In order to grasp this great truth, the first thing we need to do is to get off our human high horse. We aren’t all that, especially when you compare us to the world of trees.

It’s remarkable how many transformative words stay locked within the walls of our churches. Our messages are beautiful, life-changing, and somehow secret. Our ideas are available only to those who know our addresses and trust us enough to step inside.

As we enter 2024, there is deep apprehension and fear about the pending presidential election this fall in the United States. How do we stay connected to our faith in such anxiety ridden times?

What do we do with the memories that haunt us? That sneak up on us late at night.  And whisper words that cut quick to our core?

The message of the angel is as scandalous and striking now as it was then. For in it is embedded God’s message in the death and resurrection of Jesus: to trust and believe in the invincibility of the good in spite of the titanic reality of evil, because God is good all the time.

Home is a place, yes, but it's also a commitment, a demand that God's justice would unfurl here and now, a faith that expects to taste God's grace in the people and the places where God has planted us.  Home is a feeling and a commitment.

Be not conformed to this world, the Bible says, but be transformed by the renewing of your hearts. Or, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. What are those conforming things that we should be watching out for? What keeps us from freedom?

Prayer seeks the good and well-being of others. It is an act and expression of love as we lift someone or some circumstances before the God whom the Bible says is love. And that is not only a matter of expression. It leads to and undergirds outward action.

I know some countries and companies are flirting with 4 day work weeks, or 6 hour workdays and finding increased happiness and productivity among their employees. They aren’t being lazy, but have learned what I have - there is so much more to life than work. 

A close reading of Mark 12: 41-44, especially interpreted through the lens of the Law found in Deuteronomy (14:22-29), stirs up important questions about an often used stewardship approach that interprets this as an object lesson from Jesus regarding individual, sacrificial giving: a person of limited means asked to give generously beyond their livelihood. 

We've had to rebuild all of our systems for who we are today. I don't know that we would've had permission without that kind of isolation to rethink some things that probably needed to be rethought, frankly.

A one on one interview with Pastor Erika Spaet exploring the challenges of planting a church and building relationships between the congregation and the community in an ever-changing world.

Journeys are less often about the goal, and more frequently about the experiences it takes to complete them. Such are the spiritual journeys that we embark on, but they are more than they seem. They can reveal things we do not expect, and like a dream, hold a unique significance for each of us.

Trying to make sense of “this generation” can be fraught with misapprehension. Many things are different, yet many things remain the same. The Gospel of Matthew helps to reinvigorate our notions of modernity, and remind us of the place that children hold as descendants of faith and the new foundation for future discipleship.

What do we do with the memories that haunt us? That sneak up on us late at night.  And whisper words that cut quick to our core?

When reading Paul’s letters, the exegetical and theological mistakes we might make are numerous and often tragic, as we all know. The list of insights is significant, of course, but so too are the distracting detours and the deadly interpretations.

A one on one interview with Jessica Liles exploring the challenges of planting a church and building relationships between the congregation and the community in an ever-changing world.

Our first interview in the Leadership Lab series with Rev. Wesley Morris.

The parable of the talents then would become a commentary at large about an economy that uses people and values things rather than values people and uses things.

It is up to people like us to reclaim and rebuild the commons, what we share of what God has given us. And some of that rebuilding is of institutions.