Note: This was originally posted on July 12, 2023 on https://www.unhurriedliving.com/. Over the years, I have led hundreds of retreats that have at their center a few hours to be alone and quiet in listening prayer. At one such retreat, one participant shared a...
As August wraps up and Labor Day is right around the corner, your congregation is gearing up to go back to school for the 2023-2024 academic year! With it comes excitement and plenty of anxiety about what entering school or moving up a grade means for students and...
I’ve often shared the story of my first experience of solitude and silence at the beginning of 1990. It was led by one of my mentors, Wayne Anderson, as part of a class I was taking at Fuller Seminary. I tell a little of that story in An Unhurried Life (see p. 20ff),...
It’s summertime, and here in Southern California it begins to get rather hot. And I find myself thirsty a lot. I’ll get out and cycle 20 miles and come back parched. It makes me think of these psalm lines:  Like a deer that longs for springs of water, so my soul longs...
I’m not the first to say it, but Jesus is an absolute genius. I remembered this yet again in a recent conversation with a Christian leader with whom I meet regularly. We were talking about how one of the challenges for Christian leaders is ending up with a utilitarian...
I don’t know about you, but I’ve always had a hard time spending extended periods of time in prayer. Our lectionary author this week, Cody Sandahl shares his own struggles with a deep prayer life. And yet, he argues, this doesn’t mean because...
