The following articles are from our flagship publication, BodyLife. They have been organized by content, so you can read those that most apply to where you are in the journey. You can also view these articles in Chronological Order if you prefer. Some articles have been listed in more than one space. We hope these articles comfort, encourage and challenge you to the fullness of what it means to live in the joy of being God's kid in the world!

Top Seven Articles by Reader Response

  1. Why I Don't Go to Church Anymore: Questions and answers about the nature of the church in our day and how it is that we can relate it with life and vitality. (May 2001)
  2. Why House Church Isn't the Answer: Those who look to House Church as a panacea for what ails the church may be sorely disappointed when they get there. What do we really have to fix for church life to be productive and powerful? (February 2001)
  3. We Already Have a Shepherd! Leadership in the Relational Church (VII): How did Jesus intend leadership to function in his incredible family. (December 2002)
  4. The Call of the Shepherd: Finding safety and purpose in the presence of Jesus and the courage to follow his voice wherever he leads us. (May 2004)
  5. The Nut Test: Learning the difference between relationship and religion and what relational Christianity looks like. (September 1997)
  6. The Deepest Freedom: Finding freedom from legalism, religious obligation and the expectations of others is only the beginning. The tyranny of Self is what most keeps us from the joy of walking in Father's life. (January 2001)
  7. Sexual Struggles and the Relational Journey Dealing with sexual temptations and failures in the context of our spiritual growth, and finding fulfillment in the gift of sexuality as God gave it to us. (April 2005)

Living the Journey - When you're unsure about the path God has put before you, or you're not living up to the expectations and demands of others around you...

  • Windblown: What Life in Him Looks Like Living in the fullness of Christ is not a matter of embracing theology ritual, or ethics but to engage him by the Spirit and follow him wherever he leads. (February 2007)

  • Breaking Free: A real-life demonstration of what it means to break free of religious obligation and break into the relationship God has always desired for us (November 2005)

  • The Call of the Shepherd: Finding safety and purpose in the presence of Jesus and the courage to follow his voice wherever he leads us. (May 2004)

  • What Is God Asking Of You? Learning to recognize Jesus' voice in our lives and having the focus and courage to follow him in the simplest things he asks of us will turn our spiritual stagnation into life and fulfillment. This article also includes 'That Lot' in Fairlie, an amazing story of a group of believers in New Zealand. (September 2004)

  • Living in Two Worlds: Eternal life is not just our distant hope. It is also our present possession and keeping focused on it will help us live in the world without being captured by it. (February 2004)

  • The Nut Test: Learning the difference between relationship and religion and what relational Christianity looks like. (September 1997)

  • The Joy of Letting Go: If we grab for security on our own terms, we'll always find ourselves falling short of the passion in our hearts for God. Here's how to let go and see God's hand transform your life. (April 2002)

  • Signposts On the Journey: What markers can help us determine if the voice you're hearing is really Father's? (May 1999)

  • What's In it For Me? How the pursuit of our own self-interest leads us far afield of God's best work in our lives. (May 1997)

  • Painting Outside the Lines. What God is doing today in the lives of his people, may not always fit between the lines of our religious institutions. (November 1998)

  • Why Settle for Anything Less? - How God's love can be our only motivation, and why we always find cheap substitutes for that incredible gift (April 1996)

  • It's So Worth It! Many who start out on the journey of relational life with God, get lost or discouraged in the process. Don't let that happen to you. (September 2002)

  • Sexual Struggles and the Relational Journey Dealing with sexual temptations and failures in the context of our spiritual growth, and finding fulfillment in the gift of sexuality as God gave it to us. (April 2005)

Intimacy With God - When you feel your spiritual growth has stagnated or your just hungry to know him better and follow him more closely...

Knowing Him Better - When you wonder why he seems so far away, or whether you'll ever be good enough to have the relationship with him you've always wanted...

  • Snapshots of Father's Love: Two recent experiences brought some fresh images of God's Fatherhood into my own life. Hopefully they will touch you in a similar way. (July 2000)
  • The Father's Delight - Learning to live in the love of the Father (November 1996)
  • The Hen and Her Chicks: The magnificent work of God at the cross that forever secured our redemption in him and our relationship with him. (November 99)
  • Rekindling Passion. God has called us to live every day in an all-consuming passionate love for him. Here's how we lose it from time to time and how we can recapture it. (January 1998)
  • Every Day, Every Moment. A call to a daily relationship with the Risen Christ that can transform our lives with his glory. (May 1998)
  • The Businessman and the Beggar. Why our pursuit of trying to earn God's favor must end before we'll ever be able to experience the reality of his life in us. (March 1998)

Growing in Trust - When it is so hard to trust what God is doing in your life, or even whether he cares enough about you to attend to the details of your life...

  • Welcome Home! The invitation God makes for us to be related to him and why our trust in him is so critical to that process. (July 1997)
  • Why Are You So Afraid? Learning to fix our eyes on Jesus, not the circumstances that assail us, and our own inabilities to do much about them. (November 1997)
  • Getting on Father's Page. Instead of inviting God to bless our work and show up where we are, maybe it would be better for us to live everyday where he is. (September 1998)
  • What's In it For Me? How the pursuit of our own self-interest leads us far afield of God's best work in our lives. (May 1997)
  • By Every Word. Intimacy with God can only be lived out as we learn to listen and follow his voice through the ups and downs of everyday living. (July 1998)

The Importance of Living Free - When you doubt the freedom that Christ has brought to you or find yourself using it for your own agenda instead of letting it transform you...

  • Reveling in the Freedom to Follow: Jesus invited people to come and follow him. So why does religion do more to discourage people from that than freeing them to follow him and discover the life in him that he wants for each of us. (July 2006)

  • Feasting on the Tree of Life Until we truly die to the right to decide what is good and not good for our own lives, we'll never find ourselves basking in the absolute joy of life as Father always meant us to know it. (August 2005)

  • To Be Free of God??!!?!? - Enjoying the freedom of becoming absolutely dependent upon God, and why we resist it so. (September 1996)

  • Freedom is Only the Beginning (May 2000): Experiencing God's freedom is not the end of the journey, but the start of it. As easily as it opens doors to know God as he really is, it can also be someone's excuse to satisfy their own desire instead.

  • The Deepest Freedom: Finding freedom from legalism, religious obligation and the expectations of others is only the beginning. The tyranny of Self is what most keeps us from the joy of walking in Father's life. (January 2001)

  • Thriving Outside the Box: If freedom only gets you out of religious obligation and not into Father's life at a whole new level, it will be your ruin, not your release (October 2003)

Religion Versus Relationship - When you wonder why the way we do church life today isn't fulfilling the deepest hungers of your heart...

  • Tree Town - A Parable For Our Times: A young man finds a book and makes all the wrong conclusions, until he discovers the key that unlocks the mystery. (November 2005)

  • The Third Road: Why walking in religion can't take us to the heights of God's joy and how the road to relationship not only leads us to righteousness, but to healthy body life as well. (June 2002)

  • The Nut Test: Learning the difference between relationship and religion and what relational Christianity looks like. (September 1997)

  • Painting Outside the Lines. What God is doing today in the lives of his people, may not always fit between the lines of our religious institutions. (November 1998)

  • The Same Old Story (January 2000): What God is doing to set people free from the tethers religion imposes on us and to soar to the heights of what it means to participate with him in his work in our world.

  • Daisy Petal Christianity. God doesn't ever want you to doubt again the immense depth of his love for you; nor for you to miss how to respond to it in a life-changing way. (March 1999)

New Testament Church Life - When you're hungry to find authentic BodyLife that allows believers to grow in love and freedom without being manipulated or abused...

    Relationships with Other Believers - When you're concerned about how to relate to other believers the way Jesus wants you to..

    1. The Real Question: How might we respond to the conflict between those who attend traditional congregations and those who look for more relational expressions of church life, that builds up the family, rather than further fragmenting it. (March 2006)
    2. In Exactly the Same Way (March 2000): The secret to loving like God loves, is to know how much you are loved by him.
    3. What about Him? Competition and how it affects our relationships with other believers (January 1997)
    4. Going to the Root - A summarization of a book that just might change forever how you view the church of Jesus Christ. (June 1996)
    5. Sharing the Journey: An excerpt from Wayne's newest book, co-written with his brother Clay, this chapter shows how pooling our wisdom can add great joy and wisdom to the journey. (July 2003)
    6. The Language of Community Highlighted excerpts from So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore, focus on the kind of things we can say to others to encourage them on the journey of living deeply in Christ. (September 2006)

    Relational Church Series - When you hungry to find alternative ways to look at the body Jesus is building and find a way to participate in it that will spur you on to the heights of living in Jesus. You can view these files in html by clicking on the title, or download them in pdf by the link provided. Many of these articles are also available in Tamil.

    1. Living in the Relational Church I: What would happen among believers who really saw the church in the same way God sees her? (July 1999) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    2. Living in the Relational Church II: A continuation of our look at the church as God views her and how we can truly participate in its life. (September 1999) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    3. Living in the Relational Church III The Spirit of Family: Why we don't experience more family life with other believers and what we can do about it. (September 2000) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    4. Giving and Generosity in the Relational Church (Relational Church IV): Tithing is only a shadow of a greater reality that Jesus invited his followers to experience in giving. (November 2000) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    5. Reasons to Run (Relational Church V): What do you do when relationships with other believers become a drag on your journey, instead of an encouragement? (March 2001) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    6. Why I Don't Go to Church Anymore (Relational Church VI): Questions and answers about the nature of the church in our day and how it is that we can relate it with life and vitality. (May 2001) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    7. Questions About Body Life: Look in on some of Wayne's correspondence as he helps people wrestle with the implications of relational Christianity. (August 2001)
    8. Why House Church Isn't the Answer (Relational Church VII): Those who look to House Church as a panacea for what ails the church may be sorely disappointed when they get there. What do we really have to fix for church life to be productive and powerful? (February 2002) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    9. We Already Have a Shepherd! Leadership in the Relational Church (VIII): How did Jesus intend leadership to function in his incredible family. (December 2002) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    10. Shared Dependence (Relational Church IX): Unless our dependency is squarely on Jesus and not on each other, we'll never know the beauty of church life. (April 2003) You can also download a pdf of this article.
    11. The Church That Jesus Builds (Relational Church X) Unless Jesus is our focus and passion we'll never discover what life can be like between believers who are sharing that passion together. Here are ways you can connect with the church Jesus is building around the world. (December 2004)
    12. Friends and Friends of Friends (Relational Church XI) Participating in the Life of the Church has less to do with rituals and doctrine as it does relationship. Here's a way to define the church that transcends all the organizations in which people try to contain it. (September 2007)

    Current Events and Trends

    • Going to the Root - A summarization of a book that just might change forever how you view the church of Jesus Christ. (June 1996)
    • Lessons from the Rubble: Thoughts on the terrorist attacks, their implications in our culture and how they can spur us on to every greater depths of relationship with Jesus. (November 2001)
    • The Most Exciting Days in History. A look at God's working in our day and how we can appreciate it, written by Kevin Smith a friend from Australia. (January 1998)
    • Once In A Lifetime... A trip to the Holy Land and lessons on trusting God with our lives (March 1997)

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