One of the most challenging things in life to grasp is our purpose. Terrible frustration and bitter consequences come from incorrectly choosing our purpose – from lost time, the sorrows of failure, and the often-overlooked pain of feeling like we are not making a difference. Purpose is not easy to find, let alone fulfill. However, God has already prepared our purpose for us and every day is leading us towards fulfilling it. Even still, finding out what our purpose is can be e

As the presidential race continues, we all have choice in whom to follow and whom to support. The freedom to choose our leaders is a unique and special thing in this world bestowed upon us by our nation’s founders. However, the freedom to choose our own path in life is a freedom bestowed upon us by God himself. Our Father in Heaven could have created anything He wished in us but He chose to create free will. Paul wrote of this to the Corinthians, “You, my brothers and sister

As we begin a new week, many of carry the stresses of last week into today. As much as we strive to keep positive, there are always things in our lives that we wish were different, we wish would be blessed, or that we wish we did not have to endure. However, life is about continual growth. God does not allow his faithful to remain in the same place forever because if we are not continuing to grow, we are not able to reach others for God. It is in our growth and learning that

Happy Elevated Friday! Today we highlight an interesting story that came from a study recently done on how likely regular people are to help others when they see them in need. In a time when all we see in the media is people being uncaring, it’s easy to believe that chivalry is dead or that everyone is only out for themselves . However, in the largest-ever study of real-life conflicts captured by CCTV’s worldwide, researchers found that bystanders will intervene in nine out o

The Mueller testimony yesterday took front stage across the media. As analysts and pundits parse through both his report and testimony, viewers we will likely only see sound bites and instances that support whichever side of the issue those pundits take. When we seek understanding through only others’ understanding or others’ chosen sound bites, we will always fail to grasp the full meaning. Similarly, when we only choose to pick certain verses from the Bible but neglect the

Remember the childhood game "telephone"? One person says something to another and they pass it around until it comes back to the original person; the message almost never remained the same. These days, the things we see and hear and not always the way things are. Because of political spin, bias, or other issues in the transmission of information, the messages we receive and the images we see cannot always be trusted. However, there is a reason that we often say something we a

What would life be without our sight? Whether it is our jobs, families, friends, or the things we see in our world (both in person or in the media), what we see usually determines what we think about and, therefore, what matters most to us. However our eyes can deceive us and lead us down wrong paths. When we feel ourselves drifting down wrong paths, or just needing to draw closer to God, we often times choose to fast certain things from our lives. After all, denial of self i

We all face storms in life that challenge our toughness, endurance, and even our grasp on our very lives. Life is not easy and God never made any promises that it would be so. However, that is why we need our God to be a big God who is capable of all things — and fortunately for us, He is! Jesus is the calmer of all storms, and showed just that to his disciples in Mark chapter 4. As they were making their way across the water, a storm threatened their very lives. They awoke a

Happy Elevated Friday! Today we highlight a true story of incredible forgiveness and the transformation change that happened because of it. In 2015, Mark Joseph Peredo was working hard to build his own business, but his dreams of business success were dashed when a car traveling on the opposite side of the highway crossed the median and struck Mark’s car. Mark suffered a shattered foot and several broken facial bones – forever changing Mark’s appearance and rendering him unab

One of the most challenging aspects of life is forgiving ourselves when we hurt others – either by mistake or on purpose. In the eyes of Jesus, there is no one that is beyond redemption and unworthy of his love and those who understand the heart of Jesus understand this about other people no matter what they may have done in the past. But sometimes the hardest person to forgive is ourselves because we know the pain we have caused others. Paul wrote to the Romans, “Therefore,