IBC Blog

Hope & Healing

Realistic Optimism

I used to think I could define myself by what our pastor Barry would call a “realistic optimist.” I think those of us who are believers really should live in that space; seeing things as they really are yet being optimistic that God is at work and we have hope. It took walking through some particularly dark times to realize that I’d been living according to the wrong definition of this term my entire life.

Formed

Revelation 7

It was the summer of 2020 when I discovered a group of people out of Atlanta that I never knew I needed. Like a lot of you, being quarantined at home as a family brought new rhythms and routines in our everyday life. If every screen time rule we had in the Harris house was going to be broken, let’s at least break it with something beneficial. Enter live worship sets on YouTube.

Max volume. Living room cleared out. Let’s worship.

Formed

Spilling the Tea

Red letter words in some editions of the Bible, meaning they are words of Jesus. They are recorded in the gospels of Matthew and Mark. In each of these gospels, they are an answer to a question from a teacher of the law. He was a Jewish religious scholar, and he noted that Jesus had answered other questions wisely, so he asked him, “What is the most important of all the commandments?” He said:

Hope & Healing

3 Reasons Why True Love is Not Just a Feeling

First Corinthians 13:4-7 is often used to characterize the love that one person has for another or what a couple should strive for in a marriage. However, Paul’s assertion here to the Corinthian Church calls to mind the true character of Jesus Christ - Jesus’ PERFECT love for us. It is a love that has the ability to withstand the fiercest of storms and the most barren droughts. It is a love that has the ability to empower us to love even when we feel unlovable, with nothing left to give.

Formed

Is your media consuming you?

We live in a world that is absolutely saturated with media – like soggy bread. It’s a rare moment when we don’t have a screen either in our sight or within our reach, each one of us connected to all the content in the world. A nearly endless list of articles, videos, songs, social media posts, podcasts, pundits, and influencers are begging for your attention – did you know social media algorithms are literally set up to keep you in their platform for as long as possible? They will send you notifications when they have noticed a trend of your usage. Their technology is able to target you; it thinks like this: Madi is normally scrolling at 3:12 p.m. when she’s experiencing an afternoon energy lull, let’s target her with notifications since she is currently not scrolling.

Formed

Broken Body Theology

I never thought much about my body until recently. It mostly did what it was supposed to do and looked how it was supposed to look, and so I haven’t had to pay it too much mind. Athletics weren’t my thing, which means my body’s physical abilities were never in the spotlight. I’ve of course fussed and fretted over my appearance like we all have, but mostly my body cooperated and came along for the ride.

More recently, though, my body insists on being noticed. I’ve had two babies (both of whom made themselves comfortable in my belly for much longer than they were welcome), I’m creeping closer to middle age, and my body doesn’t look or feel the way it always has. Things hurt. Some days, things hurt an annoying amount.