David Brooks recent NY Times article entitled "The Great Divorce" speaks of what is becoming on of the largest issues of our day, not just because it's an election year, but because it's a real issue. Brooks reveals the dramatic shifts in American culture between 1963 and the present, noting that, while there's always been a gap between wealth and poverty, in previous eras that gap wasn't accompanied by a behavior gap. Brooks writes, "income gaps did not lead to big behavior gaps. Roughly 98 … [Read more...]
Co-illumination: Preaching from the text of life
January 6, 2012 By 5 Comments
This Sunday, I'll be starting a new series at our church entitled, "Every Square Inch: Blessing the World through Culture Reading and Vocation". In this series I'll be preaching from the book of life, a book that's declaring eternal truth, every day, all around us. In spite of this constant revelation, the reality is that our hearts and minds are so fragmented that we usually don't hear what God is saying to us through culture. We're grown up believing that God's truth is found in the … [Read more...]
Hope for the New Year: Let’s get beyond “NO”
January 2, 2012 By 1 Comment
If history tells us one thing, it's that humans are good at saying NO to systems that don't work. If our species were a single body, we'd have an excellent immune system. When oppressive regimes arise, it's only a matter of time until they collapse. The weight of their own corruption weakens them until an uprising from the masses leads to regime change. The toppling of empires is nearly always welcomed with fanfare. We like burning flags, and effigies, and toppling statues. There's … [Read more...]
Spiritual Fashionistas: It’s not about the clothes – it’s about the body in the clothes
December 5, 2011 By 1 Comment
I just returned from a worship service here in Austria on this 2nd Sunday in Advent. Though I understood only a few dozen words, I wanted to be there both to worship, and because of my friendship with the pastor (we had a discussion about Austrian church history, and you can view it here). It was beautiful and by beautiful I mean many things, not the least of which is that it was utterly appropriate for the Austrian culture. The church choir sang two numbers, and Austrian singing is … [Read more...]
The whales and Isaiah: finding God’s vision for living (Part I)
October 17, 2011 By 5 Comments
Back in the '80s, I moved from Los Angeles to a small island, a jewel of green set amidst the glorious beauty of Puget Sound. I moved there to lead a small congregation of evangelical Christians as we, together, tried to learn what it meant to be the presence of Jesus in that place. At the time, Christian's ire was directed against a vague emerging spirituality that was labelled "the new age movement." Those railing against the movement taught that you could recognize this dark spiritual by … [Read more...]
The political problem: policy trumps people
October 14, 2011 By 10 Comments
I posted this picture on my Facebook account recently and oh my! People do feel strongly about Wall Street, and the Wall Street occupiers, about personal responsibility, government incompetence, and who's to blame for the mess we're in. My friends fall broadly into two camps: BLAME THE GOVERNMENT. We're in this mess because the banking system is greedy and corrupt, and the government is either: a) spending too much; b) beholden to special interest groups; c) in bed with a global economy … [Read more...]
Churches are dying because young people are shut out. Let’s fix this.
October 10, 2011 By 4 Comments
Churches are strange. If a steel plant closes in a Rust Belt city, you can be sure that there won’t be a new one opening in the same town where the one shut down. And yet, when it comes that thing called “church,” we’re living in an era when 3,500-4,000 churches are closing their doors in America every year. At the same time, there are roughly the same number of new churches opening their doors each year. As a result, we’re in this very strange time when established churches … [Read more...]
People are hungry–is the church feeding them?
October 4, 2011 By 3 Comments
NOTE: I'm going to be blogging over at Patheos, at least for a few months. If you're a Patheos regular, welcome to my blog, I'm a pastor, teacher, author, writing about how Christ changes everything. "Today’s generation are demonstrably less content, and consequently less optimistic, than those that went before. They work longer hours, with less security, and less chance of leaving behind the social background into which they were born. They fear crime, social breakdown, … [Read more...]
“Individual Morality” = Oxymoronic Half Truth
September 14, 2011 By 11 Comments
A recent NY Times editorial exposes the reality that emerging generations have almost no sense of ethic and morality because, as they've been taught by our culture, "morality is a personal, individual matter." It appears that, aside from the most obvious moral issues, such as the wrongness of rape and murder, 18-23 year olds have no consensus on issues like cheating on a test, driving drunk, or cheating on one's partner. When asked about the rightness or wrongness of situations that, in other … [Read more...]
“Individual Morality” = Oxymoronic half-truth
September 14, 2011 By 7 Comments
A recent NY Times editorial exposes the reality that emerging generations have almost no sense of ethic and morality because, as they've been taught by our culture, "morality is a personal, individual matter." It appears that, aside from the most obvious moral issues, such as the wrongness of rape and murder, 18- to 23-year-olds have no consensus on issues like cheating on a test, driving drunk, or cheating on one's partner. When asked about the rightness or wrongness of situations that, in … [Read more...]
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