Favorite Music of 2018

Favorite Music of 2018

There is a massive amount of great music being made today (and plenty of mediocre music), so one person’s list surely only scratches the surface. But for whatever it’s worth, here are the 2018-released albums, songs, and cover songs (in our overwhelming and confusing musical present, the past has become an important inspiration) I enjoyed the most.

If I Could Design My Dream Church

If I Could Design My Dream Church

On days when I’m sitting in my real church and feel frustrated by something, I sometimes daydream about my ideal church. I dream about a church I would always be proud and never embarrassed to call home; a church so amazing that any non-Christian who visited would never want to leave.

Favorites of 2017

Favorites of 2017

I maintain a Google document going each year that keeps track of the best music, movies, books, and TV I've enjoyed that year. Sometimes I even take note of best restaurants and food experiences. As we close the book on 2017 and as I prepare to create a blank 2018 Google document in a few days, here's a look at what made the cut in my favorites of 2017.

Stars and Cells and Advent

Stars and Cells and Advent

For a few months in 2003-2004, the Hubble Space Telescope zoomed in on a seemingly blank, small spot in the sky. To the naked eye it looked like a speck of black emptiness. But once developed, the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image showed that inside that small, randomly selected patch of sky, over 10,000 galaxies could be seen.

The Most Radical Mission for Christians May be the Most Mundane

The Most Radical Mission for Christians May be the Most Mundane

It may not sound exciting. It may seem too predictable and institutional and bourgeois. It’s certainly not going to be comfortable. But showing up at church week after week, and giving oneself to the building up of the body, is a revolutionary act of mission.

We Are Stones

We Are Stones

I love the New Testament passages that describe the church in terms of stones. Peter says Christians are “like living stones” who are “being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood” (1 Peter 2:5), with Christ as the cornerstone (2:6-7). Paul says similar things in Ephesians 2:19-22