Summer is almost over in Kansas. The kids are headed back to school next week. That can only mean one thing: it’s almost football season. No, not that one, the other one, and to get yourself excited with me, here’s a little love from KC’s own Jason Sudeikis. So far my favorite lines are: “… ties and no playoffs… why do you even do this?” “Why you keep passing it backwards? What’s going on here?” “Would you explain to me... Read more
So I’ve never heard of Katie Hopkins, apparently she’s well known in the UK for being part of their apprentice reality show. However, I’m writing this book right now and in one of the chapters I talk about cheating and our ability to rationalize bad behavior. So I have a Google alert on the word “cheating” so I can watch what’s in the news. This article and the above clip came up yesterday. During her stint on the celebrity apprentice show,... Read more
Our family spent a week in Colorado on vacation a few weeks ago. It was a much needed break and we had a ton of fun together. The 2nd half of our week we spent in Breckenridge. BTW, you can get killer deals on condo rentals in Summit County in the summertime. We had been hiking and knocking around town for about a day when my oldest son said, “It’s weird. Everybody in this town is really cheerful and happy.”... Read more
We are working our way through Ephesians this summer at my church, preaching from a whole chapter each week. The discipline of dealing with Paul a chapter at a time is helping me keep a bird’s eye view. It feels like not getting lost in the details has been great for preaching. Nowhere is this more evident than in Chapter five, and the verse, “Wives be subject to your husbands.” These are part of the Haustafeln, or “house precepts/rules,” found... Read more
I confess that when I’m trying to write – blog posts, articles, books, sermons – I typically have to be in a place that has some energy and activity. Sitting alone at my desk in my office almost never does it for me. Over the years I’ve spent a lot of time at Panera. Summertime is a pretty busy season there, though, so lately my location of choice has been a small, out of the way McDonald’s. I’ll admit that... Read more
Earlier this summer my kids were playing little league, so we started watching some pro baseball, hoping to learn about the game. It’s been fun to be a Royals fan for the first time in a long time. I haven’t watched baseball much since 1994. Mr. K died in 1993, and the strike came in 1994. Since then mall market teams have been at a pretty serious disadvantage and the Royals have never quite been the same. I’ve been pretty ticked off... Read more
I’ve been reading about Edward Snowden since the story broke, wondering how I should respond. As of today, Russia has granted him a year’s asylum. The truth is that I’m not terribly concerned about the right to privacy and how it is violated by electronic surveillance programs, but I can certainly see how some might be. I’ve spent the past five years of my writing career arguing that individualism is running our society off the rails, so it’s hard for... Read more
Nobody listens to the low wage workers of the world… really… nobody. Lately their tactic has been to organize one day strikes to draw attention to their struggle. In recent weeks, employees having been staging one day walk-outs to make their point. What’s their point? Their point is that wages for CEOs in America rose over 16% last year to an average of $15 million/yr. Low wage workers have seen their wages flat line – no raise. Interestingly McDonald’s teamed... Read more
I confess that I’ve been on a bit of a digital fast for the past two weeks. My family and I went camping and hiking around Colorado for a week and them came home to just lay low and take it easy. It’s been a great two weeks and I’m feeling much more energized as I get to work this morning. Still, I have to confess that I wish I had another week off! I confess that Colorado has to... Read more
I confess that I’m on vacation for the next few weeks. I think I really need a little time off, so I might be a little neglectful of the blog. I confess that my rule of life says that I will spend somewhere around 22 days a year at Conception Abbey on retreat. I get 6 days at the abbey each year with the Associated Ministerial Order retreats. I’m supposed to take four study leave retreats, each around 3 days.... Read more
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