Today’s parable is not so different from the parable before it—the story of the prodigal son. Both stories use the same word to describe the main character’s wastefulness. Both stories reveal...

My maternal grandparents lived on a lush, green acre in central Ohio. My younger sisters and I spent many a childhood summer there, playing board games from our mom’s childhood, eating...

Yesterday’s reflection examined prayer as release. Today, we observe prayer as request. The psalmist and their exiled people have specific needs: mercy and rescue. In my own places of oppression and...

Once again, grief reduces the spiritual relationship to a question: “How long?” In my own despair, I’ve certainly asked this question, finding it to be both natural and utterly bizarre. How...

Throughout nine years of nonprofit work, I’ve met hundreds of women suffering abuse and trauma. Their heartbreaking stories of generational dysfunction, extreme adversity, and unfathomable injustice have transformed my perspective on...

There is perhaps no experience as insular and disorienting as grief. It absorbs the whole person, clouding the mind, narrowing the senses so that agony is all one sees, hears, feels,...

One of the themes suggested by Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary for this passage is the difference between saving and welcoming. Specifically, the author suggests that the...

In an era in which we’re told that we should not pursue perfection but progress, it seems like overkill to risk ninety-nine sheep for just one. I mean, the rest could...

Often, we think of individual spiritual practices as something we do just for ourselves, practices that fortify and prepare us for the day ahead. This is only partially true. Our faith...

A once-popular practice in some Black churches was “testimony time.” Before the worship service began, the deacons would lead a time for prayer and praise to be offered, followed by testimonies...