The other day, I was chatting with someone when it happened—that familiar tightening I hadn’t felt in a while. My fists were clenched. My shoulders were high. My mind felt foggy and overworked. And suddenly I recognized it. My body was telling me something it has told me before. The feeling was eerily similar to the mental exhaustion I carried during the height of COVID. Not the same circumstances, not the same level of isolation—but the same deep weariness that comes from wo

Every now and then, a metaphor pops into my brain that’s just too good to ignore. I love cooking and baking competitions. Lately I’ve been watching a lot of Chopped and The Great British Bake off. Chopped is a frantic Food Network show where chefs are handed a mystery basket of ingredients. As I was watching Chopped the other day,  I thought: Oh my goodness… this is also pastoring. To be honest, for a fleeting moment, I thought this metaphor applied during COVID pastoring too

A bright orange guitar pick with Gsus Saves on it. My office manager handed me this guitar pick earlier this week — bright orange, with the words “Gsus Saves” and a guitar chord chart printed right on it. I laughed out loud at first. It’s clever, right? A pun that strums right at the intersection of faith and music. But the longer I held it in my hand, the more I realized — there’s actually a little theology in this tiny triangle of plastic. On one side, there’s the Gsus chor

The world feels so big and overwhelming right now. Some mornings I wake up and wonder what fresh headline will undo for the rest of the...

What does Christian perfection REALLY mean? As a United Methodist clergyperson, I have a love-hate relationship with the word perfection....

This picture is one of my absolute favorites of me in the midst of ministry. It pops up on my Facebook memories every year in late...

If you’ve been told “this is just how Christianity is,” know that it can be different. And you deserve to experience that difference.

hank you for dreaming big, for trying even when you were scared, for loving deeply. Thank you for laying the foundation of the life I now live.

I wish I could go back and whisper something true to her: some of those dreams won’t come true—and that’s not a failure. That’s grace unfolding.

Say what you mean and mean what you say One of my kids delights in saying what they call the "opposite of opposite." Usually, it goes...

What word would you choose to focus on for the entire year? In years past, as I entered into the new year, I made resolutions. For some,...

How a new succulent garden gave me new eyes to see hope in my midst.