Wayward Son

Musician. Composer. Recovering perfectionist. Minister-in-transition. Lover of puns. Hijacker of rock song references. Questioner of the status quo. I'm not really a rebel. Just a sincere Christ-follower with a thirst for significance that gets me into trouble. My quest has taken me over the fence of institutional Christianity. Here are some of my random thoughts along the way. Read along, join in the conversation. Just be nice.

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Lessons In Perspective

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Categories: changing mindsets, moments of truth

Sometimes, your entire perspective can change in a moment. One event. One unexpected situation.

For my family, this happened twelve days ago, on March 21.

For those waiting with baited breath for me to release those long-promised posts about Trump and the church, I haven’t forgotten. Things keep happening so fast that it’s difficult to keep the drafts current, but eventually I’ll start a conversation here about that. For now, this is more important.

Perspective.

On Tuesday, March 21, at about 6:30 a.m., I had just arrived at my co-working space to start the day’s writing assignments. My phone rang; it was my wife, the Wild One.

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The Deafening Silence

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Categories: moments of truth

This week, I’ve been compelled to start a list I call “Things I Never Thought I’d Do.”

This list goes back to Election Day, but most have occurred within the past week. Here’s what’s on the list so far:

  • Voted for a Democrat
  • Began posting politically on social media
  • Attended not one, but two major protests
  • Got into an Uber with a stranger on the way to one of the two protests (when they shut down the airport trains)
  • Found out the publishing house I’m writing music for plans to allow the ACLU full access to their library (including my music) for free–and I was actually okay with that

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Reflections on the New Year

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Categories: Meanderings (look it up), moments of truth, Things that Will Probably Get Me In Trouble

good-year-1911507_640Happy New Year!

Like many of you, I get particularly reflective at the dawn of a new year. It’s really just a date on the calendar, nothing particularly spiritually significant about it from my perspective, but it is a time to take inventory, in a manner of speaking–to take a breath and get ready to go again.

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We Interrupt This Fiasco of an Election Cycle to Bring You the Following Personal Update

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Categories: How I am

In a few days, it will all be over. (Or not…but at least the immediate campaigning will stop.)

I wrote yet another huge blog post that’s still in my drafts–an open letter of sorts, kind of a last-ditch appeal to the evangelical church to rethink their choice for President–but I didn’t post it, either here or on Facebook, largely because I didn’t see the point. Most people’s minds are made up, and no one’s really listening to each other anymore. The divide is wide, the breach is deep, and it will take some time to heal when this is all over. Suffice it to say that this election cycle has exposed some very disturbing traits in the western Christian community, so as dormant as this here blog has been, I might have a few things to say in the coming days. 🙂

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Never Goes Away

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Categories: moments of truth

I made a mistake this morning. Or maybe not.

On Sundays, I take it fairly easy. I try not to write for work, but I’ll often go to a coffee shop and surf the Internet, maybe blog a little if I feel inspired. While doing that this morning, I opened up Spotify and saw a Praise and Worship playlist. Curious, I thought I’d see what was playing.

Oops.

Not what you think, though.

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The Nagging Questions

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Categories: Meanderings (look it up)

As I write this, it’s the fifteenth anniversary of 9/11, the day America changed. Now that I’m living in New York where it happened, it feels even more weighty to me, as observances are happening at Ground Zero and all around the area. As horrifying as it was to watch on a small screen, I still cannot imagine what it must have been like for those living here at the time to go through it firsthand.

This isn’t really a 9/11 post–I suppose it just enhances my pensive mood this morning.

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Why I No Longer Feel Guilty for Leaving the Evangelical Church

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Categories: moments of truth

I have a confession to make. It’s not something I’ve been hiding, except perhaps from myself–it’s just something I realized this weekend. For many years now, I’ve been processing my thoughts about leaving the evangelical church (more specifically, the institutional church). Yet all along, there has been this underlying subtext of guilt. I felt guilty about it.

After all, you’re not supposed to leave. Right?

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What the Day Reveals (a New York Update)

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Categories: moments of truth

I love the creative way God reveals things to us sometimes, how sometimes He orders our steps in an unusual way so that the day reveals something significant to you. One way I know God is creative and artistic–I mean, apart from creating the heavens and the earth and the trees and the vast expanse of the universe and stuff–is that He seems to have a flair for the dramatic. For those of you who are tracking our personal journey here, I’d like to share the events of such a day–one that happened just a few days ago.

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I Never Thought I’d See the Day

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Categories: politics? oh puh-leeze.

Okay, I gots something on my mind…and fair warning, it’s about politics.

As I grow older, I never thought I’d become one of those dudes that says, “I never thought I’d see the day when…[fill in the blank].” You know the type–the geezers that sit around and complain about the changes in world they live in, as compared to the world that they grew up in, and pine for the good old days.

But I have to say, this election year has got me saying this more and more–if not out loud, than at least to myself.

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