Presby-Musings

Well, my friends---this is it: my final Daily Devo until after Labor Day.   As many of you know, I will be going on a sabbatical (my first ever in 20 years of ministry) for the summer, which means that I'm taking a break from all of my pastoral duties, including writing the Daily Devos each weekday.  I toyed with the idea of setting something up so that they would continue in my absence, but it flew in the face of what I'm trying to do for the next three months: rest, rejuvenate and reflect.  I'll be doing some traveling to the United Kingdom, spending time with family as much as I can, and at some point moving my middle son to the University of Arkansas.   I'm also taking a solo trip in my Jeep out west, that will include a three-day stop at Ghost Ranch retreat center in New Mexico.  And I'll be winding things up in late August with a silent retreat at a Benedictine monastery on the coast of California.  I plan on reconnecting with old friends, spending some time w

When I was a kid my family would often travel on Memorial Day to the small community of Seibert, Colorado where my dad grew up. In a small cemetery on the outskirts of town, we would visit the graves of my dad's grandparents, and those of close friends and relatives.   I remember walking among the graves, reading the stones, and marveling at the small American flags that were placed by those who had served in the military.   When my grandfather died when I was ten, those trips took on new meaning for all of us.  My grandmother would refresh the flowers on his grave, and we would all stand quietly as she did--each of us thinking our own thoughts, remembering him in our own way.   Years later, I officiated at my grandmother's funeral and would visit that cemetery for the first time as an adult.  I recall recognizing gravestones I had gazed at as a child, and for a moment it felt timeless, albeit the fresh dirt and clay from my grandmother's grave told a different story.   Tod

The Conclusion of the Series - The Way: Lessons from The Early Church The early members of this movement were first called “Followers of the Way”—a direct reflection of their desire to follow “in the way” of Christ.   Today we’re going to hear the story of how true freedom comes when we surrender to the idea that Jesus is the Lord.  The story of Paul, Silas, and a Jailhouse Earthquake.  If you came in here today carrying burdens over the state of your life, things you think will never get better, a world that doesn't seem to be tilted toward what is good, right, and true...  Have I got some good news for you.  THE WAY LEADS US TO THE TRUE FREEDOM THAT COMES FROM SURRENDER 16 Once when we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a female slave who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune-telling. 17 She followed Paul and the rest of us, shouting, “These men are servants of the Most High God, who are telling y

Thoughts and prayers.  This phrase is one of the most oft-used by Christians in times of crisis when they want to send well-wishes to someone.   Admittedly, I've used it on scores of occasions as I tried to comfort friends, family, and church members, who had endured a loss or were going through a difficult time.  This particular phrase has also become one of the many ancillary targets by thousands of people on social media in the aftermath of the Uvalde, TX school shooting, the supermarket shooting in Brooklyn, and the shooting at a church in California--all within the last month.   I did a quick scroll through Twitter this morning after entering #thoughtsandprayers as a search term, and the results were pretty sobering.   The overwhelming sentiment can be summed up like this: "Stop sending your thoughts and prayers and do something."  This isn't a new criticism.  It's one that is lifted up every time there is a mass shooting in the U.S., which sadly is pretty o

I stood outside my littlest boy's elementary school today and stared up at the flagpole where the American flag and Texas flag stood at half-mast.  The flags were displayed thusly because of the horrible tragedy in Uvalde, TX yesterday that claimed the lives of 19 elementary school students and two of their teachers.  As I stood there, a father who had just dropped off his child walked by me and said: "It's so unbelievably sad, isn't it?"  I said that it was.  We looked knowingly at one another for a moment, and then he moved on.  So I  prayed then as I looked over the buildings where my son has spent the last nearly six years of his life---halls, and playgrounds that he knows so well, teachers who have taught him, and cared for him...  I prayed that he and everyone in those buildings would be safe today, the day after that, and for always.  With my eyes filling with tears, I prayed that I would live to see the day when we would be freed from the sinful systems th

  Today I have been watching the news out of Uvalde, TX unfold where an 18-year-old armed suspect entered an elementary school and killed (at this writing) 21 people---nineteen students and two teachers.  My heart is broken... again.   Invariably, my mind goes to my own little guy, who I sent off to school on his bike this morning, and who I got to see come through the door at the end of the day.  But just 160 miles south of where my son goes to school, there are at least nineteen families who can't say the same.  They sent their little ones off to school, and they are never coming home again.  My mind went back to December 14, 2010, the day when I heard the news of the horrific shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary school, which claimed the lives of 20 children, and several adults.  I wept uncontrollably then as I thought of those precious children's lives being taken by a deranged young man armed with weapons he had no business owning.   And I thought to myself, "Maybe now..

Have you ever met someone and within a few moments they said or did something that just rubbed you the wrong way?   Have you ever had a co-worker that gets under your skin, so much so that you can't stand to be around them after a while? Or maybe you have a family member who constantly says things that drive you crazy, and every time there's a family gathering you feel a knot in your stomach when you see them?  The fact is, no matter how enlightened, together, or serene we like to think we are, there are always people who can really get our goat.   These are the kind of people who seem to know just what to say, or how to act to get us riled up, and ready to rumble.  And try as we might to truly work on all of these things to be better at finding the good in everyone, we have moments when all of our hard work, therapy, meditation, prayer and the like fail us and it all just unravels.   Pema Chodron once wrote:   ... sooner or later someone walks through that door and pushes all

I'm in a strange season in my life where all of my boys are celebrating milestones--all within a couple of weeks of one another.  My oldest son just finished law school, my middlest boy is graduating from high school, and my youngest will be a middle schooler in the coming year.   There are sixteen years between my oldest and youngest if you are wondering how all of that is possible.   Unlike most of my friends whose kids are all leaving the nest, I'll be that old guy on the sidelines of his kids' football games for some time to come.  I'm doing my best to wear that well, though.   These kinds of transitions are bittersweet.  As difficult as it is to realize even my littlest guy is growing up,  it's kind of a gift to be seeing all these transitions happen at once.   It's also been humbling to see how they are growing up to be kind, empathetic, thoughtful humans, who genuinely want to make a positive impact on the world, and who seem to care deeply about making a

Two thousand years ago, a gathering of people in a middle-eastern city began a movement that would circle the globe and leave its mark on individuals and cultures on every continent. This movement would eventually become known as The Church. The early members of this movement were first called “Followers of the Way”—a direct reflection of their desire to follow “in the way” of Christ.   Over the next couple of weeks, we'll be journeying through passages from the book of Acts in the New Testament as we learn some valuable lessons from the early Church.   Whether you consider yourself a church person or not, you are invited to join us on this journey as we find out what mattered to those early followers, and why what mattered to them, still matters to us today.  Today we’re going to hear the story of Lydia, a woman who became a leader in the church—an unlikely convert, and a powerful witness.  I read this week that Lydia found the God who was finding her.  I think that's just abs

Fr. Anthony de Mello once told this very short, humorous, and very pointed story...  A tourist to a town hired a guide to show him the sights.  At one point during the tour, the tourist said to the guide:   "You have a right to be proud of your town.  I was especially impressed with the number of churches in it.  Surely people here must love the Lord." To which the guide replied:  "Well, they may love the Lord, but they sure as hell hate each other."   If you're like me, that last line probably drew a wry smile from you, or maybe a chuckle.   Whatever you felt was all due to the juxtaposition of the phrase "...they may love the Lord" against "....they sure as hell hate each other," which is a bit jarring, and also pretty funny.   It most likely didn't make you laugh out loud, though, because it hits a little too close home for most of us---especially those of us who claim to follow Jesus, and who attend church on a semi-regular basis.  Be

  This past Sunday my youngest son "graduated" from the 5th-grade class in the kids' ministry at my church.  His official graduation will be next week, but this one was significant.  For the past nearly six years, Jacob has grown up in our church's kids ministry, for more than half of his life.  As the pastor of the church,  I couldn't be prouder of what our kids' ministry stands for, and what we teach.  But as a parent---I'm unbelievably grateful.  One of the "parting gifts" my son received from the leadership team of our kids' ministry was a book entitled, "The Circles Around Us," a book about love, acceptance, and community.   It's one of those kids' books that really isn't a kids' book if you know what I mean, and at first, he acted like he wasn't impressed with it, but I caught him reading it when he thought no one was looking.    He also received a jar full of notes from his teachers, team leaders, and frie

How many second chances do you get in life?   I think in some aspects, we get more than a few of them.  But there are some things that once missed, never come around again---at least not in ways that we once hoped they would.  I've had more than a few redemptive, restorative, and resurrecting second chances in my life.  Some have even been of the variety that I mentioned earlier---the kind that you thought would never be possible.   And there are some things that seem lost to me forever.   I believe that we all experience this in one fashion or another.  Maybe as you are reading, you find yourself in a space in your life where you are longing for a second chance.   You want to fix the relationship that got broken.  You feel you need to prove yourself at work after a setback.  You made a mistake that you feel you've been paying for.  You got a bad diagnosis, and you need a new way forward.  You feel like you've done things that God can't forgive you for--but you long for

It doesn't take much to send me off on a tangent of imagination, memory, or both.  I've always been that way.  I can get sidetracked easier than a puppy, or an eight-year-old kid in an arcade.  This was the word I saw the most on the progress reports of my grade school years:   "Daydreamer."   Before there was a widespread understanding in the fields of education as to different learning abilities, kids generally were affixed with a label and deemed to be an annoyance.  To be fair, there were good teachers, though.  There were teachers who got it.  God bless them for being kind and doing the best they could to help me learn how I needed to learn.  When I was a kid, I didn't understand how to harness the energy and the voices in my head to do whatever it took to excel.  That knowledge came later when I was in high school, and I learned to use it to my advantage.  I can get some stuff done if it needs doing. In fact, I  often measure the quality of my day by how muc

Two thousand years ago, a gathering of people in a middle-eastern city began a movement that would circle the globe and leave its mark on individuals and cultures on every continent. This movement would eventually become known as The Church. The early members of this movement were first called “Followers of the Way”—a direct reflection of their desire to follow “in the way” of Christ.   Over the next several weeks, we'll be journeying through passages from the book of Acts in the New Testament as we learn some valuable lessons from the early Church.   Whether you consider yourself a church person or not, you are invited to join us on this journey as we find out what mattered to those early followers, and why what mattered to them, still matters to us today.  Today we're going to dig into a fascinating story from Acts chapters 10 and 11, and we're going to learn about just how big the Gospel of Jesus Christ really is---sound good? Before we get into the sermon today, though.