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I get the same answer almost every time: “Bible study and prayer.” The scene looks like this: I sit down over coffee with a student who’s stuck in their walk with Christ, bored with the Christian life, and struggling to hear from or care about Jesus at all...

Poor is such a confusing word. We normally think of poverty as a bad thing, the kind of thing that shows up in shock-value statistics like 43 percent of people in the world live on less than $2 a day, or poverty causes the deaths of 22,000 children a day.

Mary’s song in Luke 1, traditionally called the “Magnificat,” is, for me, one of the most astonishing and challenging passages in the Bible.  

For the Urbana 12 Worship Team, food is very important. This is true theologically as we use the dinner table as a metaphor to discuss worship culture, but it’s also true practically as we get to know each other and celebrate different cultures over our meals.

In this month of Advent, our thoughts usually turn to Jesus and Mary. Yet lately I’ve found that I’m more drawn to Elizabeth. Perhaps it’s because I’m older. Or maybe it’s because I know what it’s like to yearn for something and then to see days, months, years pass without having that yearning fulfilled.

Advent is about longing. It’s a time to remember the Israelites’ years of waiting for the Messiah, and to focus on our own longing for a deeper sense of Emmanuel in our daily lives as well as for Jesus’ return.

I moved to Madison, Wisconsin, from the western Chicago suburbs six weeks ago based on a strong sense of God’s leading. I didn’t get an angel or nine months of planning like Mary did—both of which would have been nice.

Have you ever had God answer a prayer you prayed for a long time? Have you ever had God answer a prayer in a surprising way?

Would Jesus eat frybread? That was the question 150 Native American students and staff from around the country gathered to discuss November 9–11 in Window Rock, Arizona (the capital of the Navajo nation).