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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Stuff I Learned from U2, and How It Influenced My Current Path

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Categories: changing mindsets, food for thought, My Story

As I’ve said at other times on this blog, my journey out of institutional Christianity has been a progressive one, but it wasn’t until I had a wake-up call–a public rebuke from a local pastor–that I truly realized how far I had drifted from the culture of the institutional church.

Before that point, I was still trying to belong to “the club” in many ways–still trying to garner acceptance from the mainstream church. After this point, I recognized that wasn’t working. I was clearly outside the walls, and I needed to learn how to embrace that fully.

This is a preview of Stuff I Learned from U2, and How It Influenced My Current Path. Read the full post (580 words, 2 images, estimated 2:19 mins reading time)

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Questions of heresy?

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Categories: Meanderings (look it up), Rantings

In response to one of my posts about the mistaken identity of the church, I got an interesting comment from a guy named Michael who expressed some concerns because he felt I was using too broad of a brush stroke when I spoke of pastors and others getting fearful over people finding alternative methods of expressing their faith. I felt it was significant enough to devote a post to it. Let me quote him here:

This is a preview of Questions of heresy?. Read the full post (592 words, 1 image, estimated 2:22 mins reading time)

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Random Stuff I Did In And Around Joplin, Missouri During the Past Three Days

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Categories: random stuff, What the heck was THAT?

  1. Drove around hunting around for photo opportunities for The Wild One. (This picture on the right is one of the more artistic photos she took–not an example of the scenery.)
  2. Talked for a half hour to some shop owners in historic Carthage, Missouri about their town’s history and colonial furniture.
  3. Ate not-really-Chinese food at a “Chinese” food restaurant (it was still good).
  4. Found out that some roads that are on the map are not really there.
  5. Picked up the trail of old Route 66 and had a milkshake at a 50’s diner.
This is a preview of Random Stuff I Did In And Around Joplin, Missouri During the Past Three Days. Read the full post (156 words, 2 images, estimated 37 secs reading time)

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Mistaken Identity (part 2)

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Categories: changing mindsets, church

(First read Mistaken Identity part 1…okay, now you’re ready…)

In my last post I described how the church in general suffers from mistaken identity, because it is an organism that thinks and acts like an institution. I concluded by sharing that because there are those who are (in increasing numbers) drifting away from the institutions and acting more like an organism, this mistaken identity is now growing into an identity crisis, especially among institutional church leadership.

This is a preview of Mistaken Identity (part 2). Read the full post (914 words, 1 image, estimated 3:39 mins reading time)

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Where’s the Inspiration in Our Five-Point Formula?

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Categories: food for thought, Meanderings (look it up)

Here’s an interesting irony to consider. Seminarians, and churchgoers in general, consider a sermon to be “good” when it has at least three solid points, and not more than five. Nonfiction books, especially the self-help or Christian kind, are considered good when they spell out a problem methodically and give you a certain number of formulaic steps to solve said problem.

But apparently God, who inspired what we know as the Bible, didn’t get the memo on presenting seven steps to success or five principles for getting to know Him.

This is a preview of Where’s the Inspiration in Our Five-Point Formula?. Read the full post (630 words, 1 image, estimated 2:31 mins reading time)

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What Kind of Weed-Eater to Buy

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Categories: What the heck was THAT?

Not really. I’m not going to talk about weed-eaters. I just wrote that to punk my friend Jim, to try and get him to come read my blog. Go here to see what I mean. (Ain’t I a stinker?)

Seriously though (or not so serious)…thought I’d break from deep thought and do a bits-and-pieces kind of post. Just about this-and-that, with a little tongue-in-cheek thrown in (and a deliberate over-use of multiple-hyphenation).

This is a preview of What Kind of Weed-Eater to Buy. Read the full post (435 words, 2 images, estimated 1:44 mins reading time)

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I Believe It, I Don’t Believe It

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Categories: food for thought, Rantings

Ever wonder why preachers just can’t talk normal?

“Praise God, the fire of God is gonna FALL in this place tonight, amen? We’re blessed beyond measure, we’re the head and not the tail. We’re gonna have us a TIME in the Holy Ghost. Can I get a witness in the house tonight?”

And that’s just the warm-up.

The sermon is usually full of the same kind of hype. If I hear one more preacher say, “How many know that _____________?”, I don’t know what I’ll do. I’ve gotten to the point where I almost can’t listen to a sermon anymore. (I like to preach ’em, just not listen to ’em.) 🙂

This is a preview of I Believe It, I Don’t Believe It. Read the full post (564 words, 2 images, estimated 2:15 mins reading time)

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Be the Change

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Categories: church, Meanderings (look it up), Rantings

So as I was sitting at a dance recital (of all places) last night, mulling things over while watching what was happening on stage…out of the blue this thought came into my head:

“Be the change you want to see.”

It was so profound I wished I had my laptop there so I could blog about it in the dark and irritate lots of people around me. But something told me someone else had come up with this phrase before me, so I Googled it when I got home.

Dang you, Gandhi.

This is a preview of Be the Change. Read the full post (556 words, 1 image, estimated 2:13 mins reading time)
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