A place to pray while you're away...

Well hey there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. Out among the vines, there's a season after a hard winter where everything looks bare — like nothing's ever going to grow there again. But a vine that looks dead in February can be heavy with fruit come August. It just takes longer than you'd like, and there's no shortcut through the waiting. That's about where I am with Keli

Hey there, friends. You're listening to A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel, just outside of Exira. Grief has a way of making you doubt things you've never doubted before. It crept up on me, too, in the quiet weeks after we buried Keli — a nagging, low-grade fear that maybe the promises I've preached my whole life were easier to say than to trust. Paul understood that ache. He wrote to the Thessalonians about grief plai

Well hello there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. I want to tell you about Job's friends — and for once, I mean that as a compliment. Everybody remembers Job's friends for all the wrong advice they gave later on. But before any of that, Scripture tells us this: "They sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that h

Hello again, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. There's a verse in the Bible that's only two words long, and lately it's meant more to me than passages ten times its size. "Jesus wept." — John 11:35 Jesus is standing outside His friend Lazarus's tomb. He knows — He knows — He's about to raise him from the dead. And He weeps anyway. I used to wonder why that verse was even in

Well hey there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. I owe you an explanation for my silence these past weeks, and I'd rather just tell you the truth than pretend I've been too busy. This spring, I lost my best friend, Keli, to cancer. I'm not going to pretend I've had much to say into a microphone since then. Some seasons, the words just don't come — not because faith disappea

Hey there, friends. You're listening to A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel, just outside of Exira. Out here among the vines, I've learned something that took me a while to really understand: a vine doesn't prove itself healthy by how it looks in April. It proves itself by what it produces come harvest. That's exactly what Jesus was getting at with the chief priests and the two sons in Matthew 21. It's not the leaves. I

Well hello there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. Jesus said something to the religious leaders of His day that must have landed like a slap: "Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you." — Matthew 21:31 Now think about who He's talking to. Not the outcasts. Not the folks everybody else looked down on. He's talking to

Hello again, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. I want to tell you about two sons and one vineyard. A father tells his first son to go work the field. The boy says "no way" — and then goes anyway. He tells the second son the same thing. That boy says, "Sure thing, Dad" — and never leaves the porch. "Which of the two did the will of his father?" — Matthew 21:31 Now here's what

Well hey there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine, and I'm Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel here in Exira. I want to tell you about a moment in Scripture where some very smart, very religious men got asked a simple question — and their answer was, "We don't know." Here's the thing: they knew. They just didn't want to pay the price of saying it out loud. In Matthew 21:23-27, the chief priests ask Jesus by what authority He's teachi

Well hey there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine , and I’m Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside...

Hello again, friends. This is A Word from the Vine , and I’m Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside Chapel...

Hey there, friends. You’re listening to A Word from the Vine , and I’m Pastor Loren from the Danish Countryside Chapel, just outside of...

Well hello there, friends. This is A Word from the Vine , and I’m Pastor Loren Christensen, coming to you from the Danish Countryside...

There’s a word the early Church used to describe the Trinity—a word that sounds like music: perichoresis . It means “mutual indwelling.”...

Let me tell you a story. Years ago, a young boy stood in his father’s workshop, watching him work with wood. The father was a master...

Hello, friends. Welcome to A Word from the Vine . I’m Pastor Loren Christensen. Today, I want to talk about the Holy Spirit—and what He...

Hello, friends. This is A Word from the Vine , and I’m Pastor Loren Christensen from Danish Countryside Chapel in Exira, Iowa. Today’s...

Welcome back to A Word from the Vine . I’m Pastor Loren Christensen, and today, I want to speak directly to the heart of the rural...

You’re listening to A Word from the Vine . I’m Pastor Loren Christensen. Let me ask you something today—not as a preacher, but as a...

Welcome back to A Word from the Vine . I’m Pastor Loren Christensen, and I’m glad you’re here. Let me start with a question: When did...