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Yesterday our oldest headed off to his junior year of college, and next week we will be dropping off our second for her freshman year. And today, as I try to hold back the dad tears, I am pondering the world they are entering—and will be living in. This post is written for them… yet, perhaps, it can apply to all of us.
Wendell Berry once sent me a letter. I still have it, tucked into one of my favorite books of his. If you ever go looking, you’ll find it marking the page of my favorite Berry poem, The Morning News. And there, in that poem, is a stanza that has guided me for many years:
I will purge my mind of the airy claims of church and state.
I will serve the earth
and not pretend my life could better serve.I received his letter just over ten years ago, when our family of five first made the decision to change the trajectory of our lives. I know you remember our move across the country, and the many shifts in our thinking and daily practices since. But what you may not fully understand is why we did it. We were not chasing opportunity or avoiding hardship. We were intentionally stepping away from the influence of power—the kind that erodes the soul, turning people into statistics, communities into voting maps, neighbors into customers, and friendships into disposable transactions.
We began our move in 2015 with a sense of how the world was about to change—and has it ever. Our move was an attempt to give you space to grow in different soil, and the opportunity to see the world with eyes unclouded by the propaganda of headlines, the pulpit, or the pews—where well-meaning words sometimes landed like stones, leaving marks we didn’t want you to forever carry.
In many ways, our choice worked. You’ve had room to breathe, to expand your vision, to notice the powers at work. But in other ways, there is no escaping it. Those who live through power are present everywhere.
The kind of power I am referring to has a pattern. History has taught us—if we are paying attention—that both church and state, once they taste it, develop an appetite for more and more control. They rarely admit this outright. They seek loyalty over truth, allegiance over conscience. In ancient Egypt, Pharaoh demanded both labor and worship. In Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar built a golden statue and decreed that all must bow—or burn. In first-century Jerusalem, Rome allowed the temple to stand, but only under Caesar’s program and control. Herod executed John the Baptist to save face at a banquet. In every case, power fears what it can not own—and so it seeks to destroy it.
This pattern is not just ancient history. It shows up in every community: in the smirk of the social insiders, in the “because I said so” of those who cannot lead without threat or control. And you can see it in more public forms today when Christian language and imagery are wielded as political props, when pulpits become campaign platforms, when religious people cozy up to authoritarian politicians because proximity to power feels like a victory over those they are disgusted by. Politicians, in turn, are thrilled to have voters who will cover the evil of their actions with their religious justifications. And power always has a scapegoat—someone whose simple existence is labeled “the real problem.”
Children, what I fear most for you is not the hardships of life. Hardship is inevitable, and you are more than capable of enduring and overcoming. And I know you can clearly see the more public issues of your day. What I fear is the slow erosion of your conscience for the sake of “peace,” “unity,” “cool,” “patriotism,” or “orthodoxy.” That you might be sold the lie that your worth or belonging is measured by your usefulness to someone else’s plan for your life.
Authoritarianism creeps. And it creeps from the halls of power into the hearts of people. It rarely first arrives in jackboots (although they have arrived!). More often, it comes wrapped in proclaimed virtue. It hides in sly humor and behind memes. It cloaks itself in righteous language or a flag. It tells you it is protecting you while quietly deciding what books you can read, what to believe, what questions you can ask, and whom you should distrust. It thrives on fear, knowing that fearful people will often cling to the very hand that is holding them down. And it always promises: Give us just a little more loyalty, a little more silence, a little more time, a little more obedience… and then you will be safe. That promise is never kept.
Berry’s words about purging “the airy claims of church and state” are not a rejection of community or good order. They are a rejection of idolatry and abuse. They remind us that our ultimate loyalty is not to a flag, a party, an opinion, a family name, a denomination, or a leader—but to the flourishing of life itself: to Love, expressed in justice, mercy, and humility. For Love, after all, is the other side of power—the kind of power that does not dominate but serves; not a power that grasps, but a power that gives.
The easy path ahead for you is to become certain in your judgments, to pick a side, and let it tell you what to believe, and fight its battles. That path will reward you at first—it will promise belonging and purpose—but it will also make you smaller, angrier, resentful, and less free.
The harder path is to stay awake: awake to beauty when ugliness dominates the headlines; awake to suffering when turning away is easier; awake to truth even when it costs you friends or challenges those you admire most.
So, as you step into this big, beautiful world… remember: there will always be voices eager to tell you what to believe, how to speak, whom to love, and what to fear. They will offer you certainty in exchange for your complexity. Belonging in exchange for your autonomy. Security in exchange for your soul.
Resist them.
Keep your hands in the soil beneath your feet and your ears tuned to voices without microphones. Choose neighbors over social clubs. Be wary of anyone who wishes to be big. Stay small in ego, big only in compassion. Test every power by this one question: Does it bear the fruit of love, mercy, justice, and humility? If not, it is not worth your allegiance.
And do not grow cynical, but do grow discerning. You will need it to live freely and faithfully.
When the voices of church or state grow loud, promising the world if you will bow, remember Berry’s words. Remember that life is not served best by allegiance to power, but by allegiance to the earth, to one another, and to the God (Love!) who is neither mascot of any nation nor chaplain of any empire.
And most of all, remember to serve—not as the powerful define service, but as the earth does: with patience, with care, with resiliency, and with an eye toward the generations who will inherit what you leave behind. It’s service to the earth that will keep you grounded.
May you always know that your worth is not in what you produce or who you please, but in the unshakable reality that you are loved… simply because you are.
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Bad theology ruins a life. And eventually, it will ruin the world.
We are witnessing the consequences of bad theology unfold in real time. And not quietly. Not in an aging church with a crooked sign and seven members. No—this bad theology has gone mainstream. It’s loud. It presents as angry. It’s punitive. It thrives on accusations, lawsuits, and spectacles of shaming and scapegoating. It claims to save the world (or a way of life, or the church) while destroying actual lives. It operates under the banner of God but denies the very essence of God—that God is love.
It offers conjured certainties instead of compassion. It trades neighborliness for a kind of nationalism that has no neighbor—only loyalty to itself. And it’s everywhere.
(I say this with care: My writing here is primarily directed to a Christian audience—to those who follow the life pattern of Jesus. I recognize that not all faith traditions, nor all Christians, nor all persons, carry the same theological assumptions or histories. So my words won’t apply equally to all. But where they do, I hope they serve as both mirror and invitation.)
Likewise, good theology doesn’t automatically produce a well-ordered life or a better world. Theology isn’t math. It doesn’t yield predictable outputs. You can speak beautifully about God and still live a bitter, burned-out, or self-absorbed life. Just visit any church and there’s a good chance you can find someone singing “God reigns; let the earth be glad!” with clenched fists and a cold heart. You can affirm justice with your lips and still hoard power with your hands. You can sing praise and neglect faithful practice.
No, right beliefs don’t automatically produce right action. Because theology isn’t a straight line—it’s more akin to a triple loop of learning:
What we profess,
How we live,
And our honest reflection and change when our lives fall out of sync.Which is why bad theology is so dangerous. Because it doesn’t stay abstract. It resists humility. And it rarely self-corrects. It doesn’t just stay on the page of a forgotten book in the library. It finds its way into public policy and practice. It becomes action. Our theology becomes how we treat others—for good or for harm.
The real truth of our theology is always revealed in the fruit of our actions. Bad theology shows up in the laws we write and the punishments we justify. It becomes who we lock up, who we deport, who we ignore. It shapes what we bless and what we curse. Our actions reveal what kind of God we believe reigns over the world.
I’ve come to believe that all theology eventually becomes either doxology or ideology—either a humble, awe-filled, lived acknowledgment of an ever-revealing God, or a psychological defense mechanism to justify our fear-driven hunger for control and safety.
As Walter Brueggemann reminds us: theology always supports either empire (royal consciousness) or neighbor. It either echoes Pharaoh, or it remembers the cry of the poor.
Bad theology imagines God as primarily interested in power, purity, and punishment.
Good theology imagines God as primarily invested in mercy, neighborliness, and mutual well-being.Now, to be clear, I’m not using “bad” and “good” in a tribal or moralistic way. This isn’t about who’s right or wrong in some ultimate sense. It’s about what kind of God we imagine. Because the God we imagine shapes how we understand everything else—power, authority, goodness, belonging, justice, and even what we call “truth.”
Bad theology assumes God’s primary role is to correct what is wrong—punitive, reactive, and controlling.
Good theology assumes God’s heart responds to suffering—restorative, compassionate, and liberating.The former leads to control, coercion, and shame. It trains us to see others—and even ourselves—through suspicion and disgust. And when we read scripture through that lens, we end up reinforcing even more bad theology!
The latter leads to healing, liberation, and justice. It helps us see people—and the world—with compassion.
And I don’t think that’s too much oversimplification. Nor is it new. The prophet Jeremiah asked long ago if we even know God at all if we ignore the poor:
“He defended the cause of the poor and needy, and so all went well.
Is that not what it means to know me?” —Jeremiah 22:16Knowing God—theology—is not about having the right answers or constructing airtight doctrine. It’s about living in an ever-deepening relationship—with both God and neighbor. It’s about drawing near to pain rather than being the cause of it. It’s about honoring the sacred complexity of our shared humanity. It’s about how we treat those whose lives have been shaped by struggle, circumstance, or simply the difficulty of being human.
So let me try to say it plainly: If your theology doesn’t move you with compassion toward the vulnerable, it isn’t rooted in the God revealed throughout the trajectory of Scripture. If it makes you colder, crueler, more self-congratulatory, or more obsessed with control—then it is not good news. It might announce itself as Christian. But it isn’t like Christ.
A major danger—and one we are living in right now—is when bad theology and harmful action become conjoined. Bad theology becomes active fuel for doing harm in the name of God. In reality, it’s just a political ideology wrapped in religious language. Doxology is not welcome there.
That’s exactly what we’re witnessing today: A theologically warped political theater of control, dominance, and purity chasing after the false gods of safety and supremacy. All dressed up in Jesus-language and golden crosses. Funded by fear. Driven by the desire to conquer, not to serve. And it destroys, rather than restores. It kills, rather than gives life. It is not good news of a cross shaped life. It is bad news with a cross logo.
So what do we do?
We return—boldly and humbly—to the foundation of Christian belief and practice:
- God is love. If you do not know love, you do not know God.
- To love God is to love your neighbor.
- To love your neighbor is to defend the poor, welcome the stranger, and honor the dignity of every image-bearer.
- As you do so, you will experience the nearness of God.
That’s not soft theology.
That’s hard, radical, inconvenient theology. Good theology.
It’s theology that requires hesed—steadfast, holy love.
It’s theology that takes up a cross—self-emptying and sacrificial service.And that just might save us all.
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This Sunday I get to preach in a local church. Preaching is not as common for me these days as it once was, but it still feels like holy ground. Because for all its imperfections, the local church—at its best—is not meant to entertain us or comfort us. It’s meant to confront us. To ask the kinds of questions that pierce through the noise of our lives and name what’s real. To challenge not just what we believe, but how we live. Not just what we say, but what we’ve built—with our lives and as a society. And this week, through the voice of an unlikely prophet named Amos, God asks one of those confronting questions: “What do you see?” (Amos 7)
As the story goes, the prophet Amos—a farmer, not a pastor or politician—receives a vision of God standing beside a wall with a plumb line in hand. It’s a simple tool, dependent on gravity, used to measure whether something is upright and true. And in God’s hand, it becomes a divine standard. Of particular note: the plumb line is not held up beside the “outsiders,” the “wicked,” or the “unclean.” It’s held beside the church. Beside the people and leaders who claim to represent God. And what it reveals is serious: their walls are built tall, but not straight. Their prayers are loud, but their ethics are hollow. Their beliefs are strong, but their compassion is weak.
That question—What do you see?—isn’t just for Amos. It’s for us. And the way we answer reveals everything. Because we don’t see things simply as they are—we see them through who we’ve become. And if we can no longer see neighborly injustice, perhaps it’s because we’ve trained ourselves not to. If we’re unmoved by the crushing of the vulnerable or the demonizing of immigrants, maybe it’s because we’ve accepted it as normal—or worse, necessary.
What do I see? I see churched people and political leaders claiming to stand for truth and justice, while standing on the crooked side of history. I see too many publicly silent people, who in private acknowledge things are askew. I see asylum-seekers fleeing political violence and economic collapse labeled as threats rather than neighbors. I see legislation crafted to protect the portfolios of billionaires while cutting food programs for children. I see communities of color over-policed and under-resourced. I see pastors thunder about their view of sexual morality, but whisper—if say anything at all—about the sexual abuse happening in their own ministry. And if I can see all this and feel nothing—if I scroll past it, excuse it, or spiritualize it away—then maybe I’ve become what Dietrich Bonhoeffer warned against. Not overtly malicious. But stupid, in the most dangerous and blindly-obedient sense.
Bonhoeffer, writing from within Nazi Germany, called stupidity “a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice.” Why? Because malice can be resisted, reasoned with, even named. But stupidity—the surrender of conscience and thought—has no plumb line for truth. It parrots slogans. It fashions the hat of hate. It reposts, retweets, and rages. It finds belonging in whatever enemy-label is trending. Bonhoeffer watched churches collapse into nationalism and theology co-opted by propaganda. He saw people stop thinking and start echoing the talking points of authoritarian power. He insisted that stupidity isn’t merely a lack of intelligence, but a forfeiting of personal and moral responsibility—the loss of agency. It spreads not in solitude but in crowds, in echo chambers, in mobs, in selective viewership. And yes, it all sounds very familiar.
We need the plumb line. And we need to remember: God’s line is not drawn to destroy—it’s drawn to restore. The question is: will we let ourselves be measured by it? Will we allow our beliefs, institutions, politics, and spirituality to be checked for alignment?
The plumb line is grace—but grace with clarity. To accept it, we must name what we see. We must reveal the truth of who we have become. And that naming may cost us. Sure, the temptation to stay quiet is strong. And the courage to stand against what we once stood with requires trusting the plumb line.
So, what do you see? And if you see it—will you say it? And if you say it—will you stand against it? God is still holding the line. Not just in the world “out there,” but in us.
And if we are to follow the Way of Jesus in any meaningful way, we must walk that line—not toward self-preservation, but toward love of neighbor. For, that is where true alignment begins—and ends.
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This very morning, I caught myself again—scrolling past a headline that should have stopped me cold. Another raid. Another detention center built to house immigrants. Another politician peddling cruelty as “common sense.” Perhaps because it feels too painful to absorb. Or too distant to change. Or maybe—if I’m honest—because I’m growing indifferent.
That’s what this reflection is about: the creeping indifference that is at work in so many of us. I can feel it in me. And I will not allow it to become my state.
There’s no doubt—we’re all being conditioned, slowly and methodically, to not flinch at the suffering of others. We are numbed by algorithmic news and trained by the headlines to skim past pain as if it were mere spectacle. We begin to confuse emotional detachment with maturity. We shrug and say, “What can we really do?”—as if apathy were a virtue. And over time, the call to neighborly compassion is replaced by muted moral distance. Indifference: the opposite of love.
But this numbing carries a cost. It requires us to surrender the basic human instinct to respond to pain. And for those within the Christian tradition, it demands that we surrender the gospel itself—for something smaller, weaker, and ultimately abusive and false.
Let me be clear: this is a pastoral lament. Yet I know there are some who can only hear these words through a partisan filter—because political identity has become the only lens they’ve been trained to use. But for those with spiritual ears to hear, this is about what happens to our humanity—and to the witness of the Church—when we stop being disturbed by injustice, suffering, and cruelty.
In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus tells the story of a wounded man left on the side of the road. The ones who strolled passed him by were the religious leaders. The moral citizens. People with credentials and civic pride. But they walked past suffering because it didn’t fit their agenda. Because it was inconvenient. And, frankly, because of their disgust for the one suffering. It was the good Samaritan—racially, religiously, and politically other—who stopped, who saw, who was moved to act.
That story is not ancient history. It’s a mirror.
So hear me—especially my white, affluent, church-associating peers:
Your bumper-sticker patriotism is salt in the wound of those suffering under the guise of “making America great again.” Your casual “I’ll pray for the president” is a punch in the face of the immigrants stripped of their humanity and locked in for-profit detention centers. Your silent nods toward cruelty-as-policy are not political neutrality—they are a grief to the God of justice and a desecration of the image of God in those being targeted.Still, even as I lament what’s happening “out there,” I am pastorally concerned about what’s eroding “in here”—in me, in my family, in the insulated, predominantly white spaces I move through. The creeping indifference that masquerades as social balance. A spiritual detachment that can sing worship songs but cannot wail for the suffering.
I’ve heard Christians say, “But they broke the law…” as if that justifies literal cages for men, women, and children whose only crime is the color of their skin and immigration from their country of origin. (Most reports estimate that over 70% of those arrested by ICE have no criminal record other than their immigration status.) To which I ask: What law are you most loyal to? Because it’s clearly not the law of God. Scripture is explicit: Welcome the stranger. Care for the foreigner. Love your neighbor.
Let me say it plainly: if your theology makes peace with imprisoning people for the “crime” of being an immigrant, then it is not the gospel you are following.
When images of separated and detained children no longer stir us to action…
When we hear of detention camps and commodified cruelty and feel nothing…
That is not moral clarity. That is moral decay.And yet somehow, many of us—especially in white Western Christianity—have confused faithfulness with emotional numbness and walking past the issues of our day. As if God’s peace requires detachment. As if faithfulness means not getting dirty. Indifference is not a fruit of the Spirit.
So what do we do?
I don’t yet know the final required actions. But, we must start by telling the truth. We name the indifference—in ourselves, in our churches, in our circles of influence. We confess the ways we’ve made peace with cruelty and violence because it helps us stay comfortable. Then we look even deeper.When the headline scrolls past—pause. Let it hurt.
When someone reduces a life to a label—resist. Ask for their story and listen.
And remember, silence is rarely neutral. Loving action will be required.We were never called to stroll past suffering. We are called to see, to stop, and to love. Because numbness is not peace. Emotional distance is not maturity. And indifference is not Christlike.
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I’ve been thinking a lot about Jeremiah. The prophet, yes. But also my friend.
My friend Jeremiah has been on a spiritual journey these past couple of years. I’ve had the joy of walking alongside him as he explores the Christian faith with fresh eyes. Recently, he expressed interest in joining a local faith community. So we’ve been visiting churches together—across traditions, aesthetics, and theological expressions. After each visit, he turns to me and asks, “What do they believe here?”
He’s not asking for a doctrinal statement. What he means is: What’s underneath all this? What’s the animating story behind this form of performance? What kind of God is being imagined and celebrated here? And, is this really all that church is?
Behind his question, I hear something deeper—a quiet ache. A lament-laced longing for something more than spiritual entertainment or ritual maintenance. A longing for something real. Something active in the neighborhood. Something that clearly communicates good news and acts of relief for the suffering.
My recent post, Yes, I Am Sad, seemed to strike a chord with some—and it’s true. I am sad. I’m heartbroken over how fragmented, distracted, and disoriented the church has become. We’ve traded a liberating invitation for afterlife coping mechanisms and culture-war theatrics. We’ve become preoccupied with securing power instead of self-emptying love. In the process, we’ve neglected the very things Jesus said matter most: the blind see, the lame walk, the hungry are fed, the naked are clothed, the imprisoned are set free, the widows are defended, and the immigrants are welcomed.
And here’s the thing: the prophet Jeremiah was sad too. He is often called the weeping prophet.
“Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears,
so that I might weep day and night for the slain of my people.” (Jeremiah 9:1)Jeremiah’s tears weren’t a sign of fragility. They were a form of resistance. A refusal to normalize empty religious routines. A refusal to imagine God in the image of power over others. A deep, embodied protest against numbness and indifference to the neighbor.
Jeremiah lived through the unraveling of his nation’s religious and political identity. He saw the temple corrupted, the marginalized crushed, the leaders indifferent. And still, he kept showing up—with lament, with courage, and with a heart torn open by grief.
I believe we’re living through a similar unraveling. And I believe we need a similar kind of courage—not a desperate attempt to rebuild what was, but a prophetic imagination to dream what could yet be… and the patient faith to live into it.
So, my friend Jeremiah—since you asked—I will imagine here with you for a while. There is no five-step plan. That’s part of the point. But I do see signposts of hope, hints of a different kind of faithfulness. And so, alongside my friend—and the ancient prophet too—I will practice holding sorrow and imagination at the same time. Maybe that’s how hope works.
I’m Imagining a Church That…
Feels Less Like a Performance and More Like a Shared Practice
Less about showing up on Sunday, and more about showing up for each other every day. Less like a stage, more like a shared table—or a community restoration project. Less like a talent show, more like a circle of honest friends. Something like AA.These are communities of common practice where vulnerability isn’t just allowed—it’s expected. They’re not built around programs but participation. Not hype, but help. Not crowds, but connection.
Because when I look at what is, I’m reminded of Jeremiah’s warning: “Do not trust in these deceptive words, ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!’” (Jeremiah 7:4)
Jeremiah called out a system that had turned sacred space into performance theater. A religion that had traded relationship for ritual. Presence for presentation. And we need that same level of lament now. We need less emphasis on spiritual experiences or encounters and more encouragement to live our lives truthfully and attentively—together.
Makes Space for Mystery
Certainty has become a drug the church can’t quit. We treat inerrancy like oxygen—as if truth will suffocate without our explanations. But mystery isn’t the enemy of faith. It’s its habitat.The truth is…inerrancy, more often than not, becomes a scapegoat for abuse—a way to silence, control, and dominate. We need to let Scripture become a doorway for meditation, not a hammer for manipulation. A place to wrestle, to wonder, to sit in silence, to seek, to suffer, and to discern new things…
We need a story of God that doesn’t pretend to explain everything, but dares us to trust—even in the dark, even in the silence.
Trusts in Slow, Non-Anxious Leadership
Pastors don’t need to be impressive. They need to be present. We don’t need charisma. We need grief-holders. We don’t need bigger platforms. We need small space-makers. We don’t need better branding. We need someone who will sit on the ash heap when nothing makes sense.This is the kind of leadership Jeremiah embodied. He was ridiculed, ignored, dismissed—and still he stayed. Still he spoke. Still he wept. And he also raged against religion that avoided the real wounds and pain of the people:
“They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious.
‘Peace, peace,’ they say, when there is no peace.” (Jeremiah 6:14; 8:11)It was a protest against shallow comfort, cheap grace, and careless hope. A protest on behalf of the wounded and the overlooked. Yes, we need pastors who will sit on the ash heap more than they stand on a stage. Pastors who will march in the streets more than they pace behind the pulpit. Pastors who feed the poor more than they administer the sacrament.
Plants Gardens in Exile
We are not in Jerusalem. We are not in Christendom. And that’s okay. The prophet’s words to the exiles still speak:“Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce…
seek the peace of the city where I have sent you.” (Jeremiah 29:5–7)This is the slow, faithful work of transformation. Not spectacle. Not dominance. Just yeast, seeds, tears, and love. The Church that’s coming won’t be the one that “takes back the culture.” It will be the one that dares to live with it, serve in it, and love it—quietly, fruitfully, faithfully.
Lets Go of Empire Logic and Strategies
Jeremiah didn’t offer a strategy for success. He offered an invitation to surrender. The Church of the future won’t be measured by attendance, followers, or members. It will be measured in mercy.“I will give them a heart to know me,” says the Lord, “that I am the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God.” (Jeremiah 24:7)
That kind of knowing doesn’t come through noise or being the center of attention. It comes through giving attention—especially to those on the margins, the overlooked, the voices we seek to silence.
So yes, Jeremiah—the prophet Jeremiah was sad too. And maybe that’s not a problem to fix. Perhaps it’s the path to follow.
A sadness that refuses to look away. A sadness that breaks open into truth. A sadness that plants gardens in the rubble and care-takes the soil beneath its own feet. A sadness that imagines—and actively embodies—a different kind of faithfulness and community.
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Walter Brueggemann, who died this past week at the age of 92, was among the most influential biblical scholars of our time — and one of its most courageous Christian voices.
Through more than 120 books and a lifetime of teaching and preaching, he invited us to hear the ancient texts not as relics, but as ever-enlivened speech: disruptive, hopeful, unsettling, and fiercely relevant. His writings on the prophets, the psalms, the land, and the imagination have shaped how pastors preach, how communities practice, and how we understand the relentless contest between empire and the kingdom — both in us and around us.
But Walter was not simply a scholar; he was a prophetic presence. His voice carried the cadence of the prophets he loved — daring, poetic, insistent, and full of faith. He read both scripture and the world with eyes wide open, refusing the comforts of denial or despair. And even outside the pulpit or the page — in the most ordinary of everyday conversations — he carried that same prophetic attentiveness.
It was following one such conversation — as we sat reading together at his kitchen table, reflecting on the ancient idea of the either/or choice — that Walter once wrote of our friendship.
In his essay Two Farmers, Two Ways, he reflected on our conversation about the either/or choice that is ever before us: whether to live by anxious control or in generative trust. Whether to serve the commoditizing powers or to be responsively led by good news possibility.
Walter never pretended these either/or choices were easy — nor did he allow them to fade into abstraction:
“The reason that this declaration is so urgent is that the ‘Canaanite’ alternative appears to offer a life of ease, comfort, and security, when in fact it is a way of the destruction of self, neighbor, community, and eventually of creation.”
Nor did he let us forget its modern, public consequence:
“A socio-economy that gives tax preference to the wealthy… that is grudging in its support of the needy… that programmatically destroys its own environment is a society that has chosen death and is engaged in relentless self-destruction. The utterance of the either/or suggests that ours is a very late time to re-choose, but not a time that is too late yet.”
Walter taught me — and so many of us — that the choice between anxiousness and generative grace is not one we make just once. It is a choice set before us again and again: in boardrooms and in pulpits, in voting booths and social media posts, at the kitchen table, and yes, even in farmyards and backyards.
As I remember it, when Walter and I sat reading together at his kitchen table, it was no academic exercise. It was a personal reckoning. Walter was carefully leading me toward the recognition that decisions between the “two ways” are not simply operative socially, but within each of us — the battle between anxiousness and generous trust waged daily in our own hearts. In our relationships, our parenting, our vocations, and our life decisions. As he wrote: “Our better angels root for us, but in the end we must choose our better selves, on offer as a gift from the goodness of God.”
What that essay does not reveal — but I hear in every line — was the context of my visit to his home and this conversation. I was in the midst of a choosing moment myself… a life decision that stood plainly between anxious striving and generative grace. In both that conversation and the essay Walter sent me afterward, I knew I was being invited — not pushed — toward making a defining choice.
And that was not the first time. Over the past ten years, Walter’s voice has been a consistent guiding presence in our family life — shaping our conversations, decisions, and ways of seeing and being in the world.
On one lighter decision occasion, when our family was debating if we should start a small flock of sheep and/or goats, Walter sent a check with a note… “for the sheep.” It was a simple act that affirmed, embodied, and gently prodded us toward the trust, stewardship of the land, and neighborliness he so often called us to.
Today, as I grieve the loss of Walter’s voice and presence, I returned to his essay. And I hear fresh again the urgency he placed before me — and I feel again the weight of choice.
Walter’s listening and response never led toward ease or mere accommodation. It was about listening for the direction of fidelity, heeding the way that honors neighbor, creation, and human agency — all while daring to say so when public policies, cultural habits, or personal decisions betray those very values.
Now it is up to each of us to keep reading, conversing — and to keep choosing. For certainly, there are choices before us today that are starkly either/or:
- Will we choose fidelity to neighbor, land, and covenant — or surrender to the false gods of profit, power, fear, and want?
- Will we trade neighborly care for authoritarian rule and nationalist myth?
- Will we treat immigrants and refugees with hospitality, or with suspicion and cruelty, stoked by fear-driven politics?
- Will we steward the land and waters entrusted to us, or sacrifice them on the altar of extraction and corporate profit?
- Will we embrace the hard work of socioeconomic justice, or cling to the false security of widening wealth gaps and “trickle down” fictions?
- Will we choose trust and generosity, or anxious control dressed up as “freedom” while the vulnerable pay the price?
As Walter wrote: “…ours is a very late time to re-choose, but not a time that is too late yet.”
Thank you, Walter — for sitting and reading with me in the text of life, for helping me see the stakes, and for reminding us all: The text still speaks. The choice is ours to make. And the Spirit is calling us toward life.
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A couple of weeks ago, I was sitting across from a pastor I had only briefly met before. We were sharing our stories, slowly revealing more as we recognized the similarity of our paths. Mid-sentence, he looked at me and abruptly asked, “You seem sad. Are you sad?”
The question caught me off guard. It wasn’t one I was prepared to answer in the moment. It wasn’t even a reality I had consciously considered. But it landed with striking clarity…like a key turning a lock I didn’t know existed.
Since then, I’ve been sitting with it. Examining it. Letting it speak.
And yes, I am sad.
There is a deep sadness that resides just beneath the surface of my life. It’s not circumstantial. Not a passing disappointment. It’s broader and deeper…a sadness of the soul. I recognize now that it’s actually been with me for a long time, patiently waiting to be named.
And in reflection, I’ve come to believe this sadness is not something to fix or rush through. It’s something to listen to, to follow, and to let guide.
This kind of sadness is not a sign of despair. It’s a sign of awareness…an awakening to the pain in the air around me. A waking up to the violence embedded in our everyday systems. Waking up to the blasphemy of the Church through its all-too-common disgust of the other and worship of power. Waking up to my own sense of dislocation—from community, belonging, family, and perhaps from calling.
Walter Brueggemann calls this awakening part of the work of prophetic imagination—the work of perceiving and nurturing an alternative consciousness in contrast to the royal consciousness of dominant culture. The starting point of that alternative consciousness, he writes, is lament. And lament can show up in many forms…anger can be a holy and fitting part of lament…and so is sadness.
I am not talking about a private sadness. It is not mere emotional reaction. It is the outcome of increasing awareness and insight…eyes that can no longer just look away from a world that incentivizes non-empathy…where economic engines depend on our distraction, detachment, and denial…where we are numb to the suffering of the poor, actively denying the degradation of the planet and quality of life, medicated by our constant consumption, and desensitized to our racism and supremacy cloaked in religious language.
Everything around us is connected. And everything, it seems, is in pain.
Those who position themselves on the Right are often driven by grievance and anger. The Left by superiority and cynicism. Both are led by fear and addicted to power. Religious conservatives frame themselves as persecuted victims. Religious liberals flinch at personal conviction.
Edit Note: For sure these are broad characterizations that don’t capture the full depth or diversity within either tradition. The real grief here is not about “liberal” or “conservative” Christianity per se, but how both ends—when shaped more by fear and power than love—become reactive opposites within the same broken system. The pain is amplified when these extremes mirror one another, each claiming moral or interpretive high ground all while sustaining the royal consciousness machinery that harms us all.
All of us are, in one way or another, caught in the machinery of a failed system.
Yes, I am sad that conservative Christians are so terrified of a radically hospitable God—one who welcomes the outcast, the queer, the migrant, the heretic—while being comforted by authoritarian political power and a god fashioned in their own image. The fear of losing control, of ceding certainty and superiority, has driven them into the arms of strongmen and systems that promise safety at the cost of compassion and grace.
And I am sad that liberal Christians are so afraid of a radically free God—one who refuses to be domesticated by ideology or reduced to social performance—while being comforted by a law-based moralism often disguised as justice. A justice that often resembles judgment of judgment…a righteousness that trades one purity code for another.
There is a strange cultural clinging to the comfort of causes without examining the community outcomes, the security of being on the “right side,” while fearing the wildness of grace…and the Spirit who blows where She will. It is still control and power—just dressed in different robes.
Yes, I am sad that the language of faith—of resurrection, healing, liberation, and beloved community—has been co-opted by nationalism on the Right, and by a sanitized vocal activism on the Left. We speak of gospel healing, but we have privatized it. We reduced it to a personal prayer project, a self-care plan, or an inner-peace process, rather than courageous, communal, kingdom work.
Of course, gospel healing requires not just inner experience, but social imagination. Not just personal peace, but public reckoning. It requires truth-telling. And therefore, lament in its many forms. And the uncomfortable work of letting go of the gods we’ve made in our own image—whether dressed in patriotism or progressivism—and returning to the wild, untamable, boundary-breaking God who is compassionate Host, great Liberator, and wooing Guide.
Just days ago, in a strangely fitting metaphor, a massive container ship lost control and ran aground—astonishingly close to a seaside home in Norway. The images are surreal: the global machinery of consumption, immobilized in shallow water, absurdly close to destroying a peaceful home. And the homeowner? According to the story…was asleep through it all, completely unaware.
It’s a telling image. What if the pain of the planet, the suffering of the marginalized, and the fracturing of the Church have already run aground—and we are still sleeping? Numb participants. Merely curious bystanders.
In this light, sadness is not weakness, a burden, or something to get over. It is the beginning of resistance. It is the refusal to stay asleep, or at least, it’s enough of a disturbance to wake us up.
Brueggemann reminds us that lament is always the first act of resistance and renewal. And sadness, then, need not be dismissed. It is an active invitation. It is the inner honesty of lament. To be attuned to the groaning of nature and the pain of our neighbor is to share in the grieving heart of God. To be sad is to pray—not with tidy words, but with tears, with silence, with shared suffering.
My faith tells me that sadness is not the end. It is a required threshold. A liminal space. The breaking open of something new. Sadness prepares the ground for hope…not the shallow waters of sentimental faith, but a motivating-hope born amid felt pain, soaked in love, and moved by the Spirit.
So yes, I am sad. And my sadness is my prayer.
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Over the past two years, I estimate I’ve sat in Spiritual Direction with around 200 different people—different backgrounds, cultures, faiths, and stories. Each person uniquely themselves, yet something strikingly similar keeps showing up… a shared ache. A longing beneath the surface. A quiet yearning to stop performing and simply be real.
For those unfamiliar, Spiritual Direction is an intentionally vulnerable space of spiritual formation—an interpersonal experience of being seen and heard in the presence of another. These conversations are often quiet, slow, and tender—but they are anything but superficial. I’ve come to think of spiritual direction as a thin space for the soul.
What is a thin space? Theologians and mystics have used that phrase to describe moments when the veil between the ordinary and the holy feels unusually sheer—when we become suddenly aware of the sacred that’s been there all along. It’s when our senses awaken, and our consciousness tunes to a deeper presence—some would call it God’s presence. I find it helpful to call it Love.
Some find thin spaces in cathedrals, prayer, meditation, worship, or mountaintop views. I find them most often in shared silence, in a deeply felt story spoken aloud, in the long pause between choosing courage and confession. Yes, I encounter Love most often in the presence and truth-telling of another.
So, thin spaces aren’t just mystical mountaintop experiences—they’re also born in the sacred reality of relational presence. And that kind of deep presence often gets blocked—not by malice or intention—but by our tendency to engage relationships through performance rather than presence.
There have been times I’ve caught myself mid-conversation—whether with a friend or a directee—and realized the real me wasn’t actually there. I was pretending. Offering a curated version of myself: a safer, more certain, more acceptable version.
Performing, simply put, is the act of managing how we’re perceived. We shape our tone, posture, and stories to fit what we think someone else wants or needs. I suppose sometimes that’s necessary in life. But often, it’s just hiding. And when we do it habitually, it steals the possibility of thin space. And there’s no room for sacred presence when we’re busy trying to be impressive or invulnerable.
Our relationships often suffer more from who we pretend to be than from who we really are. Most of us don’t wake up intending to wear masks. But we do. We learn to perform—becoming what we think others expect: the competent leader, the smart thinker, the wise counselor, the fun friend, the kind person. These personas aren’t always false—but they’re rarely our whole selves. They insulate us. They make us look connected without letting us be connected. And the longer we lead with them, the harder it becomes to tell the difference between performance and real presence.
It seems that the older I get, the more I too ache for depth—for the kind of relational connection that isn’t managed or performative, but real. I find myself drawn to the intimacy of Love. But I’ve also learned that realness can feel risky. It doesn’t always fit the scripts we’ve inherited or the roles we’re expected to play.
I’ve noticed, in myself and others, how easily we drift into relational performance—how tempting it is to show up as the version we think others want. And occasionally, when I’ve tried to step out of that—when I’ve shown up more whole, more honest, less managed—it hasn’t always gone well. Sometimes, it’s actually strained relationships. Not because I intended harm, but because realness, even when spoken gently, can feel disruptive when it breaks the unspoken rules of performative relationships.
We often say we want authenticity, but it can be hard to hold. We promote vulnerability, but usually only the tidy kind. We confuse real presence with politeness, and treat honesty as something unsettling. And so we learn to hide, to shrink, or to stay surface-level—until we’re no longer known. Or worse, we start believing that showing up as our true selves isn’t welcome—or even safe.
Now, let me be clear… healthy relational boundaries are good. Necessary. But sometimes what we call boundaries are actually refusals and resistances. Refusals to tell the truth. Resistance to discomfort. Refusal and resistance to Love. And when that’s the case, they’re no longer about our health or wholeness…they’re about protecting our fears. Relational walls built from fear often masquerade as “boundaries”—but instead of protecting connection, they block it. What could have been thin place becomes a place of confusion and disconnection.
So what does it mean to risk realness—to show up heart-open, unmasked, and truth-told?
It means choosing to explore your actual being over managing your image.
Embracing silence long enough for truth to speak.
Not offering a right answer, but an honest response.
Receiving someone’s reality without rushing to fix or frame it.
Risking realness—not for shock value, but for the sake of showing up.
And trusting that thin places are holy spaces.Thin spaces aren’t always comfortable, but they are always sacred. And they open when we forget about ourselves and stop trying to be impressive, good, or right—and instead dare to be real. They form when we refuse to posture and choose to be present.
So today, may you risk realness.
May you help create thin space—holy space—for others to do the same. -
It’s almost gardening season here in the Adirondacks. Almost, but not yet. Although the sun is shining on most days, those pesky May frosts will teach patience to any overly eager gardener. And as we practice waiting—while preparing both ourselves and the soil along the way—I am reminded of this:
You can’t force a plant to bear fruit on command. Not by yelling at it. Not by pruning it into submission. Not by standing over it with a spreadsheet and a deadline. Not with executive orders, memos, or discipline committees. Yet, still, we try—and I’m not talking about plants.
We try in relationships, in institutions, in churches. We build systems—both external and internal—with rules and data, metrics and punishments. We tell ourselves that if the authoritative pressure is heavy enough, the outcome will be good. Once we get control of the soil, the conditions, the plant… maybe then we can manufacture something of value. But fruit doesn’t grow like that. Not real fruit. Not the kind Paul spoke of:
“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control…” —Galatians 5:22–23
Paul didn’t write those words as a motivational list. He wasn’t coaching behavior. He was naming the visible evidence of a life well-grounded and faithfully lived. The signs of an invisible rootedness. The abundance of a life not bound by the way of law—whether religious, cultural, or political.
Paul knew something we tend to forget: you can’t cultivate Spirit-fruit in empire-type soil. Not then. Not now. It just won’t work. And when we try…we end up with something more bitter than Spirit-fruit.
Empires—whether Babylon or America—run on a different kind of law than the one Paul was talking about. They run on law rooted in fear, competition, and control. It doesn’t matter if that empire is Rome, the American consumer rat race, an oppressive religious or militant regime, or the co-opted-faith-based-entertainment-machine we often call church.
And empire isn’t just “out there.” It gets inside us. It is both the soil we operate in—and the nutrients of our life…and it is the antithesis of the Spirit. The way of empire always demands and requires. Empire produces pressure, not patience. Focuses on appearance, not gentleness. Judgment, not hospitality. Disgust, not regard. Compliance, not joy. Control, not freedom.
So when we don’t see the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, we might be asking the wrong questions. We often ask: How can I do more? Be better? Try harder?
But Paul might ask something simpler: What power are you presently living under and practicing? Because the Fruit is not the problem. It’s usually the impatient gardener.
Today, I invite you to notice the condition of your spirit. What power is working in you… and through you? Are you fluent in shame? Do you easily see the wrongs of others, but rarely your own? Are you driven by judgment? Do you see yourself as good and right—and others as broken, misguided, even disgusting? Are you tuned to fear? Do you worry about losing some previous “way of life” or “sense of order,” and feel a need to control things to keep it all from slipping away?
Then maybe the absence of Fruit in your life isn’t failure. Maybe it’s wisdom of the Plant…a Spirit-refusal to bloom under the wrong sun or out of season. Because the fruit of the Spirit doesn’t grow until it’s ready. It will not respond to coercion. It cannot grow in the season of fear. It does not serve empire—or answer to its ways.
The Spirit grows where great patience reigns. Where Love is the soil, not the reward. Where joy is unscripted, not scheduled. There’s a wildness to this fruit that no system can replicate. No program can manufacture it. No policy can contain it. And no act of judgment or condemnation can produce it.
It’s the fruit of another kingdom. A truer law and way. One that doesn’t require you to first behave—but invites you to first belong. To root yourself in the soil where Love really lives.
So if you’re tired of trying to force the fruit—maybe it’s time to stop. Maybe it’s time to ask: Am I willing to leave the empire ways behind… for something more holy and free?
Because the frost will soon pass. The ground will soften. The soil will wake up. Right where you are. Where I am. Right here. Even in Adirondack dirt.
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Holy Saturday is about holy silence.
In such silence, we do not move quickly or seek to assign clarity.
We do not rush toward the next day or pretend disappointment has not occurred. Holy silence is the long exhale between “It is finished” and “He is risen.“The land of silence.
In Into the Silent Land, Martin Laird speaks of silence not as emptiness, but as a particular kind of presence—a presence that dwells beneath the noise of our thoughts, our griefs, our compulsions. Silence, for Laird, is not something we create—it is the very ground of our being, always there, waiting. It is Presence.
(Note: Laird’s book is the best I have ever read on the topic of Christian contemplative prayer.)Holy Saturday invites us into that Land of Silence.
It calls us to release our grip on controlling outcomes, to cease our striving to fix or explain, and to simply be. Not as resignation, but as radical trust.
It is the spiritual posture of rest without certainty.There is no spectacle on Holy Saturday.
No miracles.
No immediate answers.
No desperate prayers to change the reality of things.
Only grief.
Sadness.
Silence.And this way provides us with a practice of prayer—
a kind of prayer that changes the pray-er.With practice, as Laird writes, “The mind gradually becomes a more faithful servant of silence, rather than its saboteur.” This is an invitation to let silence become our teacher—not to conquer it or interpret it, but to consent to it. To wait with it. To dwell in it.
Silence as prayer—the way of Holy Saturday—is a practice we must learn,
for most of us are not naturally prone to such a way. And it is a practice that, I suspect, is particularly important in our current day.Silence is not absence.
It is presence beyond words.
It is trust in its most radical form.Silence reminds us:
Something is happening, even when we cannot see.
A greater Reality is unfolding beneath us, always.So we wait.
Not passively, but attentively.
Not despairing, but fully feeling.
Not alone, but with Presence.
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Shane Ash 