The Flatpicking Pilgrim's Progress

The blues can teach us to have a sense of moral seriousness, a steely ethical and spiritual backbone that continues to hope without collapsing into a giddy, almost pre-teen naivete about spiritual matters, in which all is victory, glory, and joy, which requires a selective, edited memory of ourselves and each other that the world around us scorn as hypocrisy that remembers your sins and forgets mi...

 These little boys were in the daycare that I would go to every now and then; we had a member of the church that ran this little daycare, it was just called Miss Henrietta's. And I went down to Miss Henrietta's one day and the little boys came home, Justin and Luke—I don't know which one said it—but they ran home and said, "Mama, guess what? God came to see us at Miss Henrietta...

"Son House was a Baptist preacher that lost his way. Fact is, I've been doing these sermons, I've been very disturbed at how many Baptist preachers turned into blues people. Or they were children of Baptist preachers who went bad. I don't know what to make of all of that. But hard times are that place where we have the temptation to fall into despair of life—to give up on life—...

As a part of the 2009 series at Vestavia Hills Baptist Church, Dr. Beth McGinnis, Assistant Minister of Music at the Church and Professor of Music at Samford University, led a conversation with church members to better understand the connections the blues have and what it can help us to better understand about our own humanity and its relevance to faith. Support the show

"Don’t ever say to anyone who has lost someone, “This is God’s will” or “I know God has something wonderful in this.”  Let them have their loss.  Do not put a band aid on a deep wound.  What God has in this, God does not need your anxiety to show them.  Just be there.  Sing the song with them.  Lament, weep, and wait."  Sermon 2 from my 2009 series, "Feeling the Blues" Support...

A sermon preached in 2009, a series about the blues. We were in the midst of enormous economic distress, if you remember, and it seemed fitting to revisit these words about blues music and troubled lives at the intersection of the stories of the Bible. David, Jeremiah, and Robert Johnson in conversation with the reality of human existence. Support the show

Julia Ward Howe, who wrote the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," asked Senator Charles Sumner to come to the aid of a needy citizen.  When Sumner turned her down with the excuse that he had grown too busy to concern himself with individuals, Howe replied, "Charles, that's remarkable.  Even God hasn't reached that stage yet." The problem with our sense of “where the probl...

The problem with our sense of “where the problem is” is that we are like the people of Gadara.  When you ask, “Where is evil?” they would point to “that man over there.”  We’re pretty sure the problem is “out there” somewhere—bad people, bad institutions, bad laws, bad luck.  But Jesus in the gospels knew the truth—if evil lives out through our social structures, it is birthed in the human heart. ...

It is rather peculiar that a holiday so connected with abundance and the numbering of blessings would have begun as gratitude for bare survival, but fitting.  Thanksgiving is the recognition of our dependence on God, not the congratulating of ourselves.  We are blessed, but not deservedly.  Life is a gift from Someone, not something to which we are entitled.  It is a time to stop, take stock, and...

Years ago, I spoke to a group of young ministers recently out of seminary. I shared a list of learnings to help them. Number 5 went,  "Church people are sinners, but, hey, imagine what they used to be like. If you want honesty in advertising, then here’s a church slogan for you: “We’re old, we’re dull, but hey, you ain’t no prize yourself.” Support the show

Immigration is both a continual theme of the American story and a recurring point of conflict. The deep divisions of the current moment are echoes of the past the we ignore and repeat. Support the show

A dead battery, a cussing mechanic, and an invitation to give a devotion to the Georgia Senate. Just another lesson in maturity in spite of myself. Support the show

I wrote to reflect not just on what was lost, but on what was revealed to me, even in the worst of times—about faith, about love, about fear, about my worries that all our efforts to stay alive as the church wouldn’t be enough, only to discover on the other side that what held these precious, human, imperfect souls in my charge together wasn’t me or the staff, or the building after all. It was the...

When we love our neighbor this way, forgetting ourselves in love for another, we connect with the powerful love that is at the heart of all things.  It is life-giving.  It is also impossible unless God helps us to love.  And yet we know, from those moments in life where we see it clearly, that this is what we were made for. So why don’t we love each other this way, if it is what we were made for?...

...This can be stated as a truism: You will love others as you love yourself. That is, your own self-perception becomes a filter through which you view everyone else.  Support the show

 Being like ancient Babylon rings a bit hollow, but the power movers seem to say, “Oh, you’ll be a lot happier. Just don’t be the one under the bus. Be a thrower.” Well, that’s one way to do it, I suppose. The historical record is fairly bleak about oppression, cruelty and rage as a long-term strategy. So, what else can there be?  Support the show

It may surprise you to know this is quite common. Among every writing by the most important and influential Christian thinkers and theologians and leaders, there are stories and journals of paralyzing doubts and fears. It's part of the whole journey to spiritual maturity. Support the show

The pastor preached a gospel sermon of hope and resurrection. The worship was inspiring. AsI left, I felt something in my chest, a familiar and indescribable twinge, as though I had accidentally walked into a beautiful hidden room full of old treasures from an earlier life. It was hope. Support the show

We are in a profoundly toxic public moment. But I will remind us that down on the ground, there is far more hope and light than you’d think from watching your preferred media. I’d suggest we let our children and teachers remind us again of who we are.  Support the show

As Lent begins today, reflections on the life and words of Thomas Merton. Amid the chaos of ultranationalism and disruption, we need to grow deeper, not more distracted. Elton Trueblood told us, "We shall never have a better world until we have better persons in it." In the insanity of this present moment, finding inner peace is not an escape, nor a contradiction. It is essential, to be...

An unforgettable day. But I was most touched by something his daughter said that night. She told us a little-known fact—that part of his childhood was spent in a children’s home. His family was disconnected by life. She said one of the reasons he loved sports teams so much was that family life had been hard for him. At the park, though, no matter who you were, or even what you had done, as long as...

In other words, unity of heart, spirit and love can exist even though we must have differences that will take longer to resolve.  We begin with this willingness to know a fellow Christian’s heart and build upon the possibility of fellowship.  It does not mean give up our convictions.  But we must begin with the hardest and highest call Jesus gave to us—to love one another as He loved us.  That is...

I want you to consider this: three astrologers came from Persia, without knowing anything about who they were dealing with in Herod.  The salvation of the world lay innocently in the arms of his mother, nothing to protect him from the power of the state.  His fate depended on these strangers and what they were to make of a dream they had that likely woke one of them up in the middle of the night w...

Cryptic and mysterious messages begin coming through the unlikeliest of messengers: an elderly woman in a nursing home. Crowds flock to see her, and experts try to determine what causes it. The local ministers are perplexed. Is it the medication? Dementia? Wishful thinking? Support the show

It was a desperate time. You might even say the worst of times. And the story plainly says that while we were still lost in the tragedy called sin,God showed up, as Forrest Gump once said. Support the show