...How our Shame Hinders our Engagement in God's Mission

Part of my own story includes a lifelong battle with shame.  Ask my Mom and she'll tell you I came out of the womb fearful.  I was an insecure kid who played it safe for the most part.

Ask a theologian and she'll tell you that shame is a Garden-grown existential reality.  It's a part of the Family story. As the old story goes, Adam and Eve hid from God.  And as Brennan Manning writes, "We all, in ...

Sandra McCracken, along with husband Derek Webb, will be our musical guest this Sunday. A songwriter whose work is described by Paste magazine as "graceful and dramatic...exploring spiritual matters with wide-eyed inquisitiveness", she'll be sharing some of her hymns with us at our Sutter S ...

Daily Reading

Matthew 2:1-12 >

When you live in a city, with all of its street lights, you can forget to look at the stars. The ancient world, innocent of streetlights, never forgot the night sky. Many people, particularly to the east of Palestine, had developed the study of the stars and the planets to a fine art. Any remarkable event among the s ...

Daily Reading

Luke 2:8-20 >

When the angel of the Lord came to announce the birth of Jesus, people were terrified. And perhaps, we are, too. When the supernatural breaks into the natural, it is terrifying. When God impedes on our plans and projects, it strikes fear in us. And sometimes, we'd like to tell Him to get lost - we've got life under co ...

Daily Reading

Luke 2:1-7 >

Luke tells the familiar story of the birth of this baby that was promised from the beginning. Odd, isn't it, that at this very point in history something so seemingly ordinary as a baby born to a young woman happens at a certain time and in a specific place while life around goes on as usual: There's a specific emperor, t ...