God is not a tool in our hands. He does not exist to serve our goals, our metrics, or our platforms.
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03/23/26
The gospel isn’t for the strong but people who know they aren’t.
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03/20/26
One great thing about our post-denominational age is that it has opened up opportunities to make common cause with other Lutherans who, despite their differences and eccentricities, can agree on some of the most important things.
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01/17/15
The task—the joyful task!—of the interpreter is to go around the house, trying various keys in various doors, until they are all opened. This is one way to picture our reading of the Bible.
01/08/15
“No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” These are the words of Jesus to a man who promised to follow him after saying good-bye to his family in Luke 9:62. Tough stuff.
01/05/15
I thought I had it all together. I had my life figured out. Even though outwardly I was serving God, inwardly I served only the god named Ego. My heart was the shrine at which I bowed the knee.
01/03/15
That’s what I mean when I say that I’ve struggled with atheism. And still do. The suffering me becomes the questioning me who becomes the doubting me who becoming the unbelieving me.
12/24/14
I know it’s a rite of pious holiday passage to complain about the commercialization of Christmas and to remind everyone to keep the “Christ” in Christmas. And don’t forget the secular “war on Christmas." Whatever.
11/16/14
Ultimately, however, I fell in love with traditions—and specifically, traditional worship—for a single, overarching reason: its components, to varying degrees, are all in the service of the Gospel.
11/12/14
Generally, we call that path the lectionary. I’m a big fan of the lectionaries in general. They do several things.
11/06/14
Yet as we mourn, but unlike those who have no hope, so also we repent, but unlike those who have no absolution. For we though we weep, there is a hand that dries all tears.
10/04/14
From creator to priest, our God now moves, from forming animals to slaying them, all so that His Adam and His Eve might remain truly His.
08/26/14
I didn’t know it, in fact I consciously rejected it, but the truth is that throughout those years, both in times of success and failure, God was up to something.
08/05/14
This summer, I made my first trip to Europe since 1984. One of the things I signed up to do was a food tour of the Marais District of Paris. My guide Catherine took us on a circuit through a small area of a neighborhood showing us the best in many food categories.
07/11/14
Because I do care now, and will care even after I’m with the Lord, here are some things I hope and pray are not said at my funeral. I care about those who will be there, about what they will hear.
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