Weaker Brother

Faith seeking understanding. Both of mine are incomplete.

Category: The Ruminations

  • Say What You Think (or, Vice Versa)

    Songs about songwriting conjure mixed feelings for me. At their best, they can make one feel seen in the relatable struggle for artistic expression. In my least gracious assessment, however, songs written exclusively about the writing of songs can feel like artistic cannibalism: creativity feeding on the very mechanism that should be giving life to…

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  • Lacrimosa Apocalypsis (Or, Songs That Make Us Cry)

    Tears illuminate what we most want to be preserved forever, what we can least bear our own existence without. They show us what we most hope for and what we most fear; in other words, tears reveal the deepest loves of our souls. 

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  • The Day You Eat of It (Love That Trusts)

    A Daddy told his daughter what she could eat and live, and what, if she ate it instead, would lead to her poisoning, though she’d have no way of knowing it if not for His loving instruction. 

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  • Only Ever Now (Mental Time Travel and the Eternal Moment)

    Our time machines are not police boxes or DeLoreans. Our brains come fully equipped to deliver us from the Now at the simple suggestion of a neurotransmitter passed between synapses. But to abide in the only slice of time that God gives me is my duty as a mental-time traveler.

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  • On Earth As It Is In Trench

    Every author plays a role in their story like God. “I created this world to feel some control, destroy it if I want…” At this moment, Twenty One Pilots fans the world over eagerly await frantically search for breadcrumbs left by band creator, Tyler Joseph, to unlock the final chapter in the years’ long story…

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  • The Last Place You Look (or, Everywhere God is Not)

    In one of life’s maddeningly common searches for lost items, the ordeal consists of a string of successive “nots.” For every place the item turns out not to be, the seeker says: “this is another place where what I seek is not.”

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  • Extinction Event(ually)

    Dragons—it seems we all on this Earth can agree—”were” but “are not.” Whatever “dragon” is, it isn’t anymore. Something killed the dragons. 

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  • Leprosy Faith (The God Who Leaves Nothing Alone)

    To see God working in everything, sometimes it means feeling like He is active in nothing. (Promise you won’t shout “Unclean!” before we’re done.)

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  • The Medium, the Message, and Jesus in the Mind’s Eye

    Surely, there is a risk when associating a created image with the reality of the Risen Lord. There is also risk when preaching about Him… That doesn’t mean we avoid the activity; it means we approach it with even greater respect. 

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  • Truest, Best, Most Beautiful (Believing What’s Been Chosen)

    Ours is no longer a world of Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, but rather one of evidence, usefulness, and pleasure. Personally, I’ve staked everything I can on a trust that goes deeper than just the most plausible argument.

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