My career as a bully was short-lived and thankfully so. I was probably 13 when I decided to try pushing around a kid a year or two younger but half my size. I figured he’d […]
Category: Worship
Complainitude
There is no end to the opportunities to complain. And there are days when I avail myself of almost all of them. I didn’t sleep well. The weather sucks. My cereal ran out. I bit […]
A Sabbath perspective
“Frank is mowing his lawn! He’s breaking the Sabbath!” My son was just five years old at the time and scandalized by our neighbor’s flagrant disregard for observing the Sabbath command. His dismay mirrors most […]
The place where you live
As a kid, going to church meant getting dressed up in uncomfortable clothing. Wool pants. Shirts buttoned up to the collar. Clip on ties. Dress shoes. My Sunday best was my Sunday torture. I didn’t […]
The gospel according to Kanye (part 2)
On Friday morning, I looked at my phone to see a text waiting for me. It was from my 17-year-old son who is taking a semester abroad, living with several families in Mexico. He was […]
Psalm 99 & the King of the World
Kings and queens don’t mean much to us today. The British royal family makes the news from time to time, but it’s usually because of their clothing styles and romantic escapades. They are almost completely […]
Psalm 135
A rendering of Psalm 135, a call to praise the real God who created the world and is actively involved in the world, unlike the empty concepts of “God” people make for themselves.
Psalm 108
(A David psalm for singing.) My heart won’t quit, God, Won’t get distracted. I’m here to sing. Yes, to make music, To give you my utmost. Wake up, piano! Wake up, guitar! I will wake […]
Psalm 100
A rendering of Psalm 100, a favorite call to worship which reminds us that thanksgiving — the gift of thanks — is an everyday activity.
Psalm 98
A rendering of Psalm 98, which is a call for all creation to join in a vast exclamation of praise to Yahweh who has remained faithful to his covenant love-bond with his people.
Psalm 66
A rendering of Psalm 66, where personal struggle and rescue are seen in the light of what God has done in history, rescuing his people after they have struggled.
Psalm 65
A rendering of Psalm 65, beginning with praise for God in the temple and then heading outdoors, where all of creation joins in the Creator’s praise.
Psalm 84
(Worship leader: A Korah family psalm to be playing on that guitar from Gath.) The sweetest place on earth Is your house, Yahweh of heaven’s armies. My soul longs, Famished, Ravenous For the place where […]
Psalm 57
A rendering of Psalm 57, an exquisite David poem of worship written in the middle of terrible circumstances.
Psalm 22
A rendering of Psalm 22, a prayer in the middle of feeling abandoned by God and yet looking forward to when God comes through and personal praise spills out on everyone else.
Psalm 46
A rendering of Psalm 46, which rests is the security of God’s presence in the middle of political turmoil.
Psalm 47
(Worship leader: Here’s a Korah family psalm) On your feet, people! A standing ovation for God! Hoot and holler With joy. Yahweh towers over all. Breathtaking, He’s King over Everyone Everywhere. He’s crushed nations, Letting […]
Advent calendar – a poem
Each day, a door opens, Revealing a hidden piece of chocolate, A tiny taste Of something sweet That whets the appetite For the Christmas feast to come. They are like cheap plastic cups In communion trays, […]
Psalm 36
A rendering of Psalm 36, which compares a life lived without God to a life immersed in God’s life and love.
Psalm 29
A rendering of Psalm 29, a David psalm viewing an electrical storm roll from north to south and seeing in it the power of God, which he uses not for destruction, but for peace.
Psalm 27
A rendering of Psalm 27, a prayer in the darkness, resetting the imagination from fear to God.
Psalm 21
A rendering of Psalm 21, which glories in God’s strength and protection of Israel’s king.
Psalm 19
(For the worship leader. A David psalm.) The heavens shout God’s glory! The skies never stop talking About his creativity. All day, Every day, They just keep on speaking. All night, Every night, They share […]
Psalm 30
A rendering of Psalm 30, a song David wrote when he was healed from a deadly illness and later used to celebrate the original Hanukkah, when the defiled and restored temple was rededicated.
Psalm 33
Sing your hearts out to Yahweh, You good and just people! Worship and integrity Are inseparable twins. Praise Yahweh with your guitar. Make exquisite music for him On your piano. Yahweh’s faithful character Can be […]
Psalm 8
A rendering of Psalm 8, which marvels at the royal role of humanity within a creation that dwarfs us and given by a God who dwarfs that creation.
Psalm 7
(A song David sang to Yahweh when he was dealing with Cush the Benjamite.) Here, I am, knocking at your door, Yahweh my God. Let me in! I need a safe place. I need rescuing. […]
Psalm 5
(Worship leader: Use a soulful sax on this one. A David psalm.) I need you to hear me, Yahweh. I need you to hear me out. You’re my King, So hear my plea for help. […]
The answer to envy
The world’s oldest profession isn’t prostitution. It’s advertising. Genesis 3 is the story of a snakish advertiser who creates a desire for something that was really nothing at the cost of everything. And we’ve been […]
Psalm 146
A rendering of Psalm 146, which considers human sources of hope before considering God’s long resumé of real hope-inspiring help.
Psalm 104
A rendering of Psalm 104, an exuberant expression of joy in the Creator and the Creation.
The only way to experience more of God
“Lord, we want more of you in our lives.” It’s a prayer I’ve heard many times and have uttered more than a few times myself. It usually precedes a time of gathered worship as a […]
Psalm 67
A rendering of Psalm 67, which moves us from a desire for a small, me-sized blessing to a global, God-sized blessing for all people.
Psalm 133
A rendering of Psalm 133, where the wisdom of unity brings healing and life to a broken land.
Psalm 14
A rendering of Psalm 14, rejecting the atheism of the world and the times when our own hearts slip into the atheism of living as if God doesn’t exist.
Psalm 150
A rendering of Psalm 150, an exuberant call to praise God with all we have, using our most passionate music.
Oh, inverted world!
When the world goes upside-down, so too does our relationship with God. It’s an important but temporary shift the Psalms teach us how to navigate.
The blame game
The blame game has no winners. It also has no shortage of players. Fingers are pointed. Questions are asked. But nothing is ever accomplished. The main question asked in the blame game is the “why” […]
When life slaps us across the face
I need a wake up call every now and then. Not a literal wake up call; I’ve got an alarm on my phone for that. But I need to be awakened from the soul slumber […]
Be still
I was on the floor of our apartment, unable to get up. My lower back was clenched in spasms of pain. The agony was so great, I could hardly move. When I went to see […]
A joyful domination
I love the underdog. If a sports team wins too often, count on me to support any team that plays against them. I think this dislike of those on top is burned into the American […]
A user’s guide to having a soul
I have been accustomed to call this book, I think not inappropriately, “An Anatomy of all the Parts of the Soul,” for there is not an emotion of which anyone can be conscious that is […]
The source of goodness in a world of suffering
Evil abounds. When we look around at the world, it’s easy to ask, “Why is there so much suffering and injustice?” But when we look a bit closer, we find a question hiding beneath the […]
Worship is practical
Worship is practical. But not because preachers provide lessons on life in sermons. Worship is practical because it reorients our lives toward God. A God-orientation isn’t airy-fairy and otherworldly. If God is the most basic […]
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” — 5th saying of Jesus from the cross
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? [Matthew 27:46 & Mark 15:34] There is nothing quite like the terror of a child lost in a crowd, desperately seeking her parents. There is nothing quite […]
The Throne
As a kid, I grew up watching the Emmy-winning TV show All in the Family. In it, the family patriarch Archie Bunker attempts to rule his household during the late 1960s and early 1970s era where […]
Living and praying as Image of God
Where does human value come from? What makes us so special? We assume the world belongs to us and is here for us to do with as we will. And so we eat whatever we […]
Uncensored prayer
I’m a heretic. There are things I believe about God which are wrong. But they’re wrong in all the right ways. You’re a heretic, too. There are things that are true about God which are […]
The true & generous life
I don’t get to edit the Bible according to what I like or dislike. I don’t have the arrogance of Thomas Jefferson, who chucked out whatever he found primitive and unenlightened and kept the moral […]
Facing fear
Fears come in all shapes and sizes. Some fears grip us by the throat, suffocating us. Some fears climb up on our backs, weighing us down as they accumulate. But all our fears have one […]
Entering into the Big Story in prayer
There are some stories other people have told me that are so vivid in my imagination, it’s as if I was there, as if those things happened to me. My wife tells a story about […]
Worship that closes the us-them divide
Living outside of my home country changed me. I’ve traveled to almost every continent as a tourist, but it was those five years of living in Canada that changed me. I became a world citizen […]
Thirsty prayer
O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water (Ps. 63:1). Those words […]
When I feel far from God
There are times when God seems just about as far away as possible. I feel alone and even with crowds around me, the world feels empty. There are times when God feels as close as […]
The self-offering of worship & the importance of giving our money away
In an effort to communicate to visitors that they aren’t trying to get their money, many churches have given up the practice of taking an offering during Sunday worship. I get the intention behind the […]
The problem of perspective
Living behind my eyes and ears, I am stuck with seeing and hearing the world from my limited perspective. Sometimes, I’m able to add my perspective and help others see things more clearly. But too […]
How long, God? The waiting is killing me!
Pain can feel eternal. Suffering slows the clock to a crawl. In the hospital where I work, I see people in deep pain on a regular basis. Physical pain that so fills the senses it’s […]
40: More than just a U2 psalm
I was a sophomore in high school when I started listening to U2, with the release of their War album. As has been their pattern, the band ends the album with a hymn of sorts. […]
An integrated life in a disintegrating world
How I live and how I worship need to be the same. I need to be the same me when I’m praying as when I’m playing. If there are two Petes, I’m in trouble. But […]
White Christmas: an Advent poem
“Come, let us reason together,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are as red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” — Isaiah […]
The heart of Thanksgiving
I love eating and Thanksgiving is easily the best eating day of the year as far as I’m concerned. And with its leftovers that stretch over the following week, my joy is good food is […]
Praying our sicknesses
The most miserable experiences in my life include being sick. I’m grateful I don’t get sick often, but when I do get something, I tend to go down hard. I can vividly recall the semi-madness […]
What the storm reveals
The winds howled and rattled the single-paned windows. Branches tumbled from the fir trees in our backyard as we sat safely in our house, grateful for sturdy modern architecture. And my three-year-old son, with wide […]
Unmasking our idolatries
Idolatry is not a thing of the past. It’s very much alive and well in my heart and yours. The only difference between modern idolaters and ancient idolaters is honesty — they were the honest […]
When the silent God speaks, what does he say?
Silence is hard to interpret. In fact, an argument from silence is considered a logical fallacy. And yet, we try to interpret the silences of others on a regular basis. We question what people think […]
When the news gets too noisy, kiss the king
“I read the news today. Oh boy.” — The Beatles Sometimes, I wonder why I read the news at all. It’s just noise. And there’s already enough noise in my life without it. But I […]
An ode to Jerusalem
Jerusalem had become the jewel of Israel, the biggest and most glorious city ever built in that strip of land between the Mediterranean to the west and the desert to the east. No other city […]
No more whiny Christians!
For my entire life, I’ve heard fellow followers of Jesus complain about what they read in the newspapers and see on TV. “The world is going to hell in a hand basket!” they complain. “Our […]
Vindication!
The first time I stood before a judge, I was guilty. Fortunately, it was just traffic court and I’d only been going 10 miles an hour over the speed limit. I’ve also had my moments […]
Psalm 5 — The God who hears & the words we speak
The first worship song that lodged itself in my heart was the Maranatha version of Psalm 5:1-3 from the early 1980s. Its minor key longing echoed inside of me, stirring a yearning for God that […]
There’s no such thing as a balanced life, but there’s something better.
I can balance my checkbook, but I can’t balance my life. It’s impossible. Things in this world just don’t like to stay in balance — just watch my attempts at yoga! Juggling a handful of balls […]
Psalm 149 — a song in bed & a sword in the hand
Prayer easily becomes rote and formulaic, even when we try to be spontaneous. I hate that about myself. I quickly and easily fall into ruts where I’m pretty much praying about the same things in […]
Psalm 150 — uncontainable praise!
A can of soda was a rarity in the super healthy home I grew up in. But occasionally, my friends and I would get ahold of some pop cans. And after we’d each guzzled one, […]
Worship that reorders our imaginations
There’s a lot more to worship than singing some songs and hearing a sermon, with prayers and an offering interspersed between them. There are also a number of purposes for worship, but I want to […]
Worship is a dance
Worship is a dance. And so too is theology. From our perspective, both of them have Jesus in the middle. But the reality, if we could step back a bit further, is surprising. I like […]
Happy “Love One Another” Day (also known as Maundy Thursday)
“What the heck is Monday Thursday? And how can it be Monday when it’s Thursday? I don’t get it.” For most of my life, the churches I attended ignored the Christian calendar. But when in […]
The cure for bad Bible reading
The sermon was excellent. It shared timeless biblical wisdom but in a fresh way. People were moved. But I was ticked off. Although I agreed with the preacher’s comments, the way the preacher handled the […]
Prayerless worship & worship that leads to praying
As I’ve spent time with different churches, I’ve become aware of how prayerless evangelical worship has become. By stripping away liturgical elements, many of our gatherings have ended up without much depth in prayer at […]
How Lenten fasts help develop different appetites
Lent is one of the least appreciated seasons in the Christian calendar. Being a penitential season, it’s a time of fasting — of saying an emphatic NO! to one particular area of our lives — […]
Sermon or Scripture: which is more important?
The question of which is more important, sermon or Scripture, seems like a no-brainer. But the way Scripture is handled before and during sermons tells the truth of the matter. Are the Scriptures read first? […]
3 reasons why “going to church” is still important
Going to church is becoming less and less of a basic Christian practice, making our discipleship anemic. For years, I have heard people say, “We don’t go to church; we are the church.” In one way, that’s […]
Two kinds of knowing — one informs me, the other transforms me
“The boy was frightened, and tried to say a prayer, but he could remember nothing but the multiplication table.” — Hans Christian Andersen, The Snow Queen I am a child of the information age. I have […]
Comprayning
Uh oh. I think I just might be a comprayner.
If the church isn’t a community, it’s nothing
The church exists to be a sign of the breaking in of the kingdom of God into a world of torn apart relationships. The church does not exist to sing songs; to listen to sermons; to […]
Psalm 131 — from ambition to contentment
I am an ambitious person, with hopes and dreams for myself. I am a true American, pursuing my own happiness. My heart isn’t quiet. It’s in turmoil, boiling with my ambitions. Unsettled by my striving, […]
Regaining our humor in an overly serious political climate
A few months ago, I was with a group of teenagers, waiting to be let into a county fair. That may or may not sound like fun to you, but the group was in good […]
The Lord’s Prayer — insistently passive praying
The Lord’s Prayer offers us an absolutely radical approach to God that even 2,000 years of having it as our most basic prayer still subverts and reorients the lives of those who pray it. Sadly, the […]
Prepare to share (or, one practice for an uncontainable faith)
When I was growing up, the churches I was a part of had two services each Sunday morning that weren’t identical like most multi-service churches now. The first service was shorter, about half an hour, […]
The Lord’s Prayer — foundation for our praying imaginations
When my friend Scott began following Jesus a few years ago, prayer was a new idea for him. In fact, the thought of it was somewhat terrifying. How do we approach the Master of the […]
Preach like a tsunami
The power of water can be as serene and unnoticed as a lake or as wild and violent as the waterfall that pours out of that lake. It’s all right there. Power on tap. As […]
A litany for campers
For the setting up of tents and the lighting of the camp fire, We give thanks to the Lord. For the unceasing murmur of rivers and the cooling of feet therein, We give thanks to […]
Preaching that jams the machine
The best preachers are poets, using words to open up windows in the minds and souls of those listening to a world ignored and unseen by a world mesmerized by trinkets and tech. As such, […]
18 things every pastor and worship leader needs to consider
1. Worship without silence leaves no room for awe. 2. The words “cool” and “pastor” don’t go together. For those who are trying: Stop it. (This applies to worship leaders, too.) 3. Prayer doesn’t need […]
Why do pastors need coaches?
It was just the first week of pastoral ministry when it hit me: I had no idea what I was doing. I’d preached a few sermons, but not weekly. I’d led a few meetings, but no […]
From Bible reading to Bible living
Followers of Jesus have always had a sense that our Bible reading ought to lead to a change in the way we live our lives. We are followers, after all, and following has action at […]
The sanity of Sabbath-keeping
One of the most life-changing books that I’ve ever read is Marva Dawn’s Keeping the Sabbath Wholly: Ceasing, Resting, Embracing, Feasting. In it, she explains how Sabbath-keeping isn’t so much a matter of obligation, but of […]
Unemployed at Christmas
Unemployed at Christmas Joseph the carpenter Did not build his baby’s bed/// Shepherds left their field And their flock No longer shepherding But chasing the angels’ call instead/// Magi followed a star Not their career […]
Religion is dead — and that's good!
RELIGION IS DEAD. IT JUST IS. BUT THAT’S OK. IT’S SUPPOSED TO BE. Eugene Peterson points out that religion is like a tree’s bark — it’s the dead part of the tree. But the bark is […]
The wisdom of worship
The Psalms is a wonderfully diverse compilation of Israel’s praise. It gathers glorious creation hymns and salvation thanksgivings together with a heaping pile of laments. And scattered throughout this sprawling mixtape are bits of what is […]
Everything that has breath — the goal of worship
What does worship look like? What does it sound like? Where does it get done? Who gets included? And what is the purpose of it all anyway? As the Psalms conclude, they do so with […]