Each week we gather news stories, notable pieces, and other important items for Christian leaders today. As always, listening broadly draws together differing perspectives from which we can learn but may not concur. Here are 10 things worth sharing this week.

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Friday is National Lemonade Day, so buy an extra cup and share it in Jesus’s name, confident that it makes a difference for eternity.

1. “Their ability rose them to prominence before their character was ready for it,” is one way the Christianity Today team describes what happened in the Acts 29 movement and the Mars Hill Church. Still in its first season, the Rise and Fall of Mars Hill podcast describes aspects with which many were uncomfortable yet remained silent out of allegiance to and affection for a charismatic leader. In answer to Episode 1’s question, “Who Killed Mars Hill?,” host Mike Cosper suggests, “We all did.” Because of the inclination to hide abuses within the church and to cover over blemishes, this is an important story to tell. The pattern it presents is not unique to megachurches; it is clear we all have an adversary with a limited yet effective number of tools.

2. Graham Joseph Hill, principal and associate professor of global Christianity at Australia’s Stirling Theological College, writes “Our World is Broken But Jesus Offers Restored, Reconciled, and Full Life” based on Col. 1:15–23. Here, Hill unpacks and reminds individuals and congregations of that for which we were made, the truly astonishing nature of the gospel which, when applied, becomes a balm to the pitfalls by which we wound ourselves. He leaves the reader with a specific suggestion with which to embody this truth this week.

3. Gabe Fisher, serving the Siburt Institute for Church Ministry as doctoral fellow, offers that type of wisdom which seeps the infusion of experience in “To Those in the Gap,” his most recent piece for Mosaic. Fisher invites the reader to stop and attend to church members in caregiving roles. These people perform a function that, in more regular times, is depleting. Layering the pandemic upon their usual duties, and now for such a marathon amount of time, creates a situation Fisher invites the reader to notice and for which he provides resources to aid the church in coming alongside.

4. In “How parents can have better conversations with teenagers,” the folks at Fuller Youth Institute make a solid case for a recent book release. Even more, and on a personal level, I hear in their examples the pitfalls and ruts of my own communicative striving. Authors Kara Powell and Brad M. Griffin guide the reader, offering “two phrases to cut and two to start using to boost your family conversation skills.” This is not the first time it’s been suggested we reserve the word just for justice alone. Whether we’re speaking or texting, it does seem to belittle either the recipient or the messenger. Powell and Griffin empower conversation partners with phrases of agency grown from empathic listening, which is how we all like to be heard and engaged. These tools extend beyond teenagers.

5. Now this is just good news! Way back in 2011, my preacher at the time, Jonathan Storment, recommended a book, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion. I flew over the moon reading the inspiring story of Jesuit Father Gregory Boyle’s founding of Homeboy Industries, a nonprofit providing jobs and social rehabilitation for those transitioning from incarceration. If you’ve ever found yourself in the LAX airport with a tummy rumble, you’ve likely visited their bakery. In “Homeboy Industries takes ‘quantum leap’ in wake of funding bonanza,” Religion News Service reporter Alejandra Molina tells the happy story of their recent monetary gift and the durable expansion it ensures.

6. The people of Afghanistan are our brothers and sisters and sisters. “John and Jan Bradley have spent years building schools and trying to improve life in the war-torn country.” Christian Chronicle correspondent Cheryl Mann Bacon’s piece, “As Afghan government collapses, Christians work to help volunteers leave,” solidifies the connection with the story of the Bradleys and others.

7. Carey Nieuwhof’s words make so much sense, and he makes it sound so easy to do what’s uncomfortable or what we’ve been avoiding! In “7 Keys to Finding Momentum and Growth When There Are No Good Options,” he prescribes an appreciative inquiry of our church environments. What’s going well, and how can we grow it? Where are people gravitating, and how can we meet them there? Nieuwhof quotes Wayne Gretzky in a way to help us all reframe and separate from old patterns that may have run their course. “Skate to where the puck is going, not where it has been.”

8. Okay, whoa. How would it look to move through the world “unafraid to be powerless, yet unafraid to be powerful?” The Gravity Leadership podcast interviewed Mandy Smith in “Childlike Faith Beyond the Baggage of Western Culture,” in response to her recent book, Unfettered: Imagining a Childlike Faith beyond the Baggage of Western Culture. Smith explores rest as the primary action in order to receive from the Lord and respond to both God and the world, admitting this “feels like death to a consumerist culture” addicted to gathering and producing. Releasing control “always takes us to the kingdom, but the kingdom is not always welcome in this world.”

9. In rediscovering Mandy Smith’s work this week, I’m reminded how much I trust her methods. Making a Mess and Meeting God: Unruly Ideas and Everyday Experiments for Worship was a staple when our kids were younger, mainly for me! Smith models a way to “rest, receive, respond” in the short video, “Reflective Art Experiment (no art skill required).” Engagement, or even our hesitancy to engage in such a practice, has much to teach us.

10. “How have you tried to fix, understand, and control in your own strength?” In “Emptying Prayer,” Mandy Smith walks the listener through a visualization for making space for the Spirit. “We welcome you, God.” We choose to partner with you, human with divine, “every single day.”