religion
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This is my father’s world
There’s something about the entire northeast being covered in a blanket of snow, everything frozen, everyone shoveling their way out, everyone subject to subfreezing conditions, everyone maneuvering through snow and ice, and everyone being exposed to the way the sun makes the snow sparkle and the ice sickles glisten – it gives me peace. This Continue reading
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Living Room Gods
we argue in our living rooms which lives are worth defendinglives of people we never met as if we’re godswe discuss genocide promised by one peopleand the mass murder committed by another peoplejudging which sin is worseas if we’re gods.we weigh the horrors some people experienceagainst the horrors another people experiencehorrors we’ve never experiencedO Lord, Continue reading
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timeless beauty
“… the King who paints beauty with time,” is a line from John Lucas’ song, Time, that keeps running through my mind. God made the earth in six days rather than one moment. God sanctifies over a lifetime rather than an instant. The God outside of time takes time to create beauty. Why? People inside Continue reading
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A Prayer for Election Season
May we be liberal with our prayers,and conservative with hasty comments.May we be liberal with our creative solutions,and conservative with our dead-end complaints. May we be liberal with genuine gratitude,and conservative with our glad-handing. May we be liberal with our kindness and respect,and conservative with our accusations. May our discernment be balanced,our ethics be consistent,our Continue reading
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Pyramid Schemes & the Church
Biblical Christianity is not a spiritual MLM. “For we do not market the word of God for profit like so many. On the contrary, we speak with sincerity in Christ, as from God and before God.”2 Corinthians 2:17 CSB The Biblical God does not need a pyramid scheme to be great. God was great before Continue reading
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Living Among
“Should we be sad or angry when someone is killed?” my four year old asked me this morning. I scooped another piece of shredded wheat onto my spoon. “Probably both,” I replied as I tried to gauge where the question had come from. I swallowed my cereal and then added, “Do you remember when Jesus Continue reading
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Serving a God Who Doesn’t Need Anything
It’s not a new to me, but it’s still hit me hard: God doesn’t need people to serve him. “The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, Continue reading
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God In Hell: An Unexpected Comfort
Several years ago, a non Christian told me that the belief that God can’t be in the presence of sin is unbiblical. At the time I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. What about God’s holiness? His purity? I let questions like these simmer in the back of my mind for years. Maybe God Continue reading
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Tangled Christmas Lights – Part 2
[Part 1 can be found here, and the TLDR could be that, untangling teachings around human depravity and humans being image bearers is even more daunting than untangling Christmas tree lights. I suggested that they can be untangled by rooting our identity in God’s work not ours. So rather than our core identity being sinners Continue reading
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Worms, Rags, and Inherent Worth
“Read it,” my three year old son said as he hands me the crumpled paper from his fortune cookie. “‘The value lies not within any particular thing, but the desire placed on that thing,’” I read. My daughter asked the natural followup question: “What does that mean?” I think many Christians have heard sermons about Continue reading
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Some Things To Leave Behind
Beliefs I’m realizing probably need to be left behind: The belief that my sin separates me from God (despite my profession of faith in the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross). The belief that “we can’t know the depth of God’s love if we don’t know the depth of our sin.” The belief that Continue reading
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The Space Between
I think we need to have a little imagination to have faith. Because faith in the gospel is embracing that there is hope. And hope is something we can’t fully see but rest and find joy in anyway. “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1 Continue reading
The Worth Of Knowing 