Tag: Cullowhee

When to Walk Away

I hit all the points I wanted to hit, and yet I felt that I did not do justice to the urgency of the message I was preaching–that we so often look at the past and wish we could have been there to commit some violent act to prevent an injustice, that we forget that we have the opportunity to insist on peaceful solutions every day. We find it so easy to tell a story and have no sympathy for the characters we recognize to be “bad,” that we get used to thinking about life in that way, rather than as the complicated, messy milieu we encounter every day.

Presidential Debates

As I sat down to watch the debates last night, and saw the eager facebook and twitter posts from friends hosting parties and debate drinking games, I remembered what it was like when election season was all about the game of the election to me. I still have friends who recognize that their lives will… Continue reading Presidential Debates

A Loved Child of God

https://www.nathanwillard.com/sermon_vid/ALovedChildOfGod_091212.mp3 Preached at Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church in Sylva, NC Sermon Text: James 3:13-4:3 No text again today, though I have (scratchy) audio to post later. Perhaps the most important aspect of Christian life, for me, is finding people who are trapped in a narrative of hopelessness, and bring them back from that… Continue reading A Loved Child of God