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.
Categories: food for thought
Below is an excerpt from my post today on Communitas Collective:
My personal journey began in the instutional church. I showed a seriousness about my faith at an early age, as well as a gift for music, which garnered me a lot of attention. By my early teens, I had felt called to ministry, and stayed on that trajectory through most of my adult life. The institutional church, and church leadership in particular, was my comfort zone.
Categories: "Love Is...", faith, love
Take this for what it is…but I felt like bringing a discussion in the comments up here to the front page.
Last night, someone identified only as “oj700” commented on this post I actually wrote one year ago tomorrow, entitled “Love…Does Not Seek Its Own.” I want to publish his/her remarks exactly as written:
Categories: random stuff, What the heck was THAT?
Categories: food for thought
A few days ago I posed the question (well, several questions, actually…but they basically boil down to this):
What could faith and Christ-following look like without the cultural baggage we put on it?
I’ve really noticed in recent years that there is an awful lot we classify as “church” that either is not mandated by the Scripture, or is unsupportable by Scripture. Yet these are so often the things we cling to the most.
Categories: food for thought, Sunday meditations
Categories: food for thought, Rantings
In my process of deconstructing, not just from institutional church but from institutional thinking… 🙂
…I’ve been realizing that there is a common thread or theme running through it. It could be worded several ways, but all convey the same basic question:
Categories: food for thought
Oh, boy, I may be stepping into some thick crap today…but it wouldn’t be the first time… 🙂
From my “tween” years through high school, I grew up in a racially integrated environment in California. My friends at school included people who were white, black, Chinese, Filipino, Latino (European and North American), Portuguese, Vietnamese…the list goes on. We played together, had fun, even sometimes joked about our differences. It just wasn’t a big deal to us. Also, most of my friendships were within the churches I attended, which added to the sense of brotherhood/sisterhood with all of us. The diversity I lived in felt so normal that I honestly thought racism was dead in this country. And especially in the church.
Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought, Rantings
Kathy over at Carnival in My Head just got back from Africa with her family, and posted a preliminary report about her trip on her blog. One of the most profound moments she described was when she said her missions team was the first American team ever to actually stay at the orphanage they were visiting–that most teams sleep at a nice hotel an hour away. One of the teachers at the orphanage expressed gratefulness at this, saying, “people come to help, but they don’t really want to be with us and live our life with us.”
Ouch. In so many ways.
Categories: Sunday meditations
Ps. 139:7-12 (NASB):
Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there.
If I take the wings of the dawn,
If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea,
Even there Your hand will leade me,
And Your right hand will lay hold of me.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me,
And the light around me will be night,”
Even the darkness is not dark to You,
And the night is as bright as the day.
Darkness and light are alike to You.
Categories: food for thought, Meanderings (look it up)
