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pastoral life

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April 2020

April 26, 2020

If We Weren’t Afraid: What Is The Post-Pandemic Church Going To Be?

We've all got a story we've told too many times, right? Mine is this: Once,...

November 2019

November 03, 2019

A Cloud of Witnesses

He'd been making the rounds. The man in the trench coat, Bible in hand, burst...

July 2019

July 17, 2019

How To Be A Guest: 7 Things I Learned About Visiting A New Church

It was an alien experience for me, pulling in that "visitor" parking spot. But after...

January 2019

January 31, 2019

Small Things

Fan turning, light burning Dust on the air Cardinal feather, change in the weather A...

September 2017

September 28, 2017

Wide Awake: True Confessions of a Bedtime Hater

We've become a nation of walking zombies. It is affecting not just our health, but...

April 2017

April 10, 2017

The Stories We Tell Ourselves: Holy Week Clergy Burnout

There's this story we clergy tell religiously around this time every year. Not the thing...

May 2016

May 12, 2016

Don’t Like Your Pastor? Don’t Leave Your Church

There's a blog post going around called "So You Don't Like your Pastor..." I read...

May 09, 2016

Cleaning the Brushes: The Never-Done Work of Ministry

My friend Kory shares some thoughts on the "never done-ness" of ministry. On behalf of...

September 2015

September 22, 2015

Talking to Strangers: Scene in a Bar

I was drinking a beer. That was her first clue that I wasn’t a real...

July 2015

July 10, 2015

Cloud By Day: Living With Ambiguity and Measuring Ministry

In every generation, people of faith journey across the hazy plains of “What does this...

June 2015

June 24, 2015

Good Call: 10 Ways to Nail that Pastoral Search Interview

It's that time again. All over the country, exhausted pastoral search committees plow through another...

March 2015

March 31, 2015

Holy Week Survival Guide: 10 Life Hacks for Clergy

Lace up the trainers, zip up your robe. Eye of the tiger, baby. It is...

November 2014

November 20, 2014

Talking to Strangers

It was Sunday morning. I stopped at my favorite, may or may not have chosen...

September 2014

September 17, 2014

How to Do It All

Sometimes other clergy ask for advice on how to balance being a pastor and a...

August 2014

August 20, 2014

Mapping the Message: A Choose Your Own Adventure Tale for Preachers

When I write about pastoral life, I try to make it interesting and/or useful to...

January 2014

January 22, 2014

Showing Up

I never know what to say when someone thanks me for making a hospital or...

January 10, 2013

As Often As You Do This…

we are winging it. Every one of us, even on our best days. Call me...

January 04, 2013

Failure to Adapt

our mainline churches are dying from this 'failure to adapt' that we see in the...

December 2012

December 19, 2012

In Church, at Christmastime

The phone is ringing off the hook, The sanctuary’s hard to book. Yes it’s clean--dare...