relationships and community on Error

The point of discourse is to learn with and from one another. I used to tell my students that at least 20 percent of what I was telling them was wrong, but I didn't know which 20 percent it was: I...

One of the most controversial decisions in Super Bowl history took place in the closing seconds of Super Bowl XLIX in 2015. The Seattle Seahawks, with twenty-six seconds remaining and trailing by four...

It is human to err, it is devilish to remain willfully in error.

Communication usually fails, except by accident

As soon as we know that we are wrong, we aren’t wrong anymore, since to recognize a belief as false is to stop believing it. Thus we can only say “I was wrong.” Call it the Heisenberg Uncertainty Prin...

Any parent who has children of speaking age has likely heard the expression, “That’s not fair.” Those words come in all shapes and sizes—quickly shouted, drawn out almost with extra syllables, or said...

On a beautiful April afternoon in 2008, two college softball teams faced off in a decisive playoff game beneath the Cascade Mountains. The Western Oregon Wolves battled Central Washington University, ...

For years Kyle and I [Jamin Goggin] had no trouble looking critically upon others in their quest for power. We bemoaned the rock-star pastors who were in the spotlight, whose churches appeared to be m...

O Lord and Father of the household of faith, we thank you for the gift of faith worked within us by your Holy Spirit. We thank you for having called us to yourself, for consecrating us to your ser...

Almighty and most merciful Father, giver of every good and perfect gift, we give you thanks for blessing us so richly with your good Word and the holy Sacraments, and supplying so abundantly all our d...

To value one another is our greatest safety, and to indulge in fear and contempt is our gravest error.

God doesn’t provide many specific instructions about the parent-child relationship, except that parents should teach their children about God (Deut. 6:7; Prov. 1-9), discipline them (Prov. 23:13; Heb....

In sharp contrast with our culture, the Bible teaches that the essence of marriage is a sacrificial commitment to the good of the other. That means that love is more fundamentally action than emotion....

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...

We live a long time in order to become lovers. God is like a good parent, refusing to do our homework for us. We must learn through trial and error. We have to do our homework ourselves, the homework ...

Prayer of Adoration Great God our Father: You are good and You are strong. You are faithful and true, and You won’t tempt or lie to us. In a world that appeals to our sinful cravings and dominated b...

Prayer of Adoration Lord, our Lord – How excellent is your name in all the earth. Because of who you are – we praise You. Because of what you’ve done – we thank You. You are a Father to the fathe...

A passage often referred to in order to describe the sacrificial, countercultural quality of the early church comes to us interestingly enough, from one of its strongest critics, known later to histor...

To err is human; to admit it, superhuman.

As a stranger walked down a quiet residential street, he noticed a man struggling with a washing machine at the doorway of his house. The homeowner was clearly having a hard time, so the passerby, wan...

I never made a mistake in my life; at least, never one that I couldn’t explain away afterwards.

Don’t be sorry for yourself because you are going to so remote a parish. Be sorry for the [Alaskan] Indians. You know nothing and they must teach you.

A common trait of human beings is a fear of failure. Most of us find ways of coping with it, but whenever failure rears its ugly head, it’s difficult not to experience the sting of feeling like we are...

Life is so constructed that the event does not, cannot, will not match the expectation.

To be told we are wrong is sometimes an embarrassment, even a humiliation. We want to run and hide our heads in shame. But there are times when finding out we are wrong is sudden and immediate relief,...

We know mistakes were made.

An American woman visiting the Philippines, observed an elderly woman on the outskirts of Manila. She looked poverty-stricken and walked with the help of a cane down into a ditch alongside a main road...

Countless mistakes in marriage, parenting, ministry, and other relationships are failures to balance grace and truth. Sometimes we neglect both. Often we choose one over the other.

When Rosina Hernandez was in college, she once attended a rock concert at which one young man was brutally beaten by another. No one made an attempt to stop the beating. The next day she was struck du...

History records the Battle of Cannae as perhaps Rome's most devastating military defeat, orchestrated by the tactical genius of Hannibal of Carthage. In the aftermath of this crushing victory, the...