Why Evangelicals Need Lent

Last updated on: February 9, 2016 at 5:35 am By Tim Suttle

Evangelicals need to observe Lent, in part, because our troubling lack of tradition leaves us untethered from the past. A church without the great traditions of the faith is like a church with amnesia. Rejecting tradition means submitting ourselves and our churches to the tyranny of the relevant, the oligarchy of the innovative, and the arrogance of the avant-garde. More than ever before, the church needs to rediscover our tradition. When I say tradition, I don’t mean pews and organs and choir robes and classical music. Those... Read more

Is That God Or Peyton Manning? I Cannot Tell: Chris Thile’s Omahallelujah!

Last updated on: February 7, 2016 at 3:05 pm By Tim Suttle

Chris Thile is set to fill Garrison Keillor’s shoes as the host of A Prairie Home Companion, the faithful fans (of which I am one) have voiced some uncertainty as to how it would work. The show has long been a real musical variety show. The music has been truly live, and truly good for as long as I can remember, but the corny skits and melodramatic radio reenactments are the real draw. APHC is a throwback to the days before tv, and it... Read more

Franklin Graham and the Pain of Being the Son of a Great Father

Last updated on: February 3, 2016 at 9:16 am By Tim Suttle

Franklin Graham can be quite frustrating at times. Over the past few years, however, I’ve been feeling more and more compassion for him. There’s a great line from the movie Amistad. Two jaded White House staffers are making fun of John Quincy Adams. “What must that be like,” one of them asks, “knowing all your life, whatever your accomplishments, you’ll only be remembered as the son of a great father?” I think of that line of dialogue every time I read about the... Read more

Nate Silver On Why Iowa Matters for Trump & Sanders

Last updated on: February 1, 2016 at 9:38 am By Tim Suttle

Why should just a few hundred thousand voters taking part in a bizarre caucusing ritual in a demographically unrepresentative state have such a massive impact on who runs for president? It seems pretty shady, but that’s a whole ‘nother question. This time around Iowa will probably have a big impact on the campaigns of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. Nate Silver cited five reasons on his blog today. Here’s a synopsis of what he said: 1. Iowa results will dominate... Read more

Surely Religious Voters Aren’t Falling for Trump’s Routine?

Last updated on: January 29, 2016 at 10:19 am By Tim Suttle

Sleight of hand has always been a big part of American politics. Donald Trump is pulling one of the greatest illusions in recent history, and his newest target audience is evangelical Christians. According to recent Pew Research, when compared to the rest of the electorate evangelicals are five times more likely to consider a candidate’s faith when they vote. During the last presidential election this posed a serious conundrum for evangelical Christians. A devout Mormon was running for president, which was a problem for... Read more

Thomas Merton on Suffering

Last updated on: January 26, 2016 at 10:15 am By Tim Suttle

No Man is An Island is slowly becoming my favorite among the many writings of Thomas Merton. This book is a deep well. Today I was reading from Chapter 5, “The Word of the Cross,” in which Merton explores the role pain and suffering plays in human life. This is a quick summary of what Merton is teaching me today. Some of these are Merton’s thoughts, and some of them are mine as Merton prompted reflection. To tell the difference, you will have to... Read more

Ten Great Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes On Non-Violence

Last updated on: January 18, 2016 at 9:23 am By Tim Suttle

“The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral; begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can... Read more

The First Word of 2016 Goes to Wendell Berry

Last updated on: January 1, 2016 at 8:04 am By Tim Suttle

If Wendell Berry were editing the aphorism, “Hell is other people” it would become, “Hell is busy people in search of something more, or something else… Heaven is a good friend.” On this first day of 2016 we do well to consider these hells and heavens that we inhabit, that we have made of the world. “Hell is in business here all the time,” Berry says, “Heaven too, or we couldn’t stand it.” I was in the audience the evening the video below was... Read more

New Dictionary Words for 2015: An A-Z Snapshot

Last updated on: December 30, 2015 at 7:52 am By Tim Suttle

Words, language, meaning, narrative… these are things that I love, and that are essential to human culture. The English language is not a fixed point. Words come and go, and usage of old words is constantly changing. The path our language takes as it progresses can tell us a lot about our culture. Here’s a quick look at a few of the words we officially embraced in 2015 – one for every letter of the alphabet. autotune: The correction of an... Read more

Sermonsmith Episode 60: Tim Suttle – Conversations About the Craft of Sermon Preparation

Last updated on: December 29, 2015 at 6:54 am By Tim Suttle

Sermonsmith is a podcast dedicated to celebrating and learning about the rhythms, workflows, tools, and prayers used by the people who are deeply engaged in the art of sermon writing. It’s creator and host John Chandler, a church planter and part-time web developer from Austin, generates a bi-weekly podcast that is straight forward: John interviews pastors and ministry leaders about their approach to the task of sermon preparation. There’s virtually no aspect of the peculiar art form of sermon writing that John has not mulled... Read more