Happy New Year! ♥ I hope you enjoyed ringing in the new year… with friends or at a watch night service at your church or in a quiet dream state in your own comfy bed. Wherever you were, may this…
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Happy New Year! ♥ I hope you enjoyed ringing in the new year… with friends or at a watch night service at your church or in a quiet dream state in your own comfy bed. Wherever you were, may this…
Read MoreEndings and Beginnings When I began blogging in 2009, I called the biweekly posts “Keeper of the Fire.” For the next nine years, I continued tending the fires of my life through writing and reflecting. The fires I tended included…
Read MoreHow is it with your soul today? The last 33 months have been so much. They have taken quite a toll… on life, on church, on everyone who is called to ministry, on our relationships, and our embodied ways of…
Read MoreHappy Fourth Birthday, Three Minute Ministry Mentor! We are excited to celebrate and grateful for all the learning and connection over the last four years. In Advent of 2018, we launched 3MMM. It’s a story I’ve told many times and…
Read MoreWhat are the conditions of wellness that make life stable and meaningful? I considered this question over the past week while I attended the American Academy of Religion (AAR) in Denver, Colorado. Along with the Society for Biblical Literature (SBL),…
Read MoreWelcome to Three Minute Ministry Mentor. We are delighted that you are here! Three Minute Ministry Mentor (3MMM) offers weekly resources for learning and deepening your practice of ministry. Our weekly episodes strive both to inform and inspire your learning…
Read More#PandemicPastoring Report (2022) Download + News | Learn about the Author | Watch the Webinar ++++++++++ Pre-order the #PandemicPastoring Study Guide The #PandemicPastoring STUDY GUIDE is available NOW! We are living in a new era of ministry. We need to…
Read MoreWelcome to the Pastoral Imagination book page. You can observe and imagine doing ministry. Yet until you enter it with your whole self, alongside people in everyday situations, you cannot know fully how a calling comes to life. ~Eileen Campbell-ReedPastoral…
Read MoreWhat is the Writing Table? In the early pandemic days, students, pastors, professors, and authors were feeling a lot of stress on our writing (here is how one of my favorite writers has navigated it). So to help combat the…
Read MoreOne of our most important tasks coming out of the last 30 months is to be listening to children. In the recently released #PandemicPastoring Report, I wrote, “teenagers, children and adults everywhere suffered social isolation and profound stress.” The multiple…
Read MoreFor two months I have been saying daily that we need more space for lament and life-giving rituals as we transition into a new era of ministry. Today I offer three idea buckets to support you in our ongoing work…
Read MoreComing Soon: New Mentoring Opportunities We have been listening to you. And we will continue listening to you. We are grateful for the ways that you are leading, guiding, and supporting many people in your care. We heard your needs…
Read MoreThis is clergy appreciation month, and we are here this week to help you thank a minister. Who needs thanking? A minister or pastor from your past who helped you to discern a call? Or perhaps your current minister –…
Read MoreIn Octobers past, I’ve written about Clergy Appreciation Month, and in 2022 we invite you to think about clergy appreciation for a new era. Because I surveyed an interviewed clergy between 2020 and 2022, I have a pretty good idea…
Read MoreThanks for stopping by to learn more about the #MeTooReckoning Workshop. We believe there is a reckoning underway, and we want this new self-paced workshop to help you navigate it. Access for the #MeTooReckoning Workshop NOW Available The course is…
Read MoreThis week we are celebrating mentoring! And we are also going to celebrate the Women’s Leadership Initiative (WLI) of Central Seminary. I know we are still on the Lenten journey for two more weeks. And I am so grateful for…
Read MoreWorld Communion Sunday created an opportunity for reflection on theologies of communion and community in a new era of ministry. The following is a sermon I preached at Glendale Baptist Church on October 2, 2022. ++++++++ Philippians 4: 1-9 4:1…
Read MoreThe times we are living in remain profoundly challenging, so today we are launching a series on five things ministers need now. The world is somewhat deceptive for all its rush and efforts to get things “back to normal.” Yet…
Read MoreDear seminary student, Welcome to a new year of intense learning and preparation for the practice of ministry. Perhaps you’re feeling a little nervous? Or maybe it is old hat by now! Either way, I want to offer you a…
Read MoreWe are now living in ministry’s new era. To even say that, sounds questionable to my own mind. Yet I look around at all the changes, and I think through all I have heard in the past 2+ years. And…
Read MoreI’ve been trying to get to Ring Lake Ranch for about a dozen years because I wanted to experience its wilderness beauty. This was finally the summer that I could make it happen. The timing was tricky. Traveling meant making…
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