Category Archives: Writing
Rerun: Clifford’s Principle
This was originally posted March 25, 2009.
At the last Grab a Brew, someone asked a question: “Would you rather be right with no evidence to back you up, or wrong, but with good evidence for it?”
I had never heard or considered this question before. My own answer was immediately obvious, but as he continued, it [...]
Rerun: Some New Thing
Due to some unforeseen circumstances, all of my writing energy lately has been directed elsewhere. I hope to start writing here again in the next two or three weeks, but until then I will be “airing reruns” from the past five years.
This one was originally posted February 10, 2007.
I have been working retail for the [...]
List: Tone Changes Meaning
Without realizing it, we read dialogue in the Bible with an imagined tone of voice. Here are three things Jesus said where the meaning changes depending on how I hear him saying it.
1. “You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye.” (Luke 6:41-42)
I always thought of Jesus saying this in a stern, almost [...]
Informed Apathy
It’s hard to imagine how different life was two hundred years ago. The telegraph had not yet been invented. Information only travelled as fast as the person who carried it, and it was valued in proportion to how far it had to be transported. Local news was abundant and travelled quickly, and it usually directly [...]
C. S. Lewis: Longing
In speaking of this desire for our own faroff country, which we find in ourselves even now, I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by [...]
Normal
Ryan met me in the parking lot of the Family Video on a Saturday afternoon. We went inside carrying chairs and popcorn, set them up in front of one of those corner televisions in the back, and watched the movie that was playing as though it was our living [...]
Harelip Prayers
Every Sunday morning the Christian radio station in Waterloo broadcasts the live service of a small church in the area. When we had band practice before church, Matt usually picked me up right as this church’s band was playing. As we scanned the stations, we’d sometimes go right past their service, but other times we’d [...]
Wonder
It was late afternoon, probably sometime in November, and I was reading a book. The sun had reached the point in its descent where if I had just then started reading I might have turned on the lamp, but I could still read for a little while longer by the natural light coming in the [...]
A Celebration of Excellence: Two Rivers Church
In August of 2003, some friends and I came to Des Moines for a Lifehouse concert. We decided to go down a few hours early to visit Willowbrook Bible Camp, since Christy’s dad was directing the high school camp that week and a few of our younger siblings were among the campers. We ate dinner [...]
A Celebration of Excellence: Bethany Bible Chapel
I said a few weeks ago that I have been a part of seven different churches in my life. What I didn’t say is that six of those churches have been in the past six years. But from the day I was born until the day I went off to college, I went to Bethany [...]
