Category: spiritual

  • Beauty and Love chasing after me

    Beauty and Love chasing after me

    It’s Psalm 23:6 in the Jewish prayer book, in Eugene Peterson’s Message version. Your beauty and love chase after me every day of my life. I seem to be far more naturally aware of other things chasing me. Aren’t we all? Work deadlines, home responsibilities, or things I ought-to be doing. Unfinished projects, a messy…

  • to look on him and pardon me

    I was singing the old hymn “Before the Throne” to my boys at bedtime tonight and one line is “for God the Just is satisfied / to look on him and pardon me.” Some of my Christ-following friends wouldn’t give this line a second thought, not seeing a problem at all. Some of my Christ-following…

  • the salvation of loss

    the salvation of loss

    I’ve heard a few stories of loss this week. No deaths or anything that would make the church bulletin prayer list, really — just more of your everyday, behind-the-scenes, run-of-the-mill kinds of loss. Loss of friendships. Loss of psychological bearings in a new season of life. Loss of inheritance. Loss of what were sunny expectations…

  • I need pastoring.

    I need pastoring.

    Yes, I need pastoring. But it’s not what you think. First, let me say that I think overall we’ve done a grave disservice to the title and meaning of “pastor.” Because when I say “pastor,” don’t you automatically only think of people who work at church buildings and deliver sermons on Sunday mornings?? It’s sad,…

  • Daily Strength for Daily Needs

    I have developed a bit of a habit of beginning my work day with just a few minutes of quiet. The more difficult my work, the more consistent I seem to be. Hm. Anyway, the few minutes of quiet are usually composed of something like read-praying, or pray-reading. (I’m not sure which.) I find myself…

  • how my thinking changed about devout orthodoxy when I watched a documentary on Hasidic Judaism

    how my thinking changed about devout orthodoxy when I watched a documentary on Hasidic Judaism

    I just watched a documentary that follows a few young Hasidic Jews as they struggle to leave their religious community and make a life on the outside. (All week long I’ve been imagining them as Hasidic-exodizers, leaving their Hasidic religious community for a different way of life. The irony is splendid – is it not?…

  • Ke$ha “Hymn”

    Ke$ha “Hymn”

    Have you heard Ke$ha’s new song, “Hymn”? It is quite beautiful. Hauntingly beautiful, in my humble opinion. I am embarrassed to say that if I would have heard this song in my twenties, it would have made me instantly angry, defensive, and judgmental. I would have gotten out my theological red pen and gone to work…

  • Jesus is different than you think.

    Jesus is different than you think.

    No matter in what country you were raised, no matter who raised you, no matter to what church you do or don’t go, no matter which Scripture passages are your token favorites, no matter how many books about Jesus you do or don’t read, no matter how aligned your theology is to whichever famous theologian…

  • every bouquet in the flower market

    every bouquet in the flower market

    Several years ago, I took a course called The History of [Christian] Doctrine. Our professor, Dr. John D. Hannah, said something that has always stuck with me. He said that, over the course of history, Catholics and Protestants walked through the same field of theological wildflowers, picking as they went. When they arrived at the…

  • I went to church 12 times this week.

    I went to church 12 times this week.

    But I didn’t go to a worship service for an hour on Sunday morning. Does it still ‘count’? DISCLAIMER: I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m at all bragging about my spirituality-infused life. I’m not. And I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m saying that hour long worship services on Sunday mornings are worthless. I’m…