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Mardi Gras

Tuesday is Mardi Gras so it’s your last chance to eat donuts without spiritual guilt. Um, sorta.

Either way, it means Lent is about to start. You might remember my Lent devotions from last year. They were fun to write, but honestly it was just too much work! So this year I’m shortening the series.

We will start March 20 and continue until Easter Sunday, April 9. Which seems like ages from now, doesn’t it? But when you write on a deadline it feels eerily close!

Like my other devotions, these Easter devotions will take us on a road trip. …

Devotions,

Easter Road Trip

Happy New Year, everyone! It’s been over a month since I’ve posted here. Thought I’d touch base and share a fun announcement.

The Advent devotions were so successful that we’ve decided to do another series for Easter. When I say “we” I mean all the people who helped on the past project. David helped with the writing, Anne with the editing, the good people at PathLight with the donation landing page, and the team at Parable with the marketing and behind the scenes tech stuff. Everyone felt like Advent was a big success, so thank you!

The Easter series will …

Book Reviews,

Ten Best Books of 2022

Okay, it’s actually the ten best books I read in 2022. Does that count? I think it does. It’s my list, so it reflects my interests. All of them would make good gifts to the right people. Or not, I don’t know. I just loved them.

So here goes:

My favorite book of the year is The Bullet That Missed by Richard Osman. This is the third installment of the Thursday Murder Club series, and all of them are a blast. Great contemporary British mysteries that make you chuckle, keep you engaged, and won’t make you roll your eyes …

Apocryphal, Devotions, Generosity,

Gratitude

A few months ago, when I was writing devotions for Lent, I came across a Thanksgiving story that I turned into a Christmas story … and now I’m turning back into a Thanksgiving story. Well, sorta. You be the judge.

The story is in Luke 17:11-19 and (oddly) it reminds me of being a parent at Christmas.

Jesus enters a village. Ten lepers call out for healing, and Jesus tells them to head toward church and they’ll be healed along the way.

The ten lepers do this, and all ten are healed, but only one of them returns to thank …

Belize, PathLight,

Hurricane Lisa

Last week Belize was struck by Hurricane Lisa. The good news is that all of the PathLight students, staff, and partners are physically safe.

The challenging news, however, is that there’s been significant damage to homes and household items. The flooding harmed everything, from mattresses to digital devices to school uniforms. Even simple things like data cards were corrupted, making it difficult for people to stay connected.

As you know if you read this blog, I grew up working in a junkyard. We were all about figure-it-out and then get-er-done. It didn’t have to be pretty. It just had to …

Book Reviews, Devotions, PathLight,

Smart Brevity

Emails, snail mail, Slack messages, texts, books, tweets, posts, blogs, reports, articles, shared documents … we are awash in communications!

Shouldn’t we stop a moment and think about how we write all this stuff?

Back in 2020, when the world felt unprecedented, a friend suggested the news service Axios. Short, simple emails that cover the top news stories in 2-3 minutes arrive each day, with links to go deeper.

Just recently the founders of Axios have written Smart Brevity: The Power of Saying More With Less.

The world needs this book.

At least I do. And many …

Devotions,

Christmas Already?

The pumpkins are on the front porch and the leaves are falling, so it must be Christmas season, right???

Okay, I know it’s a cliche to joke about how fast Christmas arrives. But when you think about what a BIG deal it is, you can see why people plan early.

Even that first Christmas had a lot of planning — new shoes for the donkey, extra diapers packed, maps to Bethlehem, and more. It sounds like everything was well planned … except for that — oops — hotel reservation.

So I’m busy planning for Christmas while Fall surrounds us. Or …

Book Reviews, Junkyard Management, Leadership, Salvaged,

The Power of Stupid Questions

I want to be as constantly stupid as the disciples. Or rather, to ask the kind of stupid questions the disciples ask Jesus.

A trademark of my writing – especially in my books – is to contradict myself. I embrace the contradiction because we need to evaluate, ponder, and understand the wholeness of an issue. Besides, it makes people think.

So this post is going to contradict one of the chapters in my book Salvaged. In chapter 10, Questioning Captain Satellite, I talk about the power of asking good questions. The line, “The best leaders ask the best questions …