Before I say anything else today, I have to express how deeply heartbroken I am for Las Vegas and those who were tragically killed and those who are fighting for their lives in the hospital. My prayers go out to them and their loved ones as we all struggle to wrap our minds around this tragedy.

I hadn’t heard what happened until I arrived at the T.V. studio after I’d dropped my daughter Caroline off at school and then I immediately saw the headlines on all the screens in the waiting room. And all I could think is that it feels like there is heartbreak everywhere right now. As a nation, in just the last month, we’ve watched the devastation left by hurricanes, the constant fighting about anything even remotely political, and now this latest tragedy in Las Vegas where so many lives were cut short.

Honestly, it all feels like too much. Too much hurting, too much fighting, too much sadness and too much tragedy.

But it also embodies the very heart of what I wanted to share as I wrote Church of the Small Things because what we’ve also seen are neighbors helping neighbors, ordinary people stepping up to make a difference in the lives around them in a million small ways. What’s going on in the world right now can seem so overwhelming and too big for any one person to handle, but each of us can impact our small corner by loving our family, our friends, and asking God to show us what he’d have us do this day right where we are with what he has given us.

David killed a giant with a slingshot he already owned.

A widow saved her family with a little bit of olive oil that was already in her house.

A young boy shared his lunch and it fed 5,000 people.

Jesus changed the world with twelve men. He didn’t even have an Instagram account.

That’s the heart of this book and study. Never underestimate what God can do with a willing heart in the midst of our seemingly small lives and offerings. Let’s love our families and friends, let’s treat each other with kindness, let us embrace this one brief, wild ride we’ve been given on this earth and make it count in a million small ways.

This is my fourth book, and my first Bible study, and I still can’t wrap my head around this whole process of launching a book out into the world. I hope you love it. 

And I hope you will consider signing up for the online Bible study with my new friends at Study Gateway. I'm thrilled to be partnering with them to make the videos available to you for free for six weeks, and to give you some other fun goodies from the book! If someone had told me even a few years ago that I would write a Bible study, I would have told them that was absurd. But it reminds me what God can do with all the small pieces of our lives.

God has more for us than we could ever imagine in the church of the small things. We just have to look for Him there.