“Let’s drive to Baja, and keep going till we reach tropical blue water.” And he meant it. He was always saying things like this. When we met, his way of asking me out had been “Let’s go on a big long walk until we get really exhausted.” I laughed, and two years later, here we were engaged. “How far is…
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That’s right, and I don’t just mean playing Fruit Ninja. I’m saying that finally, FINALLY this is the year that I can join the Slice of Life Challenge over at Two Writing Teachers. Can I really write something sharable, daily, for more than two days in a row? Honestly, I can do almost NOTHING with any consistency. But I’m giving…
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Devotional time! My church does a Lenten devotional each year written by us, for us, and this year we’re thinking about a favorite hymn. I picked Holy Spirit, Ever Dwelling. Ever. Not just sometimes, not just when the time is right, not just when expected, not just when we feel it. The Holy Spirit is EVER dwelling within us and everywhere.…
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I wish someone had told me years and years ago: It is not only OK, it is a gift to possess no authority or expertise whatsoever. Sure, in areas of life in which I am the responsible party, I need authority to carry out my work. And I’ve spent a good chunk of my professional life thinking hard about the…
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Guest post this week on Writers Who Care! It’s late summer and all is quiet on the seminary front. United Lutheran Seminary is now a reality, not a plan, but for me that just meant that no courses were offered this summer. So, a break. But quiet on the work and seminary front means things go noisy and active on…
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Writing is hard. No, seriously: it's really, really hard.
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On time for writing-- and time for praying
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What does it mean to be a light? How good do I have to be? How shiny?
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Driving on the highways of Texas and New Mexico, the neon crosses and stark billboards would loom in the distance for miles before you could read them: “Jesus Saves.” Or in the street, at a park, or at a public event, a stranger with a handful of tracts might ask, “Are you saved?” For most of my life, and especially…
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The first hymn I ever loved was “Fairest Lord Jesus,” in our hymnal as “Beautiful Savior” (ELW 838). Having not been raised in the church, then coming home from summer camp wanting to find out everything I could about God, I listened to the Christian radio station in Houston. Mixed in there with a lot of very bad theology and political…