I really wanted this to be a Jolly blog.

The parables of the Mustard Seed and the Yeast pack a powerful one-two punch in just a few carefully chosen words.

When fiscal realities come into conflict with caring for an institution’s employees, time after time the former easily outweigh the latter.

I found value in the kept-things. I also found value in the empty space left behind by the things I let go of.

As I pick my snap peas, I also hear a pastoral note in Jeremiah 29. Yes, exile will be long. Babylon is not Jerusalem. All

My small-sample survey suggests nightmares fall into three types: fear of external threats; fear of internal inadequacies—mortal or moral weakness; and fear of abandonment.

We were asked to make a list of goals for our marriage. I only remember two, and we failed at both.

When asked by an interviewer how he wished to be remembered, Buechner said, “I would choose the fiction.” Yet few readers engage Buechner’s fiction today.

Too often in church history and in churches today we have rushed to premature judgment assuming we know who is clearly evil and who is

A long commute and late nights at my first job meant I was tired every evening and longed for every weekend.

Becoming a pastor — to say nothing of starting a new church ! — can feel like signing up to open a Blockbuster Video location

High summer and the plant life here in the muggy Midwest is pumping with all abandon, turning sunlight, soil minerals, and atmosphere into plant tissues,