A troupe of builders was in and out of our house for much of this past fall. In the theater of our basement, they performed for a seven-week run—hammers, saws, and drills banging, humming, and buzzing in dissonant harmony, while a variety of radio stations blared out the melody of each...

Several years ago I took my parents on an expedition, at their request, to the cemetery where they will someday be buried. We stopped at the main building, found a map indicating the location of their plots, and drove to the site. I parked the car, and as they made their way across the grass, I...

Tomorrow my friend Sarah will bury her husband, the first of my peer group to do so. And while she and I haven’t had much contact in the half-decade since I moved to a different state, Sarah will always be a special friend. When the devastating news of her loss reached me on Wednesday...

The face value of my dad’s gift was only one dollar and thirty-nine cents, hardly a fortune and barely even a gift. But it was a treasure from the man I have loved all my life to the man I will love for the rest of my life.

The recipient of the one-dollar coin and the thirty-nine pennies was...

Reposting today in memory of my friend Tim, who met Jesus last night, and shortly thereafter, I’m sure, was reunited with his dearly loved wife, Judy. The or iginal post was written in September 2015, and at the time, I was pretty sure I’d never see Tim again this side of the new earth,...

A three-tiered platter filled with treats isn’t really designed for a two-person party, but we’re using it nonetheless this New Year’s Eve. It was supposed to be part of a new holiday tradition in our house, but things didn’t turn out that way. At least this year.

One of the...

My one and only New Year’s resolution is to write a blog post today. Call me a party pooper (you wouldn’t be the first), but I don’t make resolutions anymore. I find I already have an impossible list of expectations for my life—no sense adding a fresh layer every January 1.

I’ve thought a lot about expectations during

I hope you have some Thanksgiving leftovers, because you’ll need them for this post. Last time we were in Daniel 8, we sorted out the geography of Daniel’s vision. This time around, we’ll sort out the history behind the vision (you might want to review the vision here). Go get those turkey leftovers before you jump on this

If you are geographically challenged, I have more sympathy for you than I used to. I have always prided myself on having a good sense of direction, and I confess I have scoffed at people who don’t know their east from their west. Maps have always been my friend – I know how to read them and, for the most part, I know how to fold them

Tomorrow I will attend my home church, as I typically do when I visit my parents for the weekend. With coffee cup in hand, I will make the rounds—hugging old (literally and metaphorically) friends and giving them the sweetened condensed version of how life presently is. Time will allow a few friends to linger longer, but most will need to

We’ve made it to chapter 8 in Daniel, but I must warn you – things do not get better any time soon. This chapter recounts a second terrifying vision that Daniel had, a vision very similar to the first vision he had in the endless chapter 7. Not only are the visions similar, the text expects us to read them in tandem. This is pretty

I’m on the other side of another interstate move, an exhausting practice I really need to stop: total upheaval followed by a long season of making a new life, five times over in the past fifteen years. You might think I’d be used to it by now, but, alas, uncertainty abounds every time and I always worry about how the new-life-making