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A Meditation on Darkness – Part Two

While I struggled with my dad’s lack of physical touch and his emotional distance, he touched me in ways that I had not fully appreciated and that have shaped me profoundly. When I consider his call, commitment, and generosity, my ambivalence gives way to acceptance and my burden of sadness lifts.
May 13, 2024
Featured Articles
Featured

A Meditation on Darkness – Part One

When I awaken night after night and stare into the darkness, I experience something more than the absence of light, something more akin to a power. This power exposes the brokenness of my life but also affords me the chance of greater wholeness and deeper intimacy with God. In the dark of night, I realize a comfort and an adumbration—a foreshadowing of my entering the deep darkness of death that draws ever closer.  
Featured
April 29, 2024

The Lodi Bus: A Memoir

The Lodi bus was the oldest bus in the Eastern Christian School Association fleet. We knew our lowly status just from riding that bus. The Association bought a new bus every year, but it never went to Lodi. The new buses went to Wyckoff and Midland Park. Even the Clifton kids had a newer bus than we did. But we lived among the heathen—not in one of the Dutch Calvinist colonies of New Jersey—and worse, among the low-class heathen. Lodi…
Daniel Meeter 21
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Featured
April 22, 2024

Bearing Witness: A Journey to Unbelief

In some ways, it felt like evangelicalism ruined religion for me, and I don’t think I’m the only former evangelical to feel that way. I say evangelicalism ruined religion for me because it felt like I could no longer relate to any religious practice in a healthy way. After you’ve experienced religious trauma, it’s hard to trust Christians, even the nice ones. I couldn’t read the Bible or participate in any sort of religious service without feeling triggered and icky…
Allison Vander Broek
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April 15, 2024

Sport and Religion

Ultimately, sport opens windows to transcendence. One can hardly watch Usain Bolt run the 100 meters, or Simone Biles do a floor exercises, or Caitlin Clark sink a three-pointer, or witness Jim Redmond supporting his injured son Derek across the finish line without recognizing that God is at work in an extraordinary way.
Paul Janssen
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April 8, 2024

From Convict to Mentor: Changing the Prison Culture from Within

Having long since given up on God and Christianity when I entered the program, I had no appreciation of its religious aspects. However, starting each class with a devotional and prayer became the building blocks upon which I started to form a renewed relationship with Christ.
Robert S. Horton
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April 1, 2024

Christ’s Followers Are Not Culture Warriors

Lent and Easter remind me to have hope. Though the Crusades did horrible damage to people and to the name of Christ, they came to an end. Likewise, this present madness embarked on by culture warriors in America will end too. Just as God reminded Elijah that not all Israel bowed its knee to Baal, so also not all Christians in America embrace destructive, vigilante power. Some deny themselves, take up their crosses daily, follow Christ, and lay down their…
Mark Stephenson
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Featured
March 25, 2024

My Mother is in Hospice Care

Loss of memory can sometimes be a gift. I know it isn’t always, and I can imagine that there are plenty of counter examples, but as I sit with my mom and experience (for the ten-millionth time in my life) her love for me, I realize that there can be a kind of grace in not remembering a few things. It’s not denial; it’s choosing to remember her life as good. My mom wants to leave this world a grateful…
Doug Brouwer
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Latest from the Blog

Daily blog by our regular bloggers & guest contributors.

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    We talk so much about laying down our lives for our friends, as Jesus laid down his life. But if we are really following Jesus in this, we don’t just lay our lives down – we take them up again!
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Poetry

Poetry
May 7, 2024

Known

And Adam knew his wife, who through the knowing bore Cain. You are handsy in the Uber ...
Haley Hodges Schmid 0
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Poetry
April 30, 2024

Inheritance (Metaphysicals XVI)

From my mother blue eyes watching from the fringes like a rabbit in long grass ...
D.S. Martin 4
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Poetry
April 23, 2024

Vespers: After Louise Glück

Once I believed in You, still do, though belief is often evasive, often abstract ...
Matthew Pullar
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Poetry
April 16, 2024

Parable of the Lost

quick breath, heart beat clock strike: each metronome tick-tocks past paths that arch like R's bowl, back by another route ...
Bethany Besteman
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Poetry
April 9, 2024

A Recovered Alcoholic-Addict Talks of Grace

The cancer shot through Earl like a rainbow and left a crook in his arm, just right to lift up the grandchild he'd never held before.
LC Gutierrez
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Poetry
April 2, 2024

How to Reconcile with a Brother

I could build him a barn, a big one, as wide as the sky, red, to show my love and to confess I share the same blood ...
Jo Taylor
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Latest Podcasts

Podcast
May 7, 2024

“Known” by Haley Hodges Schmid

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews Haley Hodges Schmid about her poem “Known.” Haley is an MFA (Poetry) candidate at Seattle Pacific University. She holds qualifications from Hope College, Shenandoah Conservatory, and Oxford University. Her work has been published in Cassandra Voices and Ekstasis Magazine. Recent projects also include The Gun Mass, an international collaborative choral work with music by Jamie Powe. She lives in West Virginia with her husband and young son.
Rose Postma 0
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Podcast
April 23, 2024

“Vespers” by Matthew Pullar

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews Matthew Pullar about his poem “Vespers.” Matthew is a teacher and writer based in Melbourne, Australia. He is the author of three collections of poetry. You can read “Vespers” on reformedjournal.com.
Rose Postma
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Podcast
April 16, 2024

“Parable of the Lost” by Bethany Besteman

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews Bethany Besteman about her poem “Parable of the Lost.” Bethany works as a worship coordinator and a church administrator for Silver Spring CRC in Maryland. She's also the managing editor for Reformed Worship.
Rose Postma
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Podcast
April 9, 2024

“A Recovered Alcoholic-Addict Talks of Grace” by LC Gutierrez

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews LC Gutierrez about his poem “A Recovered Alcoholic-Addict Talks of Grace.” LC is a product of many places in the South and the Caribbean, as well as writing and comparative literature programs at Louisiana State and Tulane University. An erstwhile academic, he now writes, teaches and plays trombone in Madrid, Spain. His work is published or forthcoming in Notre Dame Review, Dunes Review, Rougarou, Apricity, and other wonderful journals.
Rose Postma
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Podcast
April 2, 2024

“How to Reconcile with a Brother” by Jo Taylor

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews Jo Taylor about her poem, “How to Reconcile with a Brother.” Jo is a retired, 35-year English teacher from Georgia. Her favorite genre to teach high school students was poetry, and today she dedicates more time to writing it, her major themes focused on family, place, and faith. She says she writes to give testimony to the past and to her heritage. She has been published in several journals, both on-line…
Rose Postma
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Podcast
March 26, 2024

“Be Killing Sin” by Cody Adams

In this episode of the poetry edition, Rose Postma interviews Cody Adams on his poem “Be Killing Sin.” Cody is an English teacher from Buffalo, NY. His poetry has appeared in Ekstasis Magazine, Heart of Flesh, Cacti Fur, among others. He received the 2016 Clarence Amann award for his short story Unstuck. He also serves as a Board Member for Forefront Festival.
Rose Postma
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