In which God incubates the Church through a pandemic
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In which God incubates the Church through a pandemic

We’re crouched in the dark, gently bending over the antique incubator. I hear a faint chirping, and my husband lifts the metal lid. There’s a bowl of water inside to keep the eggs soft, and the air smells like warm, wet grass. Inside, a newly hatched chick bravely stands, singing his baby victory songs. And…

The narcissistic church and our need for a Saviour
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The narcissistic church and our need for a Saviour

“For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power” (1 Cor. 4:20). We’re seated at supper around chicken wings and garlic toast. I’m telling my family about Pastor Sonnel, a friend of mine from Sierra Leone who’s been leading revivals in eight remote villages. I tell them how he was…

What the Church can learn from St. Francis of Assisi at Christmas
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What the Church can learn from St. Francis of Assisi at Christmas

Since I was young, I’ve longed to see Jesus. I’ve longed to encounter God in a very physical way.  And most every Alberta winter, when the sky is just a scroll of black parchment and the stars wink of some ancient secret, when the path beneath our feet crunches of snow and ice and the…

What It Means to Live a Victorious Life in the Midst of Suffering
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What It Means to Live a Victorious Life in the Midst of Suffering

I’m seated amidst a sea of black dresses and suits in the glaring heat of a summer afternoon. There’s the faint smell of lilacs. We’re outside on white plastic chairs in a semi-circle facing a table of photos of a man who died at 33 years old, after being rendered paralyzed five years earlier through a car accident.

The Church Ablaze with Hope During COVID-19

The Church Ablaze with Hope During COVID-19

I walk the long lonely gravel roads of our small Alberta hamlet, past farm fields giving way to spring, under a night sky studded with the same stars Father Abraham once knew. I’m worshiping in this darkest hour but my worship turns to weeping as I remember the German Minister of Finance Thomas Schaefer, his body found by train-tracks, presumably suicide, at the end of March.