Nineteen years ago tomorrow, terrorists directed by Osama bin Laden successfully orchestrated an unforgettable attack that defined the next decade of American life. Hijacking four commercial jets, terrorists flew two into the World Trade Center towers and one into the…
A walking guide to praying in your home
I was reminded of a prayer practice when I read our pastor’s plea for “purposeful prayer for a world that is very much in need of God’s healing.” As the California fires continue destroying homes and lives, 2020’s disastrous news…
How a Muslim beggar taught me about dignity
Perhaps I had grown too accustomed to seeing people dig through the garbage containers at the edge of the street in my residential neighborhood in Semarang, Indonesia. Then, one day I prepared a sermon for the small English-language congregation I…
Let’s call the divorce lawyers for the sick marriage of church and state
In the world of British sociological order, there are five estates: nobility, clergy, middle class, press, and then any other group that can stand up to the other four. In the United States, having rejected the idea of the nobility…
‘The Lapsed’: An ancient church controversy with 2020 implications
We’ve all lapsed from something, haven’t we? If we live long enough, we lapse from all sorts of promises, convictions and ideals we thought we’d never relinquish. COVID-19 has enforced collective lapses from restaurants, concerts, movies and sporting events, not…
History tells the power of peaceful protest
When my wife, Priscilla, and I return to Germany for research, we stay at an apartment building in Munich that sits a stone’s throw from the famed English Garden, a magnificent mixture of streams and forest and fields. Halfway to…
A rural church reimagines the Lord’s Supper as a farm stand
During my last semester at Wake Forest University’s School of Divinity, I walked the brick pathway of Hearnz Plaza with one of my professors. Our conversation’s focus was on my future plans to move away from my native North Carolina…
After 23 years in prison, Curtis Flowers is free
I have been working to free Curtis Flowers for 12 years. He’s been locked up twice that long. Yesterday, Sept. 4, after six flawed murder trials, Lynn Fitch, attorney general of Mississippi, dismissed the charges against Curtis with prejudice. That…
This November, I will vote with others in mind
For the last three years, I have lived and worked as a Baptist missionary among refugees in Vienna, Austria. This has been a life-changing experience as I have met God along the way through the life, witness and faith of…