Practices Make The Church #Praxis15
I got an opportunity to join the good people at Praxis Conference in Houston this week. Some thoughts have been spurring. Every church is formed by the practices that they partake in together. The more…
Year: 2015
The Parable Of The Deathbed Conversion
There once was a man who was righteous, his name was Richard. Every single day of his life was dedicated to the Lord’s work. He raised his family in church, he operated his business honestly…
Giving Money To The Church Is Not Worship
Recently I saw this on a giving card that a church handed to it’s congregants. “WE RECOGNIZE THAT FINANCIALLY SUPPORTING OUR CHURCH, IS ONE OF THE WAYS WE WORSHIP GOD.” Underneath it was all the…
(Sometimes) Nonviolence Is Used To Control
I’m currently reading Culture and the Death of God. I’ve enjoyed Terry Eagleton in the past, especially in Reason, Faith and Revolution where he gives I think one of the best apologies for the Christian…
Can you Share The Journey Of Truth?
I’ve struggled with how much of my wrestling I can share. As a seen leader of a church congregation there is this expectation that you are extremely careful with what you share. Questioning the incarnation…
Christianity Is Not Absent Of Violence
I’ve been reading a lot about American civil rights movements and its leaders and the South Africa Apartheid. I’m reading this after having read enough of the nonviolence theologians and practitioners of Christianity. So I…
Two Temptations of Longing For Justice
If God exists and is active, if his will and action truly raised Jesus from the dead, then what we think and do and achieve as human beings is not the only thing that the…
Myth of Progress: Women
We like to think that we live in a progressive society, that we’ve come so far as a society and equality is at the forefront of our minds. One of the myths that we believe…
Committing to the South End
I wrote this article for the Sarnia Journal his past week. Keeping my thoughts to under 500 words and on topic has served to be good exercise in being concise and clear. Our values speak…
Maybe Violence Is Necessary Sometimes
For quite a while I’ve had the moral principle of non-violence being necessary for the way of the Christian. Taking cues from John Howard Yoder and Stanley Hauerwas I had come to the belief that…
Thinking vs Feeling In Regards To Empathy
I am predominately a thinking person. My wife endearingly calls me a robot because when situations arise that would for some evoke deep feelings, I tend to respond with logic rather than comfort. In a…
Imagine being uprooted from your home
My first piece written for the Sarnia Journal. If you feel like your rights are being trampled on for a situation like a barricade coming down – can you stop for one second and try…
Whoever Is Against You Is Not For You
A friend recently counselled me in regards to my post on Bethel and their fight against homosexuality that “the disciples wanted to call down fire on some folks and Jesus counselled a different approach.” This…
Action Precedes Belief Only Once You’ve Been Enlightened
We start life where the way we live informs the way we think. We are raised as children and then eventually grow into adults and we only know life how we experience it. The majority…
Thinking Further And Acting Better Than Bill Maher On Muslims, Terrorism and The Charlie Hebdo attacks
Bill Maher has been growing in popularity as of late. People are really jumping on his no-shit direct opposition to religion. In particular, he was recently on the Jimmy Kimmel show where he stated that…
The Goodness and Badness of Guilt and Grace
This morning we chatted a bit about guilt, shame, repentance, confession and this quote: The one way of not doing anything about a situation is feeling guilty about it, because when people feel guilty about…
New Years Sermon: On Meaninglessness and Setting Goals
Let me start with a story. This is taken from Caesura Letters. Philosophies for Sale is a clever dialogue written by Lucian of Samosata, a second century satirist. It is a story about an auction…