Jun 23
Times of transition are tough. We currently find ourselves up to our ears in boxes and and clutter and mess as we prepare to pack up and head back across the Rockies next week to begin a new chapter in our lives as family. We have done this moving thing a number of times now, but it never gets easier. It is simultaneously celebratory, reflective, disorienting, emotionally exhausting, and painful. Read more
It is an odd thing, I have discovered during my nearly three years as a pastor, to be entrusted with people’s pain.
It’s not an everyday occurrence, but today pain came calling. Two conversations with two people, both carrying crippling burdens of hurt and despair, sorrow and longing, both dealing with the complex cocktails of physical, spiritual, mental, and relational pain that characterize so many lives, both searching desperately for a word of hope, comfort, or encouragement. Read more
Each year, one of the most significant parts of the Regent Pastors Conference for me is when we take the Lord’s Supper together as our last act before going our separate ways. Given some of the themes that I reflected upon in my previous post, this year was no exception. Read more
Not a lot of time for blogging this week as I’m in Vancouver attending the annual Regent College Pastors Conference. As always, it’s been great to get away and enjoy a time of worship and intellectual stimulation in the beauty of springtime in Vancouver. A few loosely connected reflections, coming out of what I have seen and heard so far this week… Read more
Over the last couple of years, my kids have periodically asked some variation of this question: “Who made God?” Usually, in response to their queries, I have stumbled and bumbled my way to an unnecessarily complex and probably not entirely satisfactory explanation of divine aseity (well, I don’t use the word, necessarily). Come to think of it, my explanations almost certainly aren’t satisfactory because the question seems to keep popping up. Read more
Apr 15
My previous post was, perhaps, a bit long on what I don’t (or didn’t) like about the word “pastor” and short on what is good and positive and substantive about the vocation. Chalk it up to my incorrigible “glass-half-empty” perspective! Or something like that. At any rate, my estimation of the pastoral vocation has been on a long and steady trajectory of rehabilitation, not least due to my encountering of inspiring examples of what it can and should be along the way. One of them, Frederick Buechner, captures much of what I was trying to convey in my post—both the potential pitfalls inherent to the position as well as the wonderful opportunities and privileges that can be part of a life with and for God and others—in this passage from Telling Secrets: Read more
Apr 12
I finished Eugene Peterson’s The Pastor last night while waiting for the kids to finish up at piano lessons. It was a good book (if a little more hortatory than one might expect from a memoir) and I am grateful for the window that it provided into the life and career of a man I admire greatly. Perhaps unsurprisingly, over the course of reading Peterson’s memoir I have found myself reflecting often upon this peculiar vocation called “pastor” that I have found myself in, how I ended up here, and what I understand it to be. Read more
Apr 1
Today was an interesting day, characterized by a number of rewarding yet demanding conversations with passionate and intelligent people wrestling with some of the deepest and most painful questions of life. Among these questions, was the question of death—how we are to understand it, certainly, but, more importantly, how we are to live with and despite it, especially when faced with the loss of someone close to us. Words often seem like meagre tools indeed when faced with the monstrosity of death, but as I sit in a quiet house ushering another day out the door, reflecting upon what it held, and snooping around in some old books, these words about death from Peter Berger hit home: Read more
I spent a bit of time this morning listening to an interesting little interview with Eugene Peterson over at NPR’s “Books” page. The interview accompanies a short excerpt from Peterson’s new book, The Pastor: A Memoir—a book that is in the mail, and that I am very much looking forward to. Unfortunately, Eugene Peterson wasn’t on campus much during the three years I spent at Regent College so I did not have the privilege of taking a course with him, but his books have been a lifeline to me over the course of my first three years in pastoral ministry (I’m thinking specifically of Under the Unpredictable Plant, Working the Angles, and Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work). Peterson’s consistent refusal to allow the pastoral vocation to be accommodated to the logic and demands of the marketplace (I believe “religious shopkeepers” is the term he uses) is an inspiration and a challenge. Read more
Last Thursday afternoon was an afternoon like many others, for me. The workday was winding down; I was cleaning up a few loose ends before heading home to take my daughter to the pool for swim club. In many ways, it had been a good afternoon—nice and quiet, mostly uninterrupted, and ideal for sermon writing and reflection. Read more
I was pleasantly surprised to discover that my post “Pockets” has been featured this month over at High Calling’s “Around the Network.” It’s always nice to be recognized—especially in the context of writers and thinkers whose work you respect and admire. Be sure to check out some of the other posts that are highlighted as well. I’ve only made it through a few so far this morning, but I have thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated each contribution I have read. Read more
A post by Andrew Stephens-Rennie over at Empire Remixed has got me thinking about confession. My sense is that confession is seen as something of a dirty word in our culture, conjuring up all kinds of unpleasant images of nosy priests and slavish religious rituals meant to assuage unnecessary guilt. Confession isn’t a popular concept in a self-obsessed culture suspicious of religious power and those who wield it and where we seem to almost instinctively think of ourselves as victims of the myriad forces that act upon us rather than active and willful contributors to the brokenness of our world. Read more
Over on a previous post, there has been an interesting conversation going on about the nature of preaching and the role it plays (or ought to play) in the life of the church. A number of issues have been raised, but among the more interesting (and personally relevant!) ones, from my perspective, is the extent to which the task of preaching is used to legitimate the existence of religious “professionals.” Read more
I preached my thirty-sixth sermon yesterday, which, in and of itself, is not a particularly momentous number or occasion, but which nonetheless, was an experience that provoked a bit of reflection. Preaching is a practice that has taken some time for me to grow into. I still find it incredibly odd that people actually entrust me with twenty minutes of their precious time on Sunday morning. And I often think that God has an incredible (or incredibly weird?) sense of humour in sticking the introverted kid who talks too fast and stutters too much in front of a microphone every Sunday. Read more
Nov 16
Well, I just returned from a wonderful week away and am spending a good chunk of today slowly wading through a very clogged in-box! One of the more humourous discoveries I have made thus far in my wading is this cartoon sent by a friend last week.
As is so often the case, it is funny because it is true… Read more
Sep 15
Richard Dawkins famously opens chapter two of The God Delusion with the following oft-quoted, adjectivally promiscuous salvo:
The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all of fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully. Read more
Ordinarily, I am entrusted with the task of preaching once per month but because of summer holidays and staff vacations I find myself in middle of preparing three consecutive sermons. I am enjoying the opportunity, but I am also gaining an appreciation for those whose regular task is weekly preaching! As I sit down this morning to begin preparing for next Sunday, a couple of quotes that came through my inbox last week are bouncing around in my head. Read more
One of the best things about being a pastor is simply the opportunity to hear people’s stories, and to see the many and varied ways that God has of drawing people to himself and his purposes. Yesterday I was in conversation with a person who is on the journey from a dark and destructive past to a more hopeful future. This person continues to have struggles and has many unresolved issues and unanswered questions, but they are walking in the right direction. It was good to hear their story and to be able to offer a bit of encouragement. Read more
 | Bart Velthuizen on The Helpers of Rahab |
| The Helpers of Rahab… on Ellipsis | |
 | paulhikes on Castles of Regret |
 | Sharon on Give Praise |
| inquisitivelypinkcd4… on The Irrelevant Moral Stra… |
