Because I love grand fiction that involves the creation of other “worlds” – Tolkien’s Middlearth or Lewis’ Narnia or Collins’ Panem – I found this animated video from TED-Ed really interesting. The question that bestselling children’s author Kate Messner seeks to answer in it is, “How do you build an alternative world that people will find believable?” Her answer has a lot to do not just with stories per se, but with us: we humans who are to the core deeply narrative creatures. Because narrative has the benefit of ordering events in a way that makes sense – that doesn’t mean it’s right, mind you, or the only way to...

Churches that stem from the Reformation have for centuries valued and cultivated an educated clergy. We have sought out persons with gifts for ministry and supported them to go to college and seminary. As a result, we have been blessed with generations of capable, profession leaders. Yet while this has benefited us as a church tremendously, one of the unintended consequences of such competent leadership has been a loss of skill and confidence among those our pastors lead. That is, because we can rely so completely on the skill of the pastor – whether to lead a Bible study, interpret Scripture, or pray – the rest of us haven’t had to...

I’ve always been something of a “quiet” Aaron Rodgers fan. Quiet simply because, having lived in the Twin Cities for the past thirteen years, I root heart and soul for the Vikings and, well, Rodgers quarterbacks the Vikings’ arch rival Green Bay. But still, after the Vikings, when it comes to the NFC North Conference, I root for the Packers. (Not only do I think you should root for your rivals if they beat you and go into post season play – you only look better if they succeed 🙂 – but I love that Green Bay is owned by the fans.) More than that, I thought Rodgers endured a lot during the post-Brett Farve years and handled it...

At first, I wasn’t sure whether to put this under preaching, or maybe worship, since that’s the ostensible subject matter, or humor. But of course it is about humor, both 1) the effective use of humor to make fun of ourselves and our world and invite us thereby to imagine different possibilities and 2) what can go happen when the joke goes awry. Sometimes humor fails because it’s not done well – a poorly told joke or ill-timed punch line. Sometimes it fails because the hearer doesn’t have enough context to make sense of it – the “you had to be there” humorous stories usually fall into this category. And sometimes it fails...