I led a Bible study Monday night at church looking at Mark 8 and the things that happened leading up to Jesus saying: After calling the crowd together with his disciples, Jesus said to them, “All who want to come after me must say no to themselves, take up their cross, and follow me. All…
As we finish up our first week of Lent, it seems a good time to offer some songs for the road. I’ve chosen songs that have come alive to me for one reason or another over the past months. Gillian Welch’s “One Little Song” seems a good place to start. gotta be a song left…
I have a growing collection of phrases that I have come across reading. I started writing them down just to see what they might become. One of them became the title of the poem below, though I’m not sure this is an ice cream shop I’d enjoy. the flavor of fear social anxiety a la…
This morning before church I read more of Seven Thousand Ways of Listening by Mark Nepo. He talked about how being on a snowy road one night sent him into a memory about his father. Nepo said, “When I returned to the snowy road, I wasn’t sure which road I was on.” Reflection on his…
spring forward it is a childish act of communal arrogance to think we can change what time it is simply by agreeing to do so the sun will be nonplussed in its rising and setting, no stars will be dismayed the moon will not be late we have given our folly a name that smacks…
I started a new book today. I haven’t finished any of the others I am currently reading, but that never stopped me before. The book is Seven Thousand Ways to Listen: Staying Close to What is Sacred by Mark Nepo. It was a gift from a church friend who knows about my struggle with my…
I saw an article several weeks ago that said a study had shown that people who surround themselves with books they have not read are better adjusted because they are continually reminded of all they do not know. I didn’t even have to finish the article to feel vindicated in my life choices. Right now,…
I’ve known this was coming for weeks. Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of my commitment to write every night during Lent. The mark on my forehead is a harbinger of marks on the page. But I wasn’t sure what I had to say, other than I meant to write more often during Epiphany. On the…
For many years now, my Facebook post on New Year’s Eve has been a line from a Counting Crows song: long December and there’s reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last . . . . I began to realize that next year never seemed to come through. It wasn’t better….
Somewhere along the way, and a long time ago now, I picked up a quote that has stuck with me: “The first rule of theology is there is a God and it’s not me.” I have no idea who said it, but it continues to ring true and it seems a fair number of Bible…