When everything's piss and flamethrowers and facts seem as squishy as the kitchen sponge, sometimes we need to return to a few basics to discern whether an idea, a movement, a vision of God, is true or a farce.

Being spiritual (though not religious) is common fare these days. I've been thinking about what we mean by this, how we use these ideas, what the assumptions often are. And I've realized I'm really not very spiritual.

winncollier.substack.com/p/im-not-ver...

The world is very complicated, and things are often more (or less) than they seem. War is almost never as simplistic as the powers pulling the strings want us to believe. If the complications (the evil motives and the misjudgments and the sheer ignorance) are allowed into the light...

It’s time once more in Holland.

It’s been a doozy of year (or was that a decade?) since last Spring. And there’s no switch to flip to turn off the sorrows and fears, the bone weariness, we continue to carry. Still, there are always new beauties, new joys, new invitations, awaiting.

I can't believe I'm writing this line: It's a very, very, bad, bad idea to attack Greenland.

//

“We’ll get Greenland. Yeah, 100%,” President Trump said.

"No, I never take military force off the table. But I think there's a good possibility that we could do it without military force.”

Lent, these weeks of bright sadness, are not merely a season for reforming or deepening my personal spiritual experience and discipline, but also a way I am invited to enter into the suffering of this aching world. Lent is an act of solidarity with the world, offered in hope and humility to our God.

Three years ago today, I shared about a Ukrainian family member who went back to visit her family. When Russia invaded Ukraine, she was stuck amid the harrowing destruction, fear, and onslaught. Do you remember those days?

On the winter run downtown and at Hope College this evening, lots of young fellas carrying roses. They felt serious, holding those bunches tight, blushing, an extra swagger, the kind of nerves that make you sweat but keep you moving.

I'm pulling for ya, fellas. Be gents & put your heart out there.

Well, look at this cutie. Miss Poppy, newest member of the fam.

If, like me, you believe Pendleton wool blankets are one of God‘s kindest gifts to the universe, then you should also know that Pendleton wool socks are what we’ll all be wearing in heaven.

Christmas’ twelfth night concluded, we arrive with those pilgrim kings at the Feast of Epiphany. Who among us does not need a revealing, a bolt of clarity that cuts through the dark night, a burning love consuming our heart?

Miska and I hugged this morning. “We made it,” I said. Smiles of relief, gratitude, and bewilderment, like desert travelers who did finally find the other side. It’s truly been the most disorienting, horrific year.

I wouldn’t want to do this again, but I also can attest…

"The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."

There is darkness, and we're fools to deny it. Yet the Light is more powerful, and we'll despair if we dismiss it. The Light has already broken in, and Light wins in the end.

Merry Christmas to you all, every one.

Yesterday, I was writing a sermon and looked over notes from 2016, when I preached from the same text. I chuckled because I realized I’d mostly missed the point. I had a few lines that I trust were mildly helpful, and I offered the whole thing in earnest.