Author: Nancy Cotterill

His name is really Jason Petty, but he’s known as “Propaganda.” A Los Angeles-based Christian hip-hop artist and poet, he grew up the only black child in a Mexican neighborhood and later a suburban all-white neighborhood. He was always the outsider and now seems especially equipped to reach across racial and cultural divides to bring…Continue reading “Propaganda” →

When Robert Lupton came to town to talk about his book Toxic Charity at the Faith & Action event earlier this year, we all got a lesson on how not to be benevolent. Yes, you heard that right. You see them at the airport in matching t-shirs. Generous people flying off on well-intentioned forays with…Continue reading How NOT to Be Benevolent? →

Cities are fundamental to God’s design and plan for the world. Although the Bible starts in a garden, it ends in a city. We saw the Word revealed in the big cities of the era through willing disciples who, you’ll notice, were not sent to the Gobi desert to preach to the sand, they were…Continue reading Raising the Standard in Indianapolis →

In 2007, Oprah Winfrey opened a $40 million school to educate 152 girls on a 22 acre site outside of Johannesburg, South Africa. Its 28 buildings offer the best educational environment, the best beds and even 400-count percale sheets, tested by Oprah herself. To me it is interesting that Oprah decided to build a school…Continue reading It Is Harder Here →

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — Indianapolis metropolitan police said a man died after a shooting in downtown Indianapolis early Thursday morning, marking the city’s 100th murder of 2017. Police found the victim with gunshot wounds on the sidewalk beneath the underpass at South Meridian Street just north of South Street. He was identified as Johnny Woods, 34….Continue reading They Heard Shots →

Jesus often spoke in parables—stories like The Good Samaritan taught us to cross the road to help others. As everyone knows, this wasn’t a story about a man walking across some asphalt, it is a story about stepping over differences, labels, and beliefs to fulfill the commandment to love our neighbors as ourselves. But the…Continue reading Christians: A Poor Advertisement for Christ? →

All told, the greater Houston area is huge, encompassing more than ten thousand square miles—bigger than New Jersey and inhabited by 12 million people. So the job of trolling to find and save thousands of people in snake- and even alligator-infested waters is not only ambitious, it is risky. Yet hundreds of people are rushing…Continue reading Not a “One and Done” →