Dear God: You say this: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.” I do this: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pMZqMNNQJE[/youtube] Well, maybe not exactly. I believe in you. And I wouldn’t blow out those candles. But like Frank Underwood I know I’ve essentially prayed “to myself, for […]
Faith
My Lenten Confession: Day 4
Dear God, Today I get to do something I love to do: lead a retreat. And lead it with a good friend, no less. And yet, even in my excitement, saying yes to this good thing means saying no to a few others. And I hate that. My FOMO is rearing its ugly head. Forgive […]
My Lenten Confessional: Day 3
Dear God, Forgive my meanness. Forgive me for the times I think mean things, the times I say mean things, the times I do mean things. Forgive the times I bypass being kind or offering grace or simply taking a deep breath and indulge in the wicked rush that is a well-time jab or a cruel cut down […]
My Lenten Confessional: Day 1
So I’ve been pushing around topics every which way about my desire to talk about our sins—to get the “big” sins, the “tiny” ones, the public ones, the secret ones out there. For a while I thought it was the Reformed coming out in me (I do so love to talk about our depravity—how else […]
Sinners Welcome Here: My Hope for the Church
Last fall, I was invited to be part of a Christianity Today International’s Hope for the Church project. An idea that encourages Christians to think more about what the church should be for, instead of against. I was happy to take part in this–especially since my role was simply to think up a hope (not hard, […]
Is Grumbling A Sin?
As soon as I said it, I knew it could be trouble. So as soon as I said–during an interview on Moody Radio’s Midday Connection–that Jesus “did some grumbling” in the Garden of Gethsemane, I made a mental note, prepared to get some push-back. Not from the hosts–Anita Lustrea and Melinda Schmidt, who understood what I […]
