http://www.ReviveCoachingGroup.com/, https://kurtbubna.com/

Kurt Bubna, 20970 Lupine Avenue, Bend, OR (2026)

06/11/2026

“Moving is one of the few life events where excitement and grief can ride in the same truck.”

I read that recently and thought, Yep. That’s exactly what this season feels like.

Katherine and I are in the middle of a move right now, and at my age, that’s not something to take lightly. Thankfully, we’re only moving about an hour outside of town, not across the country. Still, moving is moving, and the boxes don’t seem to care how old you are.

Moving consistently ranks among the top stressors people experience in life, and I understand why. It’s physical and emotional.

There are boxes everywhere. Endless decisions. A to-do list that seems to reproduce overnight.

But beneath all of that is something deeper.

Every move involves loss.

You leave familiar rooms, familiar routines, familiar memories. You say goodbye to a chapter of your life that can never be revisited in the same way again.

At the same time, there is excitement. New possibilities. New adventures. New stories waiting to be written.

That’s the tension. Grief and anticipation sharing the same space.

This move has reminded me of a few things.

First, you can’t do everything at once. Take the next step. Then the next one. Most mountains are climbed one step at a time.

Second, exhaustion is real. Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is sit down, breathe, and rest.

And third, don’t neglect your soul while you’re managing your schedule.

In stressful seasons, quiet time with Jesus isn’t a luxury. It’s oxygen.

The boxes will eventually get unpacked.

The chaos will settle down.

The new place will begin to feel like home.

But the peace we need most doesn’t come from having everything organized. It comes from staying connected to the One who walks with us through every transition.

You may not be packing boxes or moving across town like some people, but if you’re carrying a heavy load, please give yourself grace

Focus on what’s right in front of you and trust God with the rest.

One faithful step at a time is enough.

06/09/2026

Hope is one of the most powerful forces on earth.

Not because it changes our circumstances overnight, but because it gives us the strength to endure them.

I’ve sat with people whose lives had fallen apart. Adult children failing. Businesses in bankruptcy. Dreams collapsing. Health diagnoses they never saw coming.

What struck me wasn’t that their pain was different than most; it was that some still had hope.

And those who had hope kept moving.

I was once hiking in dense fog in the mountains. Visibility had shrunk to just a few yards. The trail ahead had disappeared. The valley below was hidden. The summit was nowhere in sight.

At one point, I was tempted to turn around.

Then the fog shifted for just a moment.

Only a moment.

But it was enough to reveal the next section of the trail.

Not the entire route. Not the destination. Just the next few steps.

And that was enough to keep me moving.

Hope often works that way.

It doesn’t always show us the whole picture.

Sometimes it simply gives us enough light for the next step.

Human beings are remarkably resilient when they believe there is a reason to keep going.

But when hope dies, motivation dies with it. We stop fighting. We stop dreaming. We stop believing our efforts matter.

As one writer wisely observed: “Hope is seeing a light beyond the present moment even when you’re still walking in the dark.”

I don’t know what you’re carrying right now.

Maybe you’re waiting for a relationship to heal.
Maybe you’re grieving a loss.
Maybe you’re staring at a future that looks nothing like the one you planned.

Hold on to hope.

Not because everything will magically work out exactly as you want.

But because hope reminds us that today’s reality is not necessarily tomorrow’s reality.

As long as hope remains, there is still a reason to take one more step.

And often, one more step is enough.

06/07/2026

What if we’ve accidentally taught people that truth is only as trustworthy as the person delivering it?

That thought has been rattling around in my head for a while now, sparked in part by something Tullian Tchividjian recently wrote.

I’ve noticed a pattern over the years.

A pastor, author, or ministry leader spends decades teaching, writing, preaching, and helping people. Churches recommend their books. Small groups study their material. Sermons are shared. Lives are impacted.

Then a failure becomes public.

Sometimes it’s a moral failure. Sometimes it’s an abuse of authority. Sometimes it’s a scandal that leaves real damage in its wake.

And almost immediately, the conversation shifts from what they did to everything they ever said.

Articles disappear. Online sermons are removed. Resources are quietly retired. Entire libraries of content can be treated as though they never existed.

I remember watching this happen after the fall of Bill Hybels. Whatever conclusions people reached about his leadership and actions, there was a noticeable effort in some places to distance themselves not only from the man but also from years of teaching that had previously been embraced and promoted.

And I understand the instinct.

Nobody wants to appear supportive of harmful behavior. Nobody wants to minimize sin or excuse serious failures.

But the older I get, the more I wonder if we sometimes confuse the vessel with the message.

When we discover that a teacher has failed, should we reexamine what they taught? Absolutely.

Sometimes, unhealthy beliefs, manipulation, or distortions of Scripture show up in the teaching itself. Those things should be confronted.

But if a message was true before the failure, what exactly happens to that truth afterward?

Does wisdom cease to be wisdom because the person sharing it later fell short?

Does truth become less true?

The reality is that God has always worked through flawed people.

Abraham lied.

Moses lost his temper and killed a man.

David committed adultery and arranged a murder.

Peter denied Jesus when it mattered most.

Their failures were real. The consequences were real. God did not pretend otherwise.

Yet God still spoke through them.

Not because their sin was insignificant, but because the power of truth never rested on the perfection of the messenger.

Thank God for that.

Because if every truth spoken by an imperfect person had to be discarded, we would eventually throw away much of what we’ve gained throughout church history.

Every one of us has blind spots.

Every one of us has failures.

Every one of us has parts of our story we wish weren’t there.

Truth does not become untrue because the person speaking it turns out to be deeply flawed.

And that is good news.

Because the messengers, sooner or later, may disappoint us.

But truth stands or falls on whether it is true. Not on whether the person speaking it eventually fails us or not.

06/05/2026

A wise person once told me that growth doesn’t require perfect conditions.

For example, plants don’t wait for pure water, perfect weather, or ideal circumstances before they begin to grow. They simply keep reaching toward the light.

Maybe there’s a lesson in that for us.

Not every word spoken over your life will be encouraging. Not every opinion will be helpful. Some people will misunderstand you. Others may see only a small piece of your story and assume they know the whole thing.

That’s okay. Your job isn’t to manage every opinion.

Your job is to keep growing.
Keep learning.
Keep healing.
Keep becoming the person God created and destined you to be.

The people who flourish in life aren’t those who never face criticism or setbacks. They’re the ones who refuse to let those things define them.

They lose jobs, endure disappointment, watch dreams fall apart, and sometimes carry the weight of mistakes they wish they could undo.

But they keep moving forward. They learn, heal, adapt, and refuse to build their identity around their worst day.

Remember, the Voice that matters most isn’t the noise around you coming from the crowd or your negative self-talk.

It’s the quiet one reminding you not to give up.

It’s the One calling you onward.

06/04/2026

Grace does not hit a magic delete button.

It does not erase consequences.
It does not rewind history.
It does not pretend damage never happened.

Grace does something far more costly.

It stays.

Grace carries people through the consequences of their sin instead of abandoning them to be crushed by it.

That distinction matters.

One of the quiet sins of hyper-religious Pharisees is assuming they can read another person’s heart. We watch behavior. We analyze words. We measure tone. Then we issue a verdict.

But Scripture is clear. We do not know the heart. Only God does.

Maybe that is why James writes, “Mercy triumphs over judgment.”

Maybe that is why Jesus says, “Forgive as you have been forgiven.”

Not after the evidence satisfies you.
Now.

We say we believe in grace, yet we often demand proof before releasing someone from our judgment. We want visible change. We want reassurance that forgiving them will not make us look foolish.

That is not the way of the cross.

The way of the cross is the death of our need to be right, our demand for control, and our desire for vengeance.

Even from the cross, Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”

Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 13 leave little room for spiritual harshness. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love keeps no record of wrongs. That chapter was not written to romanticize weddings. It was written to correct believers who were acting cruelly in the name of being right.

This does not excuse sin.
This does not minimize harm.
This does not remove consequences.

It clarifies roles.

We are not judge and jury.

We are witnesses to grace.

Our role with the fallen is not to police repentance. It is to pray for mercy, extend grace, and forgive because we were forgiven, not because someone met our conditions.

Yes, fruit matters.

But forgiveness is not contingent on what we see.

Grace moves first.

That is the scandal of it.
That is the cost of it.
That is the way of Jesus.

And anything less might feel righteous.

But it is not love.

06/03/2026

Grace does not always sit well with how we like to think about ourselves.

Grace strips us of credit and leaves us with one honest reality.

I brought the mess.
God brought the rescue.

That is sometimes difficult to swallow and easy to forget.

Especially after you have walked with Jesus for a while.
You clean some things up. You grow. You start making better choices.
And slowly, quietly, something shifts.

You begin to act like you had more to do with your salvation than you really did.

Not out loud. You would never say it, but underneath, it creeps in. And you start thinking too highly of yourself.

Thankfully, grace cuts through our pride.

It reminds us that our salvation and growth are real, but not our trophy. We earned nothing through our performance and good behavior.

So, grace and mercy are not just words we dust off in sermons or quotes.

They are the whole foundation.

Without grace, there is no answer for sin.

Without mercy, there is no hope after failure.

And here is the part that steadies me when my head and heart drift: If I was not the source of my rescue, then I do not have to be the one who sustains it either.

God is not asking you to become impressive. He is asking you to stay humble and honest.

You sometimes still bring the mess.
And He always still brings the rescue.

Remembering this will help you keep your self-righteousness in check.

Stay anchored in grace. It is the beginning and the end of it all.

Of everything with God.

06/02/2026

I’ve failed at love more times than I care to admit.

Maybe that’s exactly why I need to talk about it. Because I’ve seen what conditional love does to people. It crushes the soul.

Conditional love says, “I’ll love you if…” or “I’ll stay as long as…” It keeps score. It whispers that affection must be earned, and when we fall short, it pulls away.

Fear-based love is exhausting. It walks on eggshells, afraid of saying the wrong thing, doing the wrong thing, or being the wrong kind of person.

It’s not really love. It’s anxiety wearing a mask.

So how do we love someone when they’ve failed us? How do we love someone we no longer trust?

Those are the questions that tear us apart from the inside. I’ve wrestled with them when forgiveness felt impossible and grace felt foolish.

And the challenge remains: to keep our hearts soft enough to forgive and to wish the other person well, even when trust has been lost.

That’s the difficult, holy work of love.

To see someone’s flaws and failures, maybe even the ones that hurt you deeply, and still pray for their healing and God’s blessing.

To release bitterness without reopening old wounds. To choose compassion over contempt. Not because they deserve it, but because Jesus loved us that way first.

“God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

Paul writes, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.” (1 Corinthians 13:7-8)

That kind of love isn’t about ignoring pain. It’s about refusing to let pain have the final word.

Conditional love focuses on performance. But people fail. When we make love about perfection, we stop practicing grace.

Unconditional love doesn’t mean becoming a doormat. It means refusing to let fear, disappointment, or failure define the story.

Loving like Jesus isn’t about pretending trust was never broken. It’s about seeing the person beyond the breaking.

And when we let go of love that depends on performance, we begin to understand the kind of love that redeems, restores, and renews.

05/31/2026

Near the end of his life, John Newton, the author of the song "Amazing Grace," said he remembered only two things clearly: that he was a great sinner and that Christ was a great Savior.

I don’t think I’m that close to the end of my life, but I love his statement!

Because most of us spend our lives trying to soften one of those truths. We either minimize our sin or minimize our need for grace. We want just enough honesty to sound humble, but not enough to feel exposed.

Newton didn’t do that.

This was a man who had lived hard. Failed miserably. Carried real regret. Yet even after becoming a pastor and writing that well-known song, he still wrestled with feeling unworthy of mercy.

That's me sometimes, too.

But perhaps you can relate? I’ve met a lot of people who love God, go to church, read Scripture, pray… and still quietly feel like outsiders to grace.

They watch other people talk about freedom and peace while wondering why they still feel stuck, ashamed, or disqualified by their past.

I understand that feeling more than I wish I did.

But one thing Jesus makes painfully clear in Luke 15 is this: the Father moves toward broken people, not away from them.

The prodigal son expected a lecture.
He got a robe. A ring. A feast. And a welcome home.

Meanwhile, the self-religious older brother stood outside grumbling.

That should tell us something.

As Tim Keller once wrote:
“God’s love and forgiveness can pardon and restore any and every kind of sin or wrongdoing.”

Any.
Every.

That means your failure may explain part of your story, but it does not get to define your future.

05/30/2026

Still

The birds still sing through falling rain,
though heavy clouds stretch wide with pain.
They do not wait for skies to clear
before they lift their song to hear.

The sun still rises, sure and bright,
behind dark clouds and out of sight.
Though shadows hide its steady flame,
the dawn still comes just the same.

The roots grow deeper through the cold,
through winter’s silence, stark and old.
Though nothing blooms for eyes to see,
new life is forming quietly.

And so it is when sorrow stays,
when night seems longer than our days.
When answers fade and hope feels thin,
and fear grows loud enough to win.

There is a work we cannot see,
a quiet shaping patiently.
A hand still moving through the night,
preparing what will come to light.

The rain will pass. The clouds will break.
The sleeping earth will stir awake.
What now seems buried, still and deep,
is gathering strength beneath its sleep.

So do not let the darkness say
this hidden season is decay.
Some things grow strong where none can see,
becoming what they’re meant to be.

Keep singing through the falling rain.
Keep trusting through the silent pain.
For just beyond what clouds conceal,
the light is rising.

And it is real.

05/29/2026

Sometimes the thing that blows my mind most about God isn’t WHAT He does, it’s WHO He wants.

God wants a relationship with me.

Let that sink in for a second.

Me. The guy who still stumbles over the same sins he swore off last week.

Me. The one who argues with God, who doubts, who drifts, who gets distracted by shiny objects and nonsense.

Me. Broken, stubborn, inconsistent, foolish, sinful me.

And yet… He still wants me.

Not my cleaned-up version. Not my Sunday smile. Not my Instagram highlight reel.

Just me.

That’s what wrecks me in the best way. The Creator of galaxies doesn’t need me. But He longs for me. Not because I’ve earned His love, but because His heart beats for relationship.

Grace like that consistently amazes me and sends me to my knees in tears.

We despair when people cancel us and get lost in self-pity. We chase people who barely text back, but God keeps calling even when we ghost Him. That’s love on another level.

“See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are.” 1 John 3:1

If that doesn’t stir something in you, check your pulse.

By the way, God’s not looking for perfection. He’s looking for presence.

Yours.

Kurt Bubna

06/11/2026

06/09/2026

06/07/2026

06/05/2026

06/04/2026

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