Cosmic justice is a deeply Biblical idea: God will right all wrongs in this life or the next. But sometimes cosmic justice in the Bible drifts all the way into vindictive fantasies like we see in Psalm 137. It’s one of, if not the single most disturbing passage in the Bible. In it, the Hebrew author recounts their grief and the brutal pain endured at the hands of the Babylonians. The author wishes for the aggressors to experience for themselves the same level of pain that they’ve caused, thus concluding the psalm: “Happy is the one who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.”&nb ..read more

What Is Lent? Lent is the 40 day period that begins with Ash Wednesday and ends with Easter Sunday. It’s a time of searching and assessing oneself in order to repent, draw closer to God, and live more honest lives.  The 40 days of Lent mimic Jesus’ 40 days of fasting in the wilderness immediately after his baptism, and in them, we do many of the same things Jesus did- fast, pray, and wrestle with temptation. Some people choose something to fast from in order to remind themselves of their dependence on God and to expose idols. Rather than subtract, many others choose to add something like ..read more

The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun, c. 1805. William Blake    A great sign appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. Because she was with child, she wailed aloud in pain as she labored to give birth. Then another sign appeared in the heaven: it was a huge dragon, flaming red, with seven heads and ten horns; on his heads were seven diadems. His tail swept a third of the stars from heaven and hurled them down to the earth. Then the dragon stood before the woman about to give birth, rea ..read more

Each year I consider doing a sermon series in October based on Phyllis Trible’s book Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives. Each year I imagine reading these stories in a room with Kindergartners,  and I decide to stick with the lectionary texts. There are plenty of Biblical texts that are Not Safe For Church and far from family friendly. There are horror stories in the Bible fit to rival the worst of Stephen King or Shirley Jackson.  In one such story in the Book of Judges, a concubine leaves her Levite husband and moves back in with her father in a neig ..read more

A man I admire from my childhood is on the board of a conservative Christian school that his grandkids attend. Recently, he told me a story about a scandal at the school. A teacher asked one student what their pronouns were on one, single occasion, and it exploded into a culture war. They had to have a big meeting with the teachers, parents, and board members. My friend says, “it was impossible to tell if they were a boy or girl. I don’t blame the teacher for asking.” It’s not the most woke perspective, but he firmly supports anyone’s right to ask and use any pronouns they wish, for any reaso ..read more

On December 16, 2004, a NorthHaven Church Task Force met at the Presbyterian church to present the findings of their visioning study. Long before NorthHaven owned any property, designed a building, or moved into its own space, it took steps to discern who she wanted to become.  The task force began by acknowledging a few things about who the church was before describing who it wanted to be. The church was made up of moderate and progressive Baptists who wanted something different in their church life. They started NorthHaven for that particular purpose. Most of the members at that time ca ..read more

Nearly two decades ago a group of moderate and progressive Baptist dreamers gathered to pray about the future of the Church in Norman, Oklahoma. They dared to let themselves envision a church without divided loyalties, who didn’t have to cow-toe around the Southern Baptists, but could live fully into who God was calling them to be.  In the years to come, that dream materialized. NorthHaven Church was birthed as a Cooperative Baptist church not fighting to preserve a misremembered past but living into God’s future. A future where all of God’s children are welcomed and included with love an ..read more

“NOOOO!!!” Fear rolled over me as I spun my head around and searched the back seat of my car for the source of mortal terror.  In the back seat, Hadley screamed like a snake crawled into the car seat with her, but there was no snake. No spider. No boogeyman of any kind, as far as I could tell.  “Hadley, what is wrong?!”  “That was my faaavooorite song,” she bawled.  Before parking the car in front of our house, Hadley sat in the back seat singing along to the cd Pamela and Kaitlin made of the upcoming Christmas play songs (12/10). When I killed the car engine, the song died ..read more

Last week I posted on Facebook asking y’all to bring coats for adults in need and to donate money so that we can buy new, modest coats for kids in need. A mother from OKC saw the post and drove down with her 6 kids. Her husband died a few years ago and she was struggling to get by. She’d depended on charity from lots of organizations to get by, but until she saw my post, she’d sworn to never again go to another church for help.  She told me a story about getting coats from a church once only to find mites and bed bugs in two of the coats her kids. Another time, the church wouldn’t help he ..read more