A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church in Boise, Idaho Aug 24, 2014 Exodus 1:8–2:10 Romans 12:1-8 I wonder if Pharaoh ever had second thoughts about killing the Hebrew peoples’ boy babies instead of their girl babies. Because if you read this story, the men aren’t much of a problem to Pharaoh. They are slaves.…
Washington State opened their sealed records on July 1 and I sent away for my original birth certificate. I received my original birth certificate last week. I now know my birth mother’s name. I wouldn’t have thought just a name on a piece of paper, disconnected from any knowledge about her, would be so powerful.…
A sermon preached at Trinity Presbyterian Church in Boise, Idaho on Aug 17, 2014 Genesis 12:1-9 2 Corinthians 5: 1-7, 16-21 I prayed long and hard about which text to read this morning. And I kept returning to the story of Abram. This text is from the early narrative of our ancestors. He’ll go on…
This weekend, our church went to the Sawtooth Mountains for All Church Camp. It was great. Good to have a different pace. Nice to have time for random conversations with no worry about what time it was or what was next on the schedule. Fun to sing around the campfire. We were generally ‘off…
A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian in Boise on July 26, 2014. Luke 15:11-32 A friend shared this quote with me a few weeks ago, and it really stuck with me: Anybody can observe the Sabbath, but making it holy surely takes the rest of the week. ~ Alice Walker My Sabbath activity tomorrow will…
I just saw the new documentary biography of Roger Ebert, titled after his memoir, Life Itself. This film, by Steve James, gets two thumbs up from me. Before seeing the film, I would not have described myself as a big fan of Ebert. I remember seeing him on TV, fighting about movies with Gene Siskel…
A friend shared an article on Facebook today that has left me conflicted and pondering things in my heart. The article, from the New York Times, is about universities and evangelical Christian student groups in conflict over non-discrimination policies. In a collision between religious freedom and anti-discrimination policies, the student group, and its advisers, have…
My most recent post at Revgals.
I spoke this weekend at the Community Progressive event in Julia Davis Park. Here’s a recap of my remarks, updated in light of the Supreme Court ruling today. There seems to be some confusion in our political and cultural discourse lately about what, exactly, constitutes “religious freedom”. The idea of religious freedom is deeply coded…
A sermon preached at Southminster Presbyterian Church on June 28, 2014 (This was at our Saturday Evening Sabbath Service. We’ll be doing this, instead of Sunday worship, the last week of each month.) Exodus 18:13-27 Thank you for being here tonight. I truly am grateful for your willingness to try something very different. I know…
Glass Overflowing 