November 9th is coming quickly. This disaster of an election cycle will be over soon, leaving us with the duty of picking up the pieces. Soon the question will no longer be “who?” and it will become “but now what?” — Last week I grabbed lunch with a church member nearly twice my age. He…
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I’m Not OK
It seems that for a few weeks every year I get in a funk. A “is-this-really-all-life-is?” kind of funk. A funk where I ask “who am I and what am I doing with my life?” but I struggle to land on an answer I like. A funk where nothing satisfies. Sometimes this funk is hard…
Shifting to Weekly Communion
Starting this Sunday our church is going to take part in The Lord’s Supper every week. For the entire life of our church we have only partaken of the bread and cup on a monthly basis, so this is a fairly dramatic shift in practice for us. Scripture speaks to the importance of Communion but there’s…
The Christian Power Complex
The story told in Luke’s gospel about two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus is striking. The story tells of these two downtrodden men, in disbelief that the man they had once believed was the Messiah, was now dead. But Jesus disguises his identity and joins these men for part of their journey to…
Following Jesus in an Evil World
A few months ago I chose a passage in Matthew 13 to speak on this past Sunday. The parable of the weeds highlights living with evil (righteousness and evil growing in the same soil), even though evil will, in the end, be thrown into the eternal fire. As events in Baton Rouge, then Minneapolis, then Dallas,…
The Inept Empowerment of Self-Expression
I read a news headline a week ago that said “breastfeeding bride nurses during wedding ceremony, getting praise from moms around the world.” At first I thought, “great work from The Onion on that one.” But no, it’s real. I have no intention of having a debate about breastfeeding. I simply want to make the observation about…