shut, who could stand in his vessel on choppy waters without losing balance, who knew the feeding times of the many shoals hidden beneath the surface, whose calloused hands…

  • A Smog-Filled City and a Murky Pond

    —

    by

    Dee Ceall
    in

    This is (finally) the first guest post from my insightful wife, Dee. Hopefully lots more to come! – Dónal I sit on a swing in the park, as I do every morning, gently rocking back and forth. I look out through the grey haze and through the tree branches, towards the murky green lake in…

  • Bearing Our Father’s Name

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in

    I remember my first visit to South Asia. Travelling around the various cities of the country, we visited church after church, house after house, conference after conference for a solid twelve days. Throughout those dusty days and humid evenings, I was introduced to many of my brothers and sisters whom I had never met. Some…

  • The Extraordinarily Ordinary Spirit

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in

    I place a high value on the ordinary means of grace. The ordinary means of grace are those things that God has given as regular, often non-spectacular, rhythmic events that form and shape our spiritual lives. They are the slow dripping of water to erode a rock, the steady flywheel of an engine that keeps…

  • Caught Before Taught

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    A sunny Friday afternoon in April 2011 found me sitting on the lawn at the back of someone’s house, quite bewildered. It was a youth weekend away, or at least, it was meant to be. I had arrived at the house of those organising it along with some friends. To be honest, at this point…

  • The World As I’ve Seen It

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in

    Dealing With Doubt – Part 3 I’ve seen too many facesAll shining like the sunI’ve seen too many skies on fireLike the face of the Holy One I’ve seen too many eyes wide openThat once were so blindAll burning with the beauty of the same loveThe same love that opened mine. This is the final…

  • The World as Best it Could Be

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in

    Dealing With Doubt – Part 2 When John Bunyan, writer of The Pilgrim’s Progress was facing an intense mental struggle, a verse came to his mind that comforted him immensely. For over a year he tried to find this obscure little verse, until at last he realised that it was not in fact from the…

  • The World as it Ought to Be

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in

    Dealing With Doubt – Part 1 The three loads of ammunition that I will lay out in these next posts touch on three different aspects of doubt, for it is a multifaceted beast. We will look at “The World as it Ought to Be”, “The World as Best it Could Be“, and “The World as…

  • The Darkness of Doubt

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    Darkness. Utter darkness. The anguish of a completely unsettled spirit compunded by the weighty shame of unwillingly facing doubt. I hadn’t chosen this. I’ve had other friends who walked into doubt over the faith because of deep-rooted sin in their lives that they just didn’t want to let go of. This wasn’t that. This had…

  • Visa Delays and Kingdom Readiness

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    It was surprisingly mild for a September night at 2am as I walked down the country roads in the eerie, yet serene, silence of the “wee hours”. Darkness, our old friend, does have a sound of silence. It has a way of simultaneously stilling us with its abrupt ending to our vision, focusing our attention…

  • The Danger of Ordinariness

    —

    by

    Dónal
    in ,

    “Remember, he is not, like you, a pure spirit. Never having been a human (Oh that abominable advantage of the Enemy’s!) you don’t realise how enslaved they are to the pressure of the ordinary. I once had a patient, a sound atheist, who used to read in the British Museum. One day, as he sat…