An All Too Common Story “Tom” is a doting father of four kids: 3 boys and one infant daughter. (When Tom’s daughter reaches dating…
Material Boy: On Artifacts, Discernment, and Elites
Community / Discernment / Pluralistic World
Andy Crouch’s Culture Making, is an important book written by an insightful writer. It warrants wide discussion. It is also strangely troubling. Perhaps this…
The cost of creativity
Some people are good at catchy titles and headlines, but I am not. I complained earlier this week over the effort it took to…
Repose in Grace
“John Calvin believed that an unredeemed life keeps oscillating back and forth between pride (‘I’ve made it!’) and despair (‘I’ll never make it!’). In…
Faster
Creation / Ordinary Life / Safe Place / Work and Rest
Faster [This essay first appeared in the December 1999 issue of Notes From Toad Hall.] December is a bad month for speed and stress.…
Matters of Perspective
Matters of Perspective When we were staying with friends Leslie and John near NYC in October it was, I think, our second day with…
Seeing Beyond the Surface
Faith / Ordinary Life / Spirituality
As a boy I loved superhero comic books. I loved the flamboyant graphics, the constantly shifting perspective, the stylized violence, the stories of adventure.…
Listening Before Writing
I have a new journal, creamy white lined pages in a black moleskin cover with an elastic band that holds it closed. A much…
A Faithful, Messy Purity
Community / Faith / Spirituality
There is a difference between keeping ourselves pure, and keeping ourselves aloof from a broken reality. It’s a huge difference. The first is courageous;…
Using Words to Wound Instead of Heal
Community / Family / Maturity and Flourishing
It is not an enemy who taunts me— then I could bear it; it is not an adversary who deals insolently with me— then…