In a Self-Righteous Religious Culture, Brennan Manning Reminded Us ‘All Is Grace’ (from the Huffington Post)
The news of Brennan Manning’s death last Friday left me reminiscing about the first time I heard him speak 20 years ago in a college chapel. He bounced around the stage with a shock of white hair, the most God-awful Scotch-plaid sport coat ever blended in a mill, all paired with polyester green pants that didn’t even come close to matching. I recalled his illustration...
Nomadic Book Club Tour is coming to Your Neighborhood: Spring/Summer ‘13
I wrote in Holy Nomad that you can (and probably should) be nomadic from the very same zip code; in the spirit of that idea, I am hoping to join your book club, reading group, small group, or church study for a discussion of Holy Nomad: The Rugged Road to Joy via Skype over the next few months. I am really looking forward to the chance to connect and share our exploration of what...
“Pruning for Lent” (from Busted Halo)
I set out not long ago in a search of the way of traveling what Jesus calls “real life” or “life to the fullest.” This nomadic expedition toward a life of joy (which I describe in my book Holy Nomad) led me to my own backyard, where I stumbled onto the divine teaching of an apple tree. As Lent approaches, here in the belly of a lifeless, ashen, Midwestern February, I wish...
“A Call for the Christian Imagination” from Relevant Magazine
It doesn’t take long as a Christian to realize there’s a wide and ugly gap between the bare-walled reality we feel captive to and the joy Jesus offers. But I have realized the tension of this dilemma is something Jesus acknowledged in His Sermon on the Mount—and in it, we find we already possess one of the most useful tools in this journey toward real and lasting joy. Jesus...
The Story of Christmas Reminds Us to Believe in Each Other (from the Huffington Post)
We rarely spend enough time focusing on the completely human element of scandal surrounding the birth of Jesus. According to the moral teachings of the day, not only did Joseph have every right to break off his engagement with his mysteriously pregnant future wife, but by all accounts, Mary could’ve been stoned in the village square for infidelity. The religious folks of the day...
We are Lazarus (from the Catalyst Blog)
I am captivated by the story of Jesus teaching in the countryside when he receives word that one of his closest friends, Lazarus, has fallen very ill. I’m not sure I’ll ever understand why, but He doesn’t seem compelled to rush home to help. A couple of lines later, He tells the twelve guys in his inner circle matter-of-factly that Lazarus has “fallen asleep.” This is...
Where was God last Friday? (Reflecting on the tragedy in Newtown) from Huffington Post
I stood in the hallway watching students file from school last Friday and shared the shock and horror brought on by the breaking news from Connecticut with my teaching colleagues. As a father, my heart was broken over and over this weekend as each new little face, each family, every new angle of the story unfolded. I was left with some pretty unmanageable questions watching the...
Wandering Through Advent
Although we rarely slow down to consider it, most of the time we live as voyagers moving about solely for the sake of discovering the next temporary provision. Our lives will certainly look a lot like that over the next few weeks as the Christmas shopping frenzy commences. We will scurry about, our fingers freshly stained with Black Friday advertisements, participating in the mad...
A Tale of Two Fridays
I walked through a local store just days after Halloween and heard “Joy to the World” floating softly from the speakers. The lyrics about hope and preparing our hearts melted like snowflakes on warm October sidewalks, amid the heated rush toward sale signs and busy employees wearing Santa hats. I paused before the beauty of that Advent song juxtaposed against the chaos...
Holy Nomad featured in the Patheos.com Book Club
I wanted to take a moment to pass along a couple of thoughtful reviews of Holy Nomad: The Rugged Road to Joy from the talented bloggers over at Patheos.com: From “The Cultivare Blog” by Kyle Roberts: “I suppose this book falls in same genre as The Ragamuffin Gospel (Brennan Manning) and The Sacred Romance (Brent Curtis and John Elderidge)–sort of a combination...
IS THIS REAL-LIFE? ACTORS ON A DIGITAL STAGE
“My cousin John and I sat around my Aunt Debbie’s farm one evening laughing about social media updates when we invented a grand scheme. We were going to make up a person. Not any person, but an extraordinary person named “Renaldo” and try to pass him on to as many Facebook friends as possible. Renaldo was going to churn out the most captivating status updates...
Living a Board-Game Spirituality?
“I generally avoid playing monopoly. Not just Monopoly, but any board game that includes the kind of setbacks like “Go to Jail” that will take you back to the first step of the contest. Many of us spend our spiritual lives under the oppression of a board-game suite of rules. We allow our missteps to immobilize us. A momentary collapse or indiscretion becomes a...
Faith and the Power of Imagination
The passing of the founder of Apple last year spawned thousands of headlines and stories about his life. I love to read about the innovation and imagination of his technology empire. I remember an article that claimed Apple executives imagined things like FaceTime, Siri, and the iPad twenty-five years ago… when phones were still attached to cords and plugged into the wall,when...
Finding Freedom in a CRASH
Stephen King begins a story with a main character who felt that life was smiling at her. She was mistaken, he writes, Life was actually baring its teeth, ready to bite her. That is the nature of life. It hits us hard at the times we least expect it. There is always a deep and affecting silence in our souls after such a CRASH. In Holy Nomad, I write that it is often a CRASH in our...
Finding Space for Joy In This Very Moment
I was writing in the kitchen while my two youngest were playing in the next room. I noticed my daughter coming in and out of the hallway bathroom suspiciously, so I took off my headphones to listen. She was carefully filling a ceramic teapot with water and taking it into the next room. Her older brother was sitting patiently with her (playing along) when she slowed her busyness...
Remembering the “Eternal” Legacy of September 11th
After viewing some of the 9/11 memorial coverage, I grabbed Bruce Springsteen’s album The Rising and listened to it onmy drive. One of the songs titled “Into the Fire”waswritten (at least I assume) in the perspective of a loved onewho lostone of the firefightersthat day: The sky was falling and streaked with blood I heard you calling me, and then you disappeared Into...
Early Reviews & Endorsements for Holy Nomad: The Rugged Road to Joy
It is still over a month before the official release of Holy Nomad: The Rugged Road to Joy. The final page proofs of the book are just now being sent off to the printer in time for September release. I’ve been very excited by some of the early (and very gracious) endorsements & reviews. I wanted to take a moment to share them with my friends in hopes that you might pass...
I Am a Rough Draft
I was a little put off when one of my friends peered at me suspiciously over the dark frames of his hipster glasses and commented, “YOU are writing a book about being spiritually nomadic?” Later that evening I thought his disbelief seemed warranted when I had a blow up at my kids over something extremely trivial. I finished my upcoming book (Holy Nomad, September 2012...
Fear’s Forecast: Mayan Calendars, Financial Ruin, Terror, War (Learning to Live a “Ridiculous” Faith)
I came across an “alarming” headline from a very conservative financial planning group the other day about future of the economy. The banner of the article inspired some anxiety about the coming year. The script read a little like this: Dr. Peter Venkman: “This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.” Mayor: “What do you mean, ‘Biblical’?” Dr...
Climbing Mount Kilimanjaro (The Power of our Shared Story)
“I have always felt life first as a story–and if there is a story there is a storyteller.” –G. K. Chesterton We all offer our own unique and essential part of a larger story. But, this is true of every great quest. Think about your favorite stories: Frodo does not set out on his own, he travels with the Fellowship. Peter may be High King of Narnia, but not...
