In light of preaching from Daniel’s apocalyptic visions during Advent, I couldn’t agree more with Fleming Rutledge in “Why Apocalypse Is Essential to Advent”.

Wendell Berry on the wisdom of simplicity from The Hidden Wound.

The December 15, 2019, edition of “The Weekend Wanderer” is here with gospel music and worship wars, Facebook’s maformation of our lives, Asher Imtiaz, Stephen Colbert’s conversion story, books, and more.

Spiritual direction is the task of helping a person take seriously what is treated dismissively by the publicity-infatuated and crisis-sated mind, and then to receive this “mixed random material of life”…as the raw material for high holiness.”

Eugene Peterson on spiritual direction in Working the Angles. More on that here as part of my ongoing posts as I read through that book.

There are a lot of albums that I return to often, but one of the constants is Max Richter’s The Blue Notebooks. The whole thing is a delight, and I never tire of “On the Nature of Daylight.”

I’m continuing my reflections on Eugene Peterson’s Working the Angles at my blog with attention to Peterson’s call for pastors to serve as spiritual directors.

Josef Pieper: > The prerequisite for justice is truth. Whoever rejects the truth, whether natural or supernatural, is at that point truly “evil” and unrepentant.

A Brief Reader on the Virtues of the Human Heart, p. 21.

I spent a lot of time this past week thinking about imagination and its relation to faith. It eventually became the first part of my message on Daniel 9, which I slightly re-worked here: “A Faith-full Imagination”.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux: “if you prepare your interior ear … and keep your inner senses open, this voice of your God will be sweeter than honey and the honeycomb.”

For your weekend enjoyment, the latest edition of “The Weekend Wanderer” is here with Fleming Rutledge, Andrew Brunson, the end of Christians in the Middle East, Presidents and the Lord’s Prayer, and more.

I appreciate your prayer support as I work on message preparation for the next three weekends at @EastbrookChurch on Daniel 9, 10-11, and 12. There is so much in these chapters that the challenge is particularly strong today as I try to gain clarity. Pray I don’t get distracted!

“The Pastor as Guide on the Spiritual Quest” - the eighth part of my reflections on Eugene Peterson’s Working the Angles.

No one should be misled into taking my footnotes as either proof of, or invitation to, scholarship. They are here to remind the reader of the rich harvest of memorabilia—rocks, fauna, and flora—which a man has picked up on repeated walks through a certain area, and now would like to share with others. They are here mainly to encourage the reader to venture into the shelves of the library and experiment with distinct types of reading. ( In the Vineyard of the Text, 5)

I loved preaching Daniel 8 at the beginning of Advent with my message “Faith Looking Forward”. I looked at the empires of earth and the spirit of antichrist, and how “the darkest hour is just before the dawn.”

The latest edition of “The Weekend Wanderer” is here, featuring Jo Saxton on narcissism, a bivocational refugee pastor, the death of John Allen Chau, Christopher Tolkien, redemptive fiction and more.

“Finding Peace: Isaiah” - the first week’s Sunday reading for our Advent devotional at @Eastbrook Church.

Choosing Hell: W. H. Auden on Charles Williams’ view of Hell.

I appreciate your prayer support today as I map out messages for the four weekends of Advent that coincide with finishing a series on Daniel at @EastbrookChurch on apocalyptic imagination and exile faith. Thank you all so much!

“Recovering Contemplative Exegesis” - the seventh part of my reflections on Eugene Peterson’s Working the Angles.

On this #GivingTuesday join me in supporting the work of two outstanding efforts for the kingdom of God: Sheepfold Ministries in the Horn of Africa and Congo Initiative in eastern Congo. More info here.

Thomas Oden on the authority of a true shepherd in Pastoral Theology: Essentials for Ministry, p. 53.

The proper authority of ministry is not external, manipulative, alien power that distances itself from those “under” it, but rather a legitimized and happily received influence that wishes only good for its recipient, a leadership that boldly guides but only on the basis of a deeply empathic sense of what the flock yearns for and needs.

More here.

For me, the only upside of being sick is the chance to read more than normal, including delving into some works from my childhood in this new edition of Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Books of Earthsea that I checked out from the library.

The latest edition of The Weekend Wanderer is here.

“In reading, teaching, and preaching the Scriptures it happens: we cease to listen to the Scriptures.” - Eugene Peterson. Read my latest on Working the Angles here.

Some reflections after spending time in the book of Daniel: “Faith and the Baptized Imagination: Biblical Apocalyptic as the Key to Exile Faith”.