Skip to content

Posts from the ‘Jesus’ Category

Mar 18

3 Comments

The Grace Guy

I was asked to give a last-minute presentation at a regional denominational gathering last weekend. The guest speaker was ill, so a bunch of pastors were tapped to plug the gaps. 2025 has been designated as the 500th anniversary of the Anabaptist movement so this was a focus throughout the weekend. How we mark these things is, of course, at least somewhat arbitrary. The people who make such decisions have designated the beginnings of our branch of the Christian tree as the date of the first believer’s baptism in Zurich in 1525. But of course, threads of Anabaptist thought run throughout Christian history. And to whatever extent “Anabaptism” can be spoken of as a monolithic movement, the 2025 version looks very different than whatever was bubbling up in 1525. History is poorly behaved and stubbornly resists our desire for clean lines and unambiguous markers. Thus, has it ever been, I suppose. Read more

Mar 7

6 Comments

Where Can I Flee?

Around the circle at the jail recently we were talking about the God who meets us at our lowest point. It’s not particularly difficult for the guys to think about their lowest point. It’s not exactly a remote hypothetical for many for them. They’re living it. They’re at the bottom. They know precisely what most people think of them—they often think it of themselves. They are well aware of their weaknesses and proclivities, their addictions and destructive habits, their character flaws and worst impulses. They know who they are, they know where they are, and they know why. Read more

Feb 5

5 Comments

Christ Ruins (and Reclaims) Everything

For at least the last year or two, two Englishmen have been fighting in my head. Well, maybe “fighting” is too strong a word. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that my brain has been hosting a “lively discussion” between two visions of what Christianity might be in and for the world in the twenty-first century. These visions are not entirely incompatible with one another; there is significant overlap, to be sure. But they are different enough to cause some tension. And it’s a tension that I feel as one tasked with leading a church in these strange times. Read more

Dec 27

The Hunger for a Single Story

Around fifteen years ago, the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie delivered her famous TED Talk called “The Danger of a Single Story.” It was hugely popular and influential. It’s among the more popular TED Talks of all time, approaching nearly 40 million views at the time of this writing. In it, she talks about discussed the problem of reducing human beings and cultures to a single narrative. We are all more complicated than the “single story,” whether that story is what it means to be black or African (in her case) or any of the other identities that we associate with or are defined by. Human beings are complex. Human cultures are complex. A single story rarely tells the whole story. Read more

Dec 25

2 Comments

A Child

A child is placed here at the midpoint of world history—a child born of human beings, a son given by God. That is the mystery of the redemption of the world; everything past and everything future is encompassed here. The infinite mercy of the almighty God comes to us, descends to us in the form of a child, his Son. That this child is born for us, this son is given to us, that this human child and Son of God belongs to me, that I know him, have him, love him, that I am his and he is mine—on this alone my life now depends. A child has our life in his hands.

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

A very Merry Christmas to all who drop by here!

Dec 23

All In (Sing!)

So here we are at the doorstep of another Christmas. This is a time of year that tends to be drenched with an awful lot of hope and nostalgia and longing and kitschy expectation. The family will be together and the snow will be lightly falling and there will be candles and cheer and lights and the perfect present (always gratefully received) and funny movies and good food and hot chocolate and eggnog (or perhaps something stronger) and wistful smiles and everything will be magnificent. Christmas, perhaps like no other holiday, has a lot to live up to each year. Read more

Dec 12

5 Comments

Somebody Save Me

My son is a lover of music. He (annoyingly easily) learned guitar and piano as a teenager, but as a young adult his tastes have migrated more toward the electronic, and towards genres that his dad doesn’t necessarily share his appreciation for (EDM, hip-hop, even, somewhat bewilderingly and incongruously, jazz!). I often scratch my head and protect my ears from what loudly drifts up from the basement. Thus has it ever been with fathers and sons, I suppose. Read more

Nov 19

2 Comments

The God Who Touches Our Limits

To say that the library at the jail has an eclectic mix of reading material would be to put it mildly. Relying on donations, as we do, we get everything from Joyce Meyer books on the habits of a godly woman to decades-old biblical commentaries to Nick Vujicic’s biography to Paul Tillich. Throw in a smattering of stray Buddhist and Muslim resources and the inmates have a rather bewildering array of options. Read more

Nov 6

8 Comments

Wednesday Miscellany: On Freedom and Curiosity

So, another Trump presidency. Today, I have very conservative Christian friends and acquaintances who are exultant and triumphant. I have very progressive Christian friends and acquaintances who are utterly crestfallen and/or enraged. As anyone who has read this blog for more than a minute likely knows, I have a deep and abiding suspicion of politics on both the right and the left, a disdain for the way in which politics has become little more than tawdry entertainment and has hollowed out our social discourse, and a profound concern that for too many Christians, politics has become their religion. But I’ve written about at least some of these matters before, so I won’t go there today. Read more

Oct 23

5 Comments

The Heavy Burden of Freedom

I was recently leading a discussion with a group of young adults. We were talking about the Sabbath, about what it is, what it isn’t, etc. We were looking at the story from the twelfth chapter of Matthew’s gospel where Jesus healed the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath. We looked at his confrontation with the religious leaders, and pondered his famous words, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” Read more

Oct 17

14 Comments

But Please, Don’t Forget to Find the Human in Your Enemy

I’ve had a few conversations recently about Ta-Nehisi Coates’s new book The Message. Coates is, of course, massively popular due to books like Between the World and Me, among others. He was a correspondent with The Atlantic and has garnered a large audience due to his writings on social and political issues, specifically on matters of racial injustice and white supremacy.
Read more

Oct 9

What If it Is Our Fault?

One of my main tasks each Sunday during worship is to pray. Some Sundays, I pray extemporaneously; other Sundays I like to have something more formal, a scaffolding upon which to hang the various things we wish to bring before God and one another during worship. Last Sunday, for example, I used a formal prayer from the back of our hymnal. It was a good prayer. It covered a lot of territory from the global to the personal. It highlighted various aspects of God’s nature and character. It contained the familiar refrain, “Lord, in your mercy… hear our prayer.” Good stuff. Read more

Sep 12

I’ve Been a Good Boy!

Among the readings I encountered during morning prayer today was Psalm 17:1-7. It is a plea for divine vindication, protection, blessing, and favour from the pen of David. I have long had something of a complicated relationship with the Psalms. I know that the Psalms are the prayer-book of the church, that really smart and spiritual people pray them every day. And they do express the full range of human emotion. And they do contain some of the most beautiful and exalted language in all of Scripture. But sometimes the implicit theology doesn’t land. It strikes me as true-ish, but not true enough. Read more

Aug 28

2 Comments

Love for the Incorrigible

I’ve been slowly making my way through Marilynne Robinson’s beautiful commentary on Genesis. It’s called, simply, Reading Genesis, and those who know anything about Robinson or her work will not be surprised to learn that it reads rather differently than a typical biblical commentary. Her soaring prose, her seemingly effortless command of complex biblical, historical, and philosophical issues, and the ways in which she weaves all this together in conversation with an ancient text is marvellous to behold. Read more

Aug 22

8 Comments

Rocky Road

I occasionally remark somewhat playfully (but only somewhat) to my congregation that they are saddled with quite possibly the least “Mennonite” pastor in our denomination. They usually laugh politely and hope I’ll move on. Why do I say this, you may be wondering? Well, let me count the ways. Read more

Jul 16

8 Comments

Orphans

I saw a screenshot in the aftermath of the Trump assassination attempt on Sunday. Some academic somewhere saying something to the effect of, “So close!” The gleeful comments obligingly took their place below. Should have had better aim! Dammit, just an inch the other way. What a glorious day this could have been! Etc., etc. The screenshot was captured as a gotcha moment. Look at all these self-righteous “progressive” elites who claim to have the moral high ground, wallowing around in the mud of glorying in an attempted assassination. It was all so wearyingly predictable. And of course, if it had been Biden’s ear that was grazed, the same sad scenario would have been playing out in different corners of the internet that are emotionally invested in being perpetually aggrieved in other directions. We are, it has seemed to me for a very long time now, grossly and terrifyingly invested in who and how we hate. Read more

May 1

3 Comments

“God Can Always Survive the Hurt We Do Him”

A single word cuts through all the noise and bustle and bravado around the circle at the jail. It’s prayer time and the guys aren’t super focused. A few talk about upcoming court dates and girlfriends in rehab and various health concerns over the humming, buzzing banter. I’m loudly repeating the requests, struggling a bit to maintain control of the room. The word is spoken softly by a young man to my immediate right. He’s been a regular ever since he arrived on the remand unit. He has an intense curiosity about him, always leaning forward on his knees, always paying careful attention, always asking questions. He’s often one of the cheerier guys in the room, but he’s not smiling right now. He looks, I don’t know, thoughtful, pensive, a little sad as he speaks the one word that reduces the room to silence.

“Forgiveness.” Read more

Apr 26

3 Comments

Prometheus vs. Adam

I spent yesterday evening with a group of young adults discussing, among other things, what it actually means to love our neighbours. Do any of us go as far as Jesus wants us to? Or even come close? Do we love enough or as well or as consistently as we ought to? Do we serve or give or help or deny ourselves in meaningful ways? Or do we just become increasingly skilled at making excuses for why we don’t do more?  At one point, I think I said something predictably uninspiring, something that seemed to reek of middle-aged resignation and cynicism. Well, give all that a decade. Sounds like a recipe for burnout to me. Read more

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »