We need to start teaching our students rhetoric and not rhetoric. Confused?  It used to be that rhetoric was the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing. To study that, one used to learn techniques and develop skills that made for more effective debate.  Being skilled in this way allowed a person to show…

I’ve long had a fascination with St Columba, an Irish Abbot who is credited with spreading Christianity across Scotland. I first learned about him on a trip to Scotland with my college where we visited Iona, the small island on the west coast that Columba used as his base for his missionary journeys. The place…

Last week I had the opportunity to do some seminars at Camp St. Christopher.  It was Sr Session (high school) and my favorite age group to speak to.  I led two seminars.  One on surviving after camp… along the lines of how do we keep growing.  The other was on persecution and suffering for the…

My article in Modern Reformation Magazine is online but only accessible without a subscription for a few more days (until June 22). The stage is set. The sound check is done. Leaders huddle for one last prayer. Cue the music. Dim the lights. Open the doors. A swarm of excited students pour into the venue.…

In a YS email, a link to this was offered but the version YS was putting out was really watered down and offered enough to satisfy the curious without the need to seek to know more.  It stated that millenials are not leaving the church because they crave: Jesus, the Bible, community, service, and purpose.…

It’s that time of year when youth camps, mission trips, bike trips, conferences, etc are in focus. We put a lot of effort into such adventures and rightly so because they have the potential to impact life change.  Yet that life change might not be exactly what we want or expect.  I am referring to…

It’s been far too long since I posted here and I have been eager to add more posts regularly but life has prevented that.  My last post followed Mothers Day and mentioned a young woman who had been in the youth group I led up near Chicago.  She had been diagnosed with inoperable tumors which…

Rather than fight the crazy crowds of dining out on Mothers Day, I took my bride on a date night Saturday evening. Only one of our offspring was going to be home for Mother’s Day anyway. We had a romantic evening that started with dinner at a local Italian eatery .  At the end of…

I ran across what I thought was the most gracious and insightful blog post about a film previously mentioned. When we uncritically accept a caricature of someone, we become less gracious people. Instead, we become more dismissive, presumptuous, and defensive. We also become more likely to misinterpret an honest challenge to our faith as an…