The Parish

Many of the central characters in Old Testament stories live complex lives. While we may not want to follow their example, if we look at them as a mirror we may recognize in them, aspects of our own life that need attention.

You don't forget a truth that sets you free, but you might forget the title.

Hope is more than wishful thinking because it is not focused on what we are wishing for – it is focused on Who we are hoping in.

Psalm 57 doesn't tells how things are, it tells us how things feel, and for that it has Cave Reviews.

Hannah and Peninnah - two wives in the same household but living with very different sorrows. How can they find a way forward?

As a young tree is bent so will it grow, but there can be more to an old story with a new name. 

How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? A poignant plea by exiles bound up with God in their story but immersed in a pagan culture by their circumstances.  

Before it speaks, the unforgettable fire waits, to see who notices.

Leah lived in a household marked by deceit, manipulation and competition. But she saw it through her gentle eyes and chose a different path.  

Apparently God doesn't cease to know our thoughts, but unfortunately we can cease to know Hers.

Healed people don't change the world, changed people do.

It is the details we dwell upon that make a story-the story we chose to tell.

We often think it's a miracle when we feel that God has heard us and responded, but what if for God a miracle is when we have heard his voice and responded.

What the Emmaus Road disciples thought they wanted was a conventional king on a throne of political power. What they got was broken bread on the Communion table.

Easter | A sense of wonder we feel in the presence of something vast that transcends our understanding of the world.

Good Friday with special guest Steve Kennedy.

Jesus isn’t looking for palm-waving admirers willing to lay down a coat, he is looking for those who will lay down their privilege

The fragrance of love is even stronger than the stench of death.

Jesus doesn’t offer a life that is happy and easy and safe. He calls us from our comfortable spectator places to take up our cross and follow him.

If we don’t learn to have a healthy appreciation for how precious and sacred life before death is, how will we ever appreciate anything that comes after.

We follow Jesus not just so that we get to the right destination but so that, along the way, we can learn how we should walk.  

Jesus didn't endure the wilderness to spare us from it, but to show us how.

The peace message of Jesus is often misunderstood, yet central to his teaching.  That's why He will interrupt our concept of what peace really is and offer an alternative that leads to human flourishing for all involved.

If we find ourselves, in these fraught times, succumbing to a desire to hoard and take care of our own, we may find it helpful to recognize that what we have is not really our "own" but a gift from God, given so that we can share.

We choose to belong to each other—because it is together—not alone,  that we can witness what love can do and maybe catch a glimpse of just how big God is.  Community is our spiritual practice, not just a byproduct of it.