Every story is a take on the story of the world. Each one stands beside the actual story of the world, tweaking and critiquing it. The movie The Martian (and the book on which it […]
All of life is a gift
There are many parts of life that are easy to enjoy. They have some kind of reward built into them. Eating is generally its own reward. Hunger is satisfied. Taste buds are pleasurably engaged. Meal […]
What lies do I believe about God?
I believe a lot things about God. I have two theological degrees and a library of several thousand theological books. And yet when it comes down to the way I live, I find my theology […]
Going all in — the meaning of baptism
I had the joy of baptizing my youngest child this past Sunday. Each time I do a baptism, I feel both elated and mystified. Christians have been doing this baptism thing ever since Jesus himself […]
Plugging the holes in our spiritualities
A friend texted me recently about a deeply frustrating conversation he’d had with a client earlier in the day. His language was colorful. Workplace frustrations are a common experience of pretty much everyone who has a […]
How God's economy works
“It’s the economy, stupid!” Bill Clinton’s one-liner from his successful campaign against the first President Bush has echoed through every election since. There may be other issues on the table, but how the President will […]
Unforgiven
I love the Lord’s Prayer — except for one phrase. There’s one line in it that trips me up. It’s the second half of “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” I rely […]
The stories we tell ourselves & the truth of our lives
I know who I am by the stories I tell to myself. The same is true of my relationships. People who are happy in their relationships tell themselves happy stories from their relationships. They remember past […]
Choosing the old & the relational in our disposable culture
We live in a disposable culture. Not only are things disposable, but people are disposable. Anne Hathaway is only 32 years old and an Oscar-winner, and yet she’s already being passed up for movie roles […]
Is Christianity a militant faith?
As a kid, I grew up singing “Onward, Christian soldiers” and “I’m in the Lord’s army.” There seemed to be no hesitancy in using militaristic imagery to describe our faith. This was no Cold War […]
The power of passion, persistence & performance
This is the story of a boy and his piano. But more than that, it’s about how to live life well. Matthias is a whirlwind. The youngest of my four kids, we call him the Exclamation […]
St. Francis & the whole gospel for the whole person
One of my favorite characters from history is St. Francis. He and I share the same birthday, the same Lord, and the same desire to live missionally in all aspects of our lives. Granted, he […]
We're all winners! [OK. That's not true. But we can learn to lose well.]
“If you can dream it, you can achieve it.” The words were emblazoned on my kids’ elementary school walls. So. Not. True. There are things I can dream of that I simply can’t do. They’re […]
Getting what we give
If you act like a bull in a china shop, don’t be surprised if people treat you like one. If you’re a shrinking violent, don’t be surprised if people pass you by. While it’s not […]
A wider view of the Fall leads to a deeper engagement in mission
For most of my life, I viewed the primary thing wrong in the world as sin, particularly a brokenness in our individual human relationships with God. The most important thing, then, was to get people […]
Slow your breath down
Sometimes, it’s the speed of daily life. Sometimes, it’s words heard that keep bouncing off the walls of our hearts. Sometimes, it’s as series of worries that are out of our control. Sometimes, it’s a […]
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 […]
Kim Davis & when faith forces you to lose your job
There’s something appealing to watching a person stick with her convictions and suffer for them. It’s the stuff of inspirational movies about inner city teachers and coaches who turn around losing teams and such. And […]
Learning your neighbor's language
I lived in Canada for five years. It’s a beautiful and friendly country that I am extremely fond of. But never during those five years did I forget that I was in a foreign country. […]
Tom Brady, cheating, and forgiveness
So, Tom Brady got away with cheating. At least, that’s how all but New England Patriots fans see things. It doesn’t matter that he didn’t need to have his personally selected footballs deflated in order […]
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 […]
Among quarreling neighbors
One Sunday we came back from worship to discover that one of our neighbors had torn down the short fence between our properties and replaced it with a taller, uglier fence. There had been no warning. […]
Erotic spirituality — the good, the bad, and the ugly of combining faith and sexuality
What is the relationship between sexuality and spirituality? In many ways, sexuality has become its own spirituality. And in the process, it has coopted church music and biblical language to articulate it. Ray Charles has […]
What's wrong with the world? I am.
In an often repeated story about the eloquently witty Catholic writer G.K. Chesterton, he replied to a request to readers from The Times to answer the question, “What is wrong with the world today?” with this response: […]
What would you be willing to sacrifice your personal happiness for?
Most of us would be willing to make sacrifices to be happier. We’d live in smaller homes, have less money, have less stuff, drink less coffee, and so on if it would guarantee that we’d […]
Get over it!
If you’re an adult, you’ve had experiences where people have said and done hurtful things to you. I have. We all have. They were painful. They were inappropriate. But they’re over. Done. Gone. In the […]
Moving from can’t … to Can-ada
Gotta love that can-do country!
Dealing with fear by living in love
I am far less rational than I like to think I am. In all kinds of small and large ways, fear keeps me from doing small things that I might like to do and large […]
Trans Jenner — discontent in a culture of self-creation
It’s amazing how quickly the culture shapers have embraced gender change. Jenner won the courage award on the ESPYS and anyone who disagreed was shamed. Siri refuses to use the name Bruce Jenner, always changing it to […]
Three essentials for leading a meaningful life
The great Scottish writer George MacDonald isolated three essentials for leading a meaningful life Someone to love. Something to do. Something to hope for. When I first came across this list, I was surprised that the first […]
Guerrilla faith — a Christian spirituality for life in a post-Christian world
Losing is tough. I hate it. When George W. Bush won the White House, Democrats talked about moving north to Canada. And when Barack Obama replaced him, Republicans made similar grumblings. When Russell Wilson of the […]
Where trust comes from
It’s a simple formula. If we want to be trusted, we’ve got to be trustworthy. But too often we expect trust without earning it. How do we learn to trust and to become worthy of trust ourselves? […]
Sports and the myth of equality
Equality is essential to mathematics. To the rest of life, it’s both nonexistent and undesirable. Recently, my family and I went to the Oregon high school track and field state championship meet. After watching numerous […]
Death by packaging
We’ve got a packaging problem. A recent article in the venerable Atlantic suggests that those plastic coffee pods that make Keurig brewing machines so convenient and popular are adding tons of the non-recyclable, non-biodegradable plastic K-cups […]
For those of us who are grieving
As those who live in this tragic beauty called life, as those who live at the intersection of sorrow and joy, we approach death with a strange mix of emotions. As those who follow Jesus, […]
Doing, Being & Do-be-do-be-doing
What does it mean to be human? Does who we are lead to what we do? Does what we do lead to who we are? Or does Frank Sinatra have it right? It’s all mixed […]
Tell me I'm wrong
Some of the most important moments in my life were times when people who cared for me pulled me aside and told me I was wrong. As kids, people told us we were wrong all […]
The difference between judgment and judgmentalism
There is a Judge. And it’s not me. Neither is it you. Everyone who has suffered injustice longs for a judge who will render a just judgment, because that means liberation (from prison or slavery […]
Living in the moment & hoping for the future
We all live in an eternal now. Everything in our lives is in the present tense. The past is gone and untouchable and the future is unformed and unhatched. This moment right here is all […]
Can we "love the sinner and hate the sin" or not?
The phrase “love the sinner and hate the sin” has come under fire recently. Many question whether it’s really just a whitewashed version of hating both sinner and sin. Included in this questioning is the […]
I don't care how you feel. Just do the right thing.
As a parent, one of my jobs is getting my kids to do things they don’t want to do, because they simply need to do them. It’s a frustrating job, but we parents do it […]
The hilarity of backhanded compliments
Recently, a friend and I had a great time trading backhanded compliments — compliments that are really put-downs. Here are a few of them. Feel free to add some of your own in the comments. There […]
Learning how to be a husband
I’m not a great husband. I’m not the worst, either. Just middling. After 21 years of life together as husband and wife, you’d think that I’d have it figured out. But it’s this same old […]
Confederate flags, modern slavery & American tokenism
So, public outrage forced the South Carolina legislature to take down the Confederate flag. Yippee. Americans should be so proud of ourselves for such a great accomplishment. OK. I’m being ironic. The truth is: We […]
The simple cure for mosquito bites
We do a lot of hiking, which often takes us to mosquito infested areas. The hikes, the views, the conversations, all of it’s great. All of it except for those dratted blood-sucking pests. Thankfully, last […]
The importance of patriotism (and its limits)
I am an American and grateful to be one. I have visited more than 20 countries and have lived for five years in Canada. Living outside of my home country and traveling widely around the […]
A nation divided & the wisdom of Abraham Lincoln
A few years ago, I had the chance to walk part of the Mall in Washington, D.C., and spend time in the Lincoln Memorial. Along with the huge and stunning sculpture of this gaunt giant […]
Dear Canada, thank you for being so awesome.
Dear Canada, You’re awesome. Really. I loved living in the Great White North for five years. And I will always be grateful that my oldest child was born in Vancouver. Thank you for excellent comedians. […]
If we're all bigots, whose bigotry is worse?
Jesus said: Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do […]
Preaching the gospel with Motown soul
He’s got that timeless voice and that classic look which make you shake your head when you hear that he’s only 25 years old and his first album just dropped this week. But Leon Bridges is the […]
How to deal with a world hostile to faith
These are tough days to be a Christian. They always have been difficult, and each generation deals with different difficulties in different ways. But the hostility nob is getting turned up and it’s easy to want to […]
Psalm 119 — Real wisdom for real life
What does the best kind of life look like? And how can we live it? If there are any questions worth pursuing, it’s these. Psalm 119 has an answer. This massive, 176-verse wisdom psalm is […]
Psalm 113 — The greatness of God is made greater in his humble generosity
Reading Psalm 113 surprised me. There seemed to be an abrupt shift from its beginning — where it talks about the magnificence of God — and its end. Here’s the psalm in its entirety: 1 […]
Thanks to my kids for making me the dad I am today
It’s pretty typical on Fathers’ Day for us kids to tell our fathers thanks for making us the people we are today. Same as with moms on Mothers’ Day. But I’d like to turn that […]
Things that make my heart hurt about the Charleston massacre
As the news unfolds about the young white man who entered an historic black church and killed nine people there, a number of things have passed through my head and heart, making me hurt along […]
The #1 relationship killer
Accusation is the #1 relationship killer. The pointed finger. The shaking head. The muttered comment. The flaming email. The rolled eyes. The sarcastic joke. The angry comment at the bottom of a blog post or […]
Does history have a "right side"?
The phrase “the right side of history” has been tossed around a lot recently. It’s been used most recently in the debate surrounding same-sex marriage and in relation to domestic violence issues. Senator Richard Blumenthal […]
What do you do when you're an arrogant arse?
I have the ability to be a self-righteous, pompous jerk. I am accomplished at treating other as if they are less intelligent than I am. This is no pleasant thing to think about. So, I tend […]
The reason we listen to other people is …
… not because they have something we want to hear. It’s because they have something they want to say. When we listen just to what we want to hear, we miss out on several things. […]
Parenting is a long goodbye
The oldest of my four children is graduating from high school in a couple days. When he moves out of our house to attend University of Portland, he will be two weeks short of his […]
When "skipping church" isn't skipping church (and when it is)
I love the meme that accompanies this post because it points to several mistakes about what it means to be the church while intending neither. 1. The first mistake is equating being in a building with church. […]
The importance of singleness in a world infatuated with romance
Every single day, my Facebook page shows wonderful pictures of couples celebrating their anniversaries together. I love it. Marriage is to be celebrated and enjoyed. The writer of Hebrews tells us in no uncertain terms: […]
Is my God really just my dog?
I love my dog. Ebony comes when I call her. She goes to her bed when I tell her to. She’s always excited to see me. She does tricks when I offer her a treat […]
The new feminism of ass-kicking babes
The stories we tell shape who we are. Take a quick look at the movies and TV shows you’ve watched on Netflix, Hulu, or whatever other way you ingest your video, and you’ll have a […]
John Daker, preaching, and when you don't know the words
A few years ago, John Daker took my home by storm. His failed attempt to sing a medley of songs as a fill-in singer on a local public broadcast station was truly hilarious. And so, […]
Everybody's good at something (and I'm good at making crumble)
She’s hilariously quirky. Her song is trite. Her musicianship is weak. Her presentation is garish. But it works. All of the pieces come together in a wonderfully light-hearted way that is both self-expressive and ego-free, […]
"What do you want?" — How to want what you really want
“What do you want?” It’s the first thing Jesus speaks in John’s gospel. A question. And a simple one at that. But it’s one of the most powerful questions any of us is ever asked. […]
Remembering martyrs on this Memorial Day
There is another kind of soldier that we often forget on Memorial Day: the martyr. Both the soldiers who take up arms to fight against evil and the martyr who takes up prayers to fight […]
How is community formed in our new nomadic era?
The way community has been formed for much of the last 4,000 years has come unravelled in the last few decades. Where agrarian societies were primarily stable farming communities — your farm and your neighbors’ farms […]
Re-membering — the relationship between community, worship & covenant
One of our sanest writers is Wendell Berry. His contribution as a Christian essayist to the environmental movement has been unique and profound. His poetry, especially his Sabbaths collection, is evocative and wise. But it’s his […]
Church is about a community to serve, not a service to attend
Relationships are both the means and the end of this life. We were made for community, and yet it is the most difficult thing we ever do. The biblical account confirms this. After an amazing […]
How to read the Bible, part 4 — Live — I live a life of active response to the God who speaks.
What we’re after is a life well-lived. Not just well-thought. Not just well-talked about. Not just well-reflected on. Not just well-prayed. These are all good things and a full life includes them. But a life […]
How to read the Bible, part 3 — Pray — I speak back to the God who is speaking to me.
It’s only polite to listen to those who speak to us. It’s also impolite to remain silent when someone has just tried to engage us in a conversation. When someone speaks to me, I respond. […]
How to read the Bible, part 2 — Engage — God is speaking … to me.
Once we’ve done the first step of Bible reading — listening to the God who speaks — we move on the the personal step: engaging. The second step in what is known as lectio divina is […]
How to read the Bible, part 1 — Read — God speaks. We listen.
There are four steps to the process of Bible reading referred to as “sacred reading” or lectio divina. The first of these is lectio, which simply refers to reading. As followers of Jesus, we know that we’re […]
What is the most lasting effect of preaching?
Far too much attention has been given to the sermon as an event. I don’t deny that it is one. I am named after one of the greatest preachers ever. Peter’s sermon in Acts 2 […]
The world is not your oyster
When I was a young journalist of 25, the art director of the magazine I was a junior editor for expressed her fondness and optimism for me by telling me repeatedly, “The world is your […]
The "authenticity" bluff — why our lack of self-knowledge undermines our claims to be authentic
Authenticity. We love it. We love the gritty, stripped down personality who says it like it is. We love the person who bares their soul. We dig musicians who reveal their innermost thoughts and hurts. We […]
Preaching that leads to praying
Preachers gather compliments, most of which are merely polite: “Good sermon, pastor.” But one of the ones I cherish most was both simple and sincere: “You’ve taught me how to pray.” Early on in my […]
What the preacher should do when the sermon sucks — three tips for before heading to the pulpit
What does a pastor do when it’s Sunday and life has intruded so much during the week that there hasn’t been a chance to write a sermon? Or the sermon that has been written sucks […]
Be different — why the world needs you to be strange
Since moving to Bend, we’ve become friends with the Strange family. I love that last name. It must draw lots of jokes and has probably been a weight for their teenage daughter. But what fun! […]
“In the Book of Exodus, God tells Moses that his name is Yahweh, and God hasn’t had a peaceful moment since.” — Frederick Buechner
Do you know your God?
Just a couple weeks after I became a pastor, my family and I were invited over to dinner by a family in our new church. Things seemed to be going well until I was asked a […]
The importance of names
Growing up, I was always called Peter. But when I started college, a friend started calling me Pete. Then I became a pastor and people seemed to want to call me by the more formal […]
God's answer to a broken world
My wife had a great conversation with a friend who was raised without faith. In the conversation, our friend asked my wife a variation on a question that people have been asking ever since the […]
What's your question?
When I first watched the movie I (heart) Huckabee’s years ago, it bounced around in my head for days. In it, there is a team of existential detectives who hilariously examine people’s lives in order to determine what question drives […]
The books we read shape the way we live
The books we read, the stories we immerse ourselves in, give us an imagination for how to live the rest of our lives. So, when I come across one that shows me a better way […]
How to end the worship wars for good — part 2
We’ve already noted the need to move from a focus on experience in worship to an encounter with God. Experiences are great, but when we make them the goal and/or measure of worship, we become […]
Protest violence and Martin Luther King's dream
We gave Martin Luther King, Jr., a holiday and put his dream on the shelf. That often happens when those who led from the margins are officially recognized. Because of the role he played in […]
How to end the worship wars for good — part 1
I’ve written elsewhere about the need to move the focus of worship from experience to encounter. If we gather to meet Our Triune God as a community, rather than to have a transcendent experience as […]
The purpose of worship — from experience to encounter
In a 2005 interview with Christianity Today, Eugene Peterson said, “Do we realize how almost exactly the Baal culture of Canaan is reproduced in American church culture? Baal religion is about what makes you feel […]
Why we love Darth Vader and other villains
For a culture that is getting more and more irreligious, we have an abiding and growing fascination with evil. One of my cherished memories as a kid is waiting in line for hours to see […]
How to kill a relationship in four easy steps
There are four sure-fire ways to kill a relationship. Most of us do aspects of each of them on a regular basis. And then we wonder why people are unhappy with us. Dr. John Gottman is […]
Ignoring the wisdom of the past at the expense of our future
I’m not a curmudgeon. I don’t get sentimental about the supposedly good old days. I don’t gripe about kids these days. This world has always been a marvel and a mess. Kids have always been […]
Shut the f*** up! — the proper use of profanity & the need for propriety
I cuss. Probably more than I should. And far more than my kids think I do. There is a time for profanity. There is a time for exalted words that express a depth of feeling […]
Of Jesus, flowers, and same-sex weddings
The court cases are adding up. People, often Evangelical Christians, are catching flak for not being willing to provide a service to same-sex couples for their weddings. We’ve had bakers, photographers, and more recently florists who […]
When it's time to stop — President Obama, Bob Marley, and the gift of Sabbath keeping
“People who are trying to make this world worse are not taking the day off. Why should I?” — President Obama quoting Bob Marley It sounds like a great argument — not taking a day […]