My first year of seminary was very difficult.

I am writing this on the occasion of the birthday of our first son, Elisha. And a son’s birthday lends the opportunity to think back to stories about how he got to be the adult (husband and father) he has become.

Last week I explored the phenomenon of “lazy brain” and how it informs our public discourse and bonds one with another. This week I ponder what is at the root of that tendency.

“The brain is lazy. Your brain would rather pattern rote or automatic responses, so it does not have to work, meaning it will not have to think.”

In 1987 I began teaching Asian Church History and “Church History” courses in Singapore.

We will not represent Jesus to the world when we constantly divide, criticize, and disparage our own brothers and sisters in Christ.

I was not quite ten years old when I sat on the floor of my parent’s bedroom watching the black and white Motorola television, August 28, 1963.

As we turn the page on another year, and as I consider the landscape of possibilities that lay before us as a community, I am drawn to the writings of a favorite ancient writer of mine…

“Think back to when you were in elementary school or perhaps high school. Who was at the dinner table at Christmas?”

Two news items that caught my attention this past Thanksgiving season are the new federal law in Australia forbidding youth under sixteen from having access to social media and the new book by humanist chaplain at MIT Greg Epstein who argues that “technology has become religion.”

Fifty-two weeks ago I tore out a page from my church bulletin and put it in my Bible.

When David Hansen’s thoughtful volume on pastoral ministry came out in 1994, my wife, Nancy, read it and said it should be required reading for every pastor.