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Don’t Cheapen This Moment
Happy Holy Week to all who celebrate! Easter is right around the corner, and Sunday is, for lack of a better term, the Super Bowl. As a pastor, it’s basically the biggest day of my year. First, though, we have… Continue reading
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Of Swarms and Crawling Things
I purchased a new personal Bible on Saturday. It’s the CSB translation, but I’m not really a translation purist, especially for my own devotional time. What I really liked was that it had spaces on the sides for me to… Continue reading
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Independence Day
Independence Day The Life of Faith and the Death of 90s America Revelation 21:1-6 (NRSVUE) 1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea… Continue reading
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Ash Wednesday
Genesis 2: 4-25 4 This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens. 5 Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no… Continue reading
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We Cannot Fail
Paul, President Carter, and the Logic of Grace 10 In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, “Ananias!” “Yes, Lord,” he answered. 11 The Lord told him, “Go to the house of… Continue reading
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“Sermon Scraps” 2019 to 2024
See, Jesus understands that faith is not first and foremost a matter of knowledge. He knows that ‘love’, as in “Love your God,” and “Love your neighbor’ is not something people learn quickly. It’s something that takes a lifetime of… Continue reading
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Passion, Promise, and Joy
December 8, 2024: Passion Scripture: Luke 3:1-6 3 In the fifteenth year of the rule of the emperor Tiberius—when Pontius Pilate was governor over Judea and Herod was ruler over Galilee, his brother Philip was ruler over Ituraea and Trachonitis,… Continue reading
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Darkness, and Light
Darkness, and Light This post contains stories of my experiences as a hospital chaplain, including those of the death of children “Did you see any miracles?” This question was directed to me by a member of my church in the… Continue reading
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9-11 Is Not History
Please be advised that this post relates to the events of September 11, 2001, which was a hard day for many people, and to the experience of violence more generally. The words herein are offered, not in a spirit of… Continue reading
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Believing Well, Part 2: For the People of God
Trouble in Paradise For three of my four college summers, I worked as a camp counselor at a small Christian camp an hour away from my parents’ house. And I loved pretty much everything about it. I loved the environment–being… Continue reading
Gladness and Hunger 