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On choosing to live insightfully
“So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is” (Ephesians 5:17). When Alice came to a fork in her road, she asked the Cheshire Cat, “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” The Cat replied, “That depends a good deal on where you want Continue reading
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Under the broom tree
It’s an ancient and deeply human question, as relevant today as when the psalmist put it into words three millennia ago. “When the world falls apart, what can the good hope to do” (Ps. 11:3 ICEL)? Or as Eugene Peterson paraphrased it in The Message, “The bottom’s dropped out of the country” and it seems Continue reading
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Hearing voices
Today I confess openly what I’ve never told anyone directly, not a counselor or spiritual director, nor my ordination committee, nor Bishop Miller or any bishop, nor any church council. I came close to telling Pastor Jeff, but so far he has not spilled the beans. But today I confess to you: I hear voices. Continue reading
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Everything has become new
You may have seen artist Charles Allan Gilbert’s depiction of an elegant young woman seated at a vanity, admiring herself in the mirror. With a slight shift of perspective, the image becomes one of a human skull. Gilbert’s art is more than a trick for our eyes or a comment on vanity. It’s also a Continue reading
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Have you eaten from the tree?
Picture the parent, arms akimbo, confronting the young child. “Have you been eating chocolate?” The child, face covered with chocolate and a “Who, me?” expression, answers, “No, not me!” Now intensify that scene several hundred times, and imagine God calling to Adam in the garden, “Where are you?” and Adam, knowing he’d been caught, trying Continue reading
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Raising Ebenezers
The question Nicodemus asked was only slightly different from the one you and I might have asked. “How can anyone be born after having grown old?” (John 3:4). Another version might be, “Once I’m settled in the familiar ways of the world, how can I give everything up and begin a whole new life?” Or Continue reading
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Grounded in love
“In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” (Isa. 30:15). For as long as I can remember, those words from Isaiah have spoken to me at some deep level, and my appreciation of them continues to grow and deepen. Mind you, I don’t yet fully understand Continue reading
The Sauntering Pilgrim 