Anyone who knows me would tell you I am a coffee lover. Some would go so far as to say I am a coffee snob. There’s something about coffee that warms the heart and awakens the soul (they tell me it’s caffeine). Anyone who knows me would tell you I am a coffee lover. Some would go so far as to say I am a coffee snob. There’s something about coffee that warms the heart and awakens the soul (they...
It Only Works If You Use It
Summer is finally here in Seymour, Indiana. Temperatures have finally reached summer levels. The sun shines brightly until close to 9:30pm. And, school is officially out of session. Now everybody gets to settle into new rhythms and realities for the next several months. One of the realities for many of us is we will be spending significantly more time outside. A quick perusal of social media...
Expecting the Exceptional
Basketball has been a love of mine for many years. On my twelfth birthday my parents gave me a basketball hoop for my birthday. I’m a March birthday, so the ground was still cold and frozen at that point in time, but that didn’t stop my friends and me from going out to the driveway to attempt to dig the hole needed to get the pole upright. We wore that hoop out. Almost every day, neighborhood...
Like A Child
The church, the actual church building of FBC Seymour, is a much busier place than most would assume. It is a hive of activity. People are constantly coming and going. The Fellowship Center is a particularly popular piece of real estate. It plays host to a Sunday worship service, the Attic Student Ministry on Sunday nights, a Wednesday evening dinner, funeral dinners, wedding receptions...
Rooted
We have lived in our current home for just slightly under a year. For the entirety of that year my wife, Robyn, and I have talked about wanting to make some major adjustments to the flowerbeds in front of our house. Whoever owned the house before us did a nice job of trimming back the bushes and making things look presentable enough to convince us to buy the house, but it was still clear that no...
Moments
One of the many lessons I’ve learned in my years as a pastor is that life is short and fast. As a pastor I am often invited to participate in the celebrations of life’s beginning, when a person is born, and also at life’s end, when a person has died. It has made me keenly aware of the fragility and fleeting nature of my own life. We are, each of us, only here for a matter of moments, and then we...
Mentorship
Every year, on or around my birthday, I would receive a card in the mail from my Grandma Ruth. I would begin looking forward to that card weeks before it was supposed to arrive. I would check the mail every chance I got, hoping to see my grandmother’s handwriting on an awkwardly sized envelope. It was, without question, the highlight of my birthday every year! Before you get too sentimental, my...
Taking the Plunge
I remember the first time I ever jumped off a high dive. I was in seventh grade and was a camper at Lake Ann Baptist Camp up in the nether regions of Northern Michigan. Out on the lake they had several jumping off points. You could jump off of the dock, which was no big deal because it was only about a one-foot drop from the platform to the water. There was a low diving board, which was about six...
Familiarity
My wife, Robyn, and I have been married for 17 years. We are living the quintessential “American Dream” with two kids and a dog. It was a dream that seemed very unlikely when we first met on the first day of our freshman year of college. It was NOT love at first sight. As a matter of fact, our first impressions of one another were less than favorable. It was NOT love at first sight. As a matter...
Church Camp
When I was a kid, church camp was the highlight of my summer. The church I grew up in was rather large. As a result, the children’s and youth ministries were big enough that our summer camps were self-run. The church would rent the entirety of a camp facility for our weeks of camp. We would bring in our own camp staff. From directors to counselors, from cooks to kitchen help, from crafts to kids...
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