Man of Sorrows! what a name For the Son of God, who came Ruined sinners to reclaim: Hallelujah! what a Saviour! Bearing shame and scoffing rude, In my place condemned he stood, Sealed my pardon with his blood: Hallelujah! what a Saviour! Guilty, vile, and helpless, we; Spotless Lamb of God was he; Full atonement! can it be? Hallelujah! what a Saviour! Lifted up was he to die, “It is finished!” was his cry: Now in heav’n exalted high: Hallelujah!... Read more

Apparently not. Yesterday I wrote in this blog about the parking lot known as Chicago’s Edens Expressway. Tonight I cheerfully got on the Edens. Sat there, parked, buring three buck-a-gallon gas. I need to pay more attention to what I write. Read more

I’m watching the local news, and they’re showing a shot of the Edens Expressway. It is a solid line of cars, because they’re doing some kind of roadwork (6:15 a.m. is the PERFECT time of day to jackhammer some concrete). These shots of cars burning three buck-a-gallon gas while idling on the parking lots known as roads in Chicago are a daily fixture of life here in the Chicago area. The underbuilt roads are one of the worst parts of... Read more

So I wrote The Church For Skeptics: A Conversation For Thinking People. (The book is somewhere in the publishing pipeline/birth canal right now.) Thanks to my part-time job at the bookstore, I get to powerskim the new books coming on on the topic of church. There is a growing choir of writers singing a variation of the “`taint how she’s supposed to be aria: I tried church. I tried really, really hard. But the boredom, shallowness, politics and self-absorbtion of... Read more

Some people from my past have appeared in digital form in my present. Whether its a post on a blog or an unexpected e-mail, it’s been very cool to hear from them. One of those people has been my friend Judie. We began swapping e-mails this summer after a pause of several years. We’d been through some intense family and church stuff together, and though our lives had diverted, she always had a special place in my heart. Her blunt... Read more

After two months of internet semi-fasting in South Florida, I’m enjoying some Internet Water Ski time (hard to surf here in the midwest) as I get back into the swing of my writing life. Here’s a few links I’ve visited this week that’ll give you a few minutes of thought-provoking and/or hilarious reading: Brent Hansen’s Letters From Kamp Krusty is quickly becoming one of my “must reads”. The guy is funny. And anyone who’d pose for a picture holding an... Read more

There’s nothing like a road trip, is there? Last week, I drove from west of Ft. Lauderdale back home to Round Lake. I did the drive in two days – 11 hours the first day, 15 the second. This is not recommended unless you have a titanium behind. Which, apparently, I do. Here are some (wildly) random observations about this trip: (1) OTR truckers – how do they do it? (2) The last palm tree I saw as I headed... Read more

One of the great, sad tragedies of my mom’s life was the story of how her adoption was hidden from her until weeks before her wedding. Her mother had died shortly after giving birth to my mom, and my mom’s distraught dad couldn’t figure out how he could work and care for a newborn as well as his other child, a 9 y/o son. A distant cousin, unable to bear children of her own, stepped forward, offering to adopt the... Read more

If only it were this easy. I won’t be able to click my heels together, Dorothy-style, and go home. Instead, I’ll be driving a 99 Toyota Corolla from Ft. Lauderdale to Chicago… …soon. Home. Read more