ecclesiastes on Healing the Past

“No, don’t! Don’t dig up the past! Dwell on the past and you’ll lose an eye.” But the proverb goes on to say: “forget the past and you’ll lose both eyes.”

To be alive is to be addicted, and to be alive and addicted is to stand in need of grace.

Maybe the most sacred function of memory is just that: to render the distinction between the past, present, and future ultimately meaningless: to enable us at some level of our being to inhabit that s...

And time remembered is grief forgotten, And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, And in green underwood and cover Blossom by blossom the spring begins.

All our experience with history should teach us, when we look back, how badly human wisdom is betrayed when it relies on itself

The story is well known in the family: my grandparents had driven up from California the evening before. Stopping at a gas station along the Oregon border, they purchased some snacks, gas, and, as the...

Lamenting a Living Son This is God’s own lament: a brokenhearted father mourning the loss of a still-living son.  Throughout the book, God has led Hosea to draw from moments of Israel’s past.  Here, ...

Mike Mason recounts how his friend Daniel Adair once said: Whenever I meet someone new, I take that person and fix him or her in my heart. To do this, I literally see that person as a star, and I ...

The Good News or the Bad News? Which do you want first: the good news or the bad news? Well, if you’re preaching Hosea these next two weeks, it doesn’t matter what you want.  You’re getting the bad ...

Pastor: Lord, we confess that too often we don’t live as people filled with the light of eternity. People: We complain. We focus on the problems we face and not the blessings you give. Pastor: W...

Preaching Commentary Lamenting a Living Son This is God’s own lament: a brokenhearted father mourning the loss of a still-living son.  Throughout the book, God has led Hosea to draw from moments of...

I’ve known a lot of people who have lived painful, tragic lives. When I was young, I assumed these people were abnormal. Their suffering was the exception that proved the rule that a well-lived life i...

I think the mistake most of us make about beauty is that we expect it to be pretty—to please us with its proportions, its balance, its harmony, its rhyme. If those are your requirements, I doubt I wil...

There is no better exercise for strengthening the heart than reaching down and lifting people up. Think about it; most of your best friends are those who encourage you. You don’t have many strong rela...

What's friendship, when all's done, but the giving and taking of wounds

Without the binding force of memory, experience would be splintered into as many fragments as there are moments in life. Without the mental time travel provided by memory, we would have no awareness o...

The Messy Middle In his classic work Transitions, author and professor William Bridges shares an excellent anecdote about life in crisis: it can happen at any time and in a myriad of ways. It also de...

We long to see our lives whole, to know that they matter. We wonder whether our many activities might ever come together in a way of life that is good for ourselves and others. Lacking a vision of a l...

The mystery of perfection as an aspect of beauty is its transcendence. It points to a glory beyond itself. I knew that when I held my children, I didn’t simply cradle flesh and blood. I held a living ...

Living in a society governed by technique conditions us to believe that in every way life is easier than it ever has been. Technique is the use of rational methods to maximize efficiency, and we...

Earlier this month Michelle Yeoh won the Best Actress Academy Award for her work in the film Everything Everywhere All at Once . In her moving acceptance speech, she said, “For all the little boys an...

People in a hurry never have time for recovery. Their minds have little time to meditate and pray so that problems can be put in perspective. In short, people in our age are showing signs of physiolog...

I saw a live podcast a few weeks ago, and the host, actor Dax Shepherd, gave the audience a couple minutes to ask questions. One young woman in the front row asked him, “How do you get through the har...

An atheist professor delighted in tearing down the Christian faith of zealous freshmen. By his own admission, he was arrogant, selfish, and intolerant of anything that didn’t measure up to his standar...

We grow in part by confessing our faults and weaknesses to each other (James 5:16; Eccl. 4:10). If we are always being strong and without needs, we are not growing, and we are setting ourselves up for...

Thank you, Lord, for this season of sun and slow motion, of games and porch sitting, of picnics and light green fireflies on heavy purple evenings; and praise for slight breezes. It’s good, God...

As we become more intentional about living according to our deepest desires, it becomes increasingly important to notice the effects of technology on our mind, our soul and our relationships.  The ...

Christmas is Over It’s Christmas morning, not yet light. I am ten years old, creeping down the stairs, and I am full of hope. My siblings and I were told there will be no Christmas. Our mother told u...

Beauty awakens the soul to act.

“My therapist told me the way to achieve true inner peace is to finish what I start. So far I’ve finished two bags of M&Ms and a chocolate cake. I feel better already.”