Daniel Darling, author, pastor, speaker - Conversations on Church, Community, and Culture

Are you slow to tweet?

February 21, 2020

“Be careful” was the cryptic text I received from a respected Christian leader and a close friend after a series of politically charged tweets I posted online in 2016. “I think most people agree with you, but you need to watch the way you tweet things. You could offend some people.” He was right. So I took it down. I hope I’ve learned a few things since then. My moments of incivility online (there have been more than one) underscore how easy it is to let our thumbs engage before our minds have caught up, to allow the passions of the moment and the speed of the news cycle influence us in ways we regret. Read more at ERLC.com...

THE WAY HOME: ESTHER ALLEN ON IMAGE, IDENTITY, AND FINDING FREEDOM

February 20, 2020

There are so many places we are pushed to locate our identity: our work, our gifts, our family, our platforms, even our ministry. Esther Fleece Allen, author and speaker, joins us to help find freedom from identities that disappoint and labels that hurt. This is a conversation that is important for parents and pastors, moms and dads, teens and boomers, and everyone in between. You'll want to lean in and listen to this conversation. This episode of The Way Home is sponsored by our friends at The Good Book Company. [powerpress] Show Notes Book: Your New Name: Saying Goodbye to the Labels That Limit Twitter: @EstherFleece Website: EstherFleece.com ...

For the Dignity of All

February 19, 2020

Not long ago I was speaking in Washington, D.C., at an event on human dignity and brought my daughter, who’d just turned 13. When the event was over, we had a few days to take in the nation’s capital. I wanted Grace to see as much as we could fit in, so I kept us on a pretty tight schedule. Then one day, as we were walking to the Washington Monument, we passed a veteran—homeless and holding a crude sign asking for money. We rushed by, but a few steps later my daughter stopped and said, “Dad, we should help him.” I responded with the usual excuses. “I don’t have any cash.” And “We’ll get him on the way back.” But Grace was undeterred. “Dad,” she said. “He’s made in the image of God. We can’t just pass him by.” She took some of her spending money for the trip and walked back...

Halfway There

February 17, 2020

Just get ready,” a colleague whispered to me during a birthday party at work. “40 is great. 41 is … Well, you’ll see.” I brushed it off with a laugh. Turning 40 struck me as an accomplishment. Four decades appeared to be the perfect age—old enough not to be foolish and young enough to still have energy and ideas and a career that seems upwardly mobile. Whenever I read the profiles of young leaders, they seem to be in their 40s. Right? I’d always dismissed the idea of a midlife crisis—guys snapping and buying a Mustang, leaving their families, and starting over—as some cliché, hedonistic act of selfishness. I still think these decisions are foolish, but I no longer doubt the pathos that descends upon many of us when we hit midlife. Read more of this recent piece I wrote for In Touch Ministries....