Advent Ghost Town, Part Three

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

Those two lost Christmases, really, are a metaphor for all the lost time of my youth and young adulthood. Lost time that remains a sort of ghost town in my memory, a desolate expanse lurking underneath and sometimes surfacing, triggered by sights and sounds and…holidays. — Coming to terms with near lifelong emotional and spiritual abuse – that includes extensive time in cult-like environments with heavy control, manipulation, and harm from parents/leaders – is a liberation in the most literal... Read more

Incarnational Boundaries

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

As the season of Advent rolls on, we inch closer and closer to the moment of release, when our waiting gives way to the celebration of Incarnation. Simply put, Incarnation means embodiment. It’s the idea that in the Messiah divinity became forever intertwined with humanity, and the original purpose of the pinnacle of creation – humankind – was reified and super-fulfilled. That is, because of Jesus, our entire embodied reality was affirmed as holy and spiritual, even as we are invited... Read more

Advent Ghost Town, Part Two

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

The thing about Incarnation is that it treats humanity like it’s divinity. Both my abuser and Brother Dawson believed in their “merismos” – a grand division between humanity and divinity, an almost complete separation of soul from spirit. Continually making this separation and opting for the divine personality within us, they thought, was the key to a truly spiritual life. To deny and suppress the intellect and the emotions and the will for the sake of the spiritual way (as defined... Read more

Advent Ghost Town, Part One

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

For the longest time I was made to believe that something was fundamentally wrong with me. Not just that I was “imperfect” or even “sinful” but that, specifically, individually, deeply, at the core of my personality, there was a terrible, and probably irreparable, flaw. That flaw can’t be explained in propositions like some kind of diagnosis, because it wasn’t created by propositions. It was created, virtually ex nihilo, by a person, working in all the demonic media available to him in... Read more

The War on X-Mas

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Guest Contributor

“You know me, I am no fan of the term Xmas or X anything. I make my kids play Christ-box 360. And if they break a bone they get Christ-rays.” – Stephen Colbert There is a severe case of what I call “Camel-Gnat Confusion Syndrome” (CGCS for short) in some circles of American Christian culture. This particular malady takes its name from an episode where Jesus is bewildered by how religious leaders make silly distinctions between what’s right and wrong... Read more

A Covenant in Sans Serif

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

So I have this tattoo. Sometimes, when my sleeve isn’t rolled up quite high enough, it says COVEN. Pretty sure that’s the reason it caught the attention of some folks at an event last week. They came over to inquire. I revealed the full word and told them the meaning. They took the picture. Fact is, the tattoo was inspired by the work of my favorite theologian, N.T. Wright (who coincidentally also inspired my second child’s middle name). Tom Wright... Read more

Not Perfect Leaders, Humble Leaders

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

There’s no such thing as a perfect leader. Every leader makes mistakes, every leader has done hurtful things, and every leader is on a trajectory of development. If we believe in leadership at all in the church – and I, for one, do – then we’ve got to be real about the fact that no one is going to do it exactly right. No, not even one. And if your perspective on leadership is based on the expectation of perfection,... Read more

The Strangest Fire

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

I grew up charismatic, in the 80’s and 90’s. I grew up in a family that joined a pioneering kind of Pentecostal stream flowing out of the Jesus Movement of the 70’s, a stream that had strong pastoral personalities founding brand new churches, some of them mega, and even denominations, schools, TV stations, and seminaries. Part and parcel of this pioneering experience was an atmosphere of resistance from the non-charismatic church. There was a kind of scorn that developed among... Read more

Why I am Conservative AND Progressive

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

A recent conversation on Twitter got me thinking about how I find myself straddling the line between what folks might call “conservative” and “progressive.” Now, my definition of “conservative” here is more literal than political. I’m not saying that I am conservative in the sense of identifying as a political – whether social or fiscal – conservative. The entire American conservative political movement is fairly repulsive to me. Listening to the local evangelical (read: baptized American political conservative) radio station... Read more

Watching an Episode of Celebrity Christianity

Last updated on: August 16, 2018 at 2:21 pm By Zach Hoag

They might as well just rename the show, “Celebrity Christianity” instead of Preachers of L.A. Because this is the definition of celebrity values corrupting the very core of the gospel to the degree that it is really no gospel at all. In my previous post on the topic, I argued that despite the spiritual claims and the apparent concern for compassion causes among many participating in this trend, Celebrity Christianity is really a counterfeit. While supposedly seeking to help disadvantaged... Read more