A Church for Starving Artists

I have a friend – a tad older than I am – who intentionally never mentions things like the meds she’s on, the joints she’s replaced, or the wrinkles she’s noticed. She never mentions her age in conversation. She never makes “senior moment” jokes. This is her choice and I respect her for it.

I am now 70 years old, retired, on a couple of meds, and have two new knees. I have no problem with sharing this information and I consider it all a joy, frankly. I’m privileged to have lived this long – longer than either of my parents or a couple of my closest friends, all of whom died of cancer. I have not died of cancer – yet. Maybe I never will.

Maybe I’ll get bonked on the head by a falling gargoyle or accidently step into a manhole. I’ve known it to happen.

HH and I moved two weeks ago today to Northern Virginia and now we live in what could be our last move, depending on how often we break our respective hips.

I think of myself as a “young retiree” and yet, as I was walking home from Harris-Teeter (two blocks away) with my cute cart, three different people offered to help me. I wasn’t struggling. I wasn’t trying to lug that cart up a flight of stairs. I was just walking and – apparently – I looked like I needed assistance.

At first, I was annoyed. Do I look like I need help? And then I reconsidered.

Who doesn’t need assistance? All of us spend our days in some form of Assisted Living.

From the rehab patient who needs help getting dressed to the lady with a folding grocery cart to the child who can’t reach the library book, we not only need other humans but it’s really good for our souls to need each other. When we acknowledge that we cannot thrive alone, we are telling the truth about ourselves.

Scripture says “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” (1 John 1:8)

I would add: “If we say that we don’t need other people, we deceive ourselves …”

Welcoming assistance from strangers – even if we don’t think we need it – builds community. Instead of being annoyed, I’m trying to feel grateful that someone even noticed me. So – thank you Smoker holding the George Will book, Woman who looked older than I do, and Young Mom with the wagon and a puppy. Thanks for offering to help the lady with the folding shopping cart.

But here’s my pitch: what if we were more intentional about noticing people? I’m not suggesting we try to Super Hero ourselves into a situation that someone else has under control. I’m not saying we should be creepy. I just saying that we could notice each other out there with intention and appreciation. Hold a door open. Carry a bag. Say ‘hi.’

Everybody needs a little help.

A fire on an Amtrak train early this morning resulted in the cancellation of my trip home to DC which was supposed to leave around 9:30 am.

I got to spend the day in an urban train station with nothing to do but hang out and watch people.  And it occurred to me that Donald Trump would hate it here.

[Note: These are pastoral observances, not political ones.]

The president has told us numerous times about the kind of humans he likes and the kind of humans he doesn’t like.  And so I’m glad he wasn’t here with me today.

In my eight hours waiting at Newark Penn, this is what I saw:

Mostly people with darker skin than mine wearing a variety of fashions from buttoned down collars to every kind of t-shirt (Knicks, NASA, a picture of Santa above the words “Believe.”) Torn jeans and hot pants. At least one bikini top. 

Travelers with all kinds of challenges like wheelchair riders and folks with mobility canes and seniors pushing walkers with stuffed carryalls attached and little kids with too much energy to sit around and wait for a train.

People with psychological situations like the young man who randomly yelled every couple of hours about a bear, to the folks who were definitely talking to themselves rather than talking into ear pods.

People who were very short and very tall, emaciated and heavyset, bearded and clean shaven, gray haired and lime green haired. 

What I heard were recognizable and unrecognizable accents.  I’m confident that most continents were represented.

Towards the end of my day, I phoned a friend after learning that her sweet dog had passed away.  I had no qualms about weeping in a train station because I lived there now – and when the call ended, I noticed that the woman next to me was also weeping. 

 “I’m so sorry about your friend’s dog,” she said.  And then she told me that her own dog had passed away suddenly last summer and she was still upset about it.  Bella had been her best friend’s dog and that friend had died of cancer at the age of 35 so when Bella died, it was like losing her last connection to her friend.  $@%# cancer.

I showed her photos of Zuzu and photos of a different dog named Zuri who graced the presence of our Presbytery office. Zuri passed away suddenly on Tuesday.  And I showed her pictures of our Spense who died in 2025 and she showed me pictures of her new dog Luna wearing a little sombrero.

And then she left to catch her train.  We didn’t know each other’s names but we knew all the dog’s names. 

And when my train finally arrived for boarding, I thought about Donald Trump who never had a dog or a cat according to biographers.  And he has said he doesn’t like immigrants or disabled people but he says he does love handsome men and beautiful women.

I was blessed to observe America in an urban train station today. And as the trained pulled out of the station, my σπλαγχνίζομαι (splagchnizomai) was on overload. And I I felt really sad for the powerful man who has no idea what he’s missing. 

I recently read about a group of church ladies who have weekly “crafternoons” (cute) when they create original wreaths for front doors. Flower wreaths for the spring. Evergreen wreaths for the winter.

What threw me was that this is a mission for unhoused neighbors. To be clear: they are making front door wreaths for people who don’t have front doors.

Q: What happens when we give people what they don’t need?

A: Lots of things, including people leaving organizations in which they once participated regularly.

Church would be one of those organizations. HH and I will be looking for a new church in the coming months and our hope is that we will connect with a church that gives us the spiritual nurture we need so that we (and the rest of the congregation) can offer what our neighbors need.

What we will not need:

• Homiletical explanations on why Jesus could have been crucified on a Thursday instead of a Friday. (We don’t care.)
• Social justice conversation groups that make us smarter but don’t change things that need to be changed.
• Bible studies without any practical spiritual inspiration.
• People who bicker, especially about things Jesus didn’t die for.
• Of course: Congregations that don’t address what breaks God’s heart in the neighborhood.

We love all kinds of music, all kinds of people, all kinds of architecture. We hope to find people with whom we can be messy and imperfect. We particularly love people who are easy to laugh and cry with.

I share this not as a request for identifying potential congregations in Our Nation’s Capital (where we are moving in a few days) but to remind so many congregations I love that nobody needs what many of our churches are offering.

• Nobody needs a congregation of people who gossip or slam each other behind their backs.
• Nobody needs a Bible study that never challenges what we have always believed/teaches us anything new.
• Nobody needs a gorgeous sanctuary with beautiful people who are ashamed to share their real lives with each other.
• Nobody needs another bake sale or car wash to “help the needy” when we won’t even offer a ride to a neighbor who needs a lift to the hospital.
• Nobody needs a wreath when they have no door, especially when we have the opportunity to help them find a home with a door.

Just as we regularly evaluate our church staffs (preferably both paid and volunteer) it’s helpful – also – to evaluate the impact of our congregations in terms of the congregation and community’s spiritual health. Is our congregation offering what anybody needs? Things like authentic community, security, inspiration, moments of awe, opportunities for life-changing service? In this wild and often infuriating world, this is what people need – whether we admit it or not. One day most of us will look for these things.

HH and I watched – back to back – two excellent funeral episodes of our favorite shows last weekend. And I’ve attended two funerals on as many Saturdays – the first for one of my favorite people who passed away much too soon and the second for a Charlotte institution in the arts world.

I love a good funeral.

It’s not about the choreography or the music or the refreshments. It’s always about the person and the way that person is remembered – preferably within the context of God’s grace. I’ve known followers of Jesus whose funerals were weirdly impersonal – about both the deceased and the Creator. And I’ve known atheists whose funerals were surprisingly holy.

The funeral of Rebecca’s father on Ted Lasso was one of the best ever and not because her father was a great guy. It was perfect because her people who didn’t just show up; they were with her in a way that only deep affection can muster. The funeral of Coop’s father on Your Friends and Neighbors was inspiring to watch if only because it illustrates what not to do when a loved one dies. Coop is surrounded by his “friends and neighbors” but they are all fake.

All this is related to a podcast I heard recently with Bill Burnett, the author of Designing Your Life. I’m in a privileged stage in life in that – so far – I’ve had a great life and if I died tomorrow, it would have been much more than enough. And yet I’m beginning a totally new stage of life in a new city, with new opportunities, and new adventures. Everybody should get this: a fresh chapter.

A good funeral can kick start a fresh chapter. To hear about someone’s authentic bravery and sacrifice or someone’s tireless creativity prompts us to do better – even if what we do is not all that sacrificial or creative. A good funeral makes me want to be a better human. What about you?

The only reason I’ve read any novels over the past year was because of my Brewery Book Group (whom I’ll miss when we move from Charlotte. Anybody want to start one in Our Nation’s Capital this summer?) While the novels we read could be bleak (The Emperor of Gladness) they were usually uplifting, if dark (Vigil.)

When I read over this (gifted to you) NYT article about the 2026 Pulitzer Prize Books, I was especially drawn to the Nonfiction Winners and Finalists – as always. This doesn’t mean I’m more scholarly or serious than people who prefer fiction. It’s probably because I’m still in constant-search-of-sermon-illustrations mode. There’s nothing like a quote from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek or Life Together to close out a traditional Presbyterian sermon. Sermon illustrations can also be found in novels, of course, but it was often so long since I read a novel that I didn’t want to date myself. (“In that new novel The Brothers Karamazov . . .“)

Note: Preachers who quote from the most recently published novels are perhaps the most well-read pastors. They are reading what they want to read rather than what they have to read.

In regards to that article about the 2026 Pulitzer Prize Winners, I was drawn to the nonfiction list and especially to:

• We the People by Jill Lepore about the history of the U.S. Constitution which sounds interesting and also possibly disturbing.
• There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America by Brian Goldstone which has got “sermon illustrations” written all over it.
• A Flower Traveled in My Blood: The Incredible True Story of the Grandmothers Who Fought to Find a Stolen Generation of Children by Haley Cohen Gilliland. Whatever happened to disappeared people and their children in Argentina doesn’t sound inspiring, but I’m a sucker for Mom Stories. I wouldn’t give this book to your Mom or Grandmother on Mothers’ Day however.

While I take occasional breaks from the difficult news of the day, my Current Events Sabbatical never lasts more than a couple days and I have to confess before you and the LORD, that I am a little judgmental about it when people tell me they “don’t read the news anymore” much less nonfiction tomes about homelessness or human torture. Reading only feel-good novels or the Style Section of the newspaper is like living in a gated community. If we don’t see homelessness or human torture, it doesn’t exist.

Clearly, I’m a fun date.

My hope for all of us is that we have some proximity to human suffering for the sake of our souls. I’ve occasionally asked in this blog “Who is the poorest person you know?” The answer reveals how gated our lives have become. If the poorest person we know has to make daily choices involving food versus medicine, we have more opportunities to follow Jesus than if the poorest person we know can only travel to Europe every other year.

Yes, Jesus died for rich people and rich people experience their own version of torture in many cases. But it’s easy to forget that not everybody can afford to meet for coffee dates or drive a car with AC when we don’t blink over buying a $5 latte or an e-car.

Gated communities, in my opinion, are a spiritual problem (unless you are the King of England.) Gated life experiences are a spiritual problem for everyone. Reading about the difficult life situations of our neighbors is part of the continuing education each of us need. If we know that human suffering exists – whether we read about it or witness it up close and personal – we are more likely to address it in some way in the name of Jesus.

Balancing the joyful and the terrible is part of life. And it’s a good indicator of our spiritual health.

This is a post about Baby Boomers who have ruined everything and I am among the guilty. Idrees Kahloon wrote this thoughtful article about issues with my generation, especially in terms of hoarding wealth, staying too long in our careers and overstaying our welcome in several of life’s other arenas.

I’m a big fan of my generation stepping aside when younger people and fresher ideas are needed and this has sometimes resulted in accusations of ageism. The truth is that I hope people (in any generation) will retire when they no longer find joy and fulfillment in their vocations. Maybe that happens when you’re 80 or maybe when you’re 55. I can’t begin to count the number of clergy colleagues who stayed too long in their churches to the point that those congregations could no longer afford a full-time pastor. (I know. Ouch.)

It would be optimal, of course, for all of us to find energy and deep satisfaction in what we do for our life’s work. But some people “can’t retire” even when they’d like to because they can’t afford to retire. They are raising their grandchildren or their own children from a late-in-life marriage. They are helping elderly parents afford home health care. They still have debts to pay off. Or they can’t stand the thought of losing the identity they’ve known for the past 40 years.

How can generations work together to make the world more equitable? (Note: these ideas are founded on spiritual values rather than political ones. Wealthy Boomers: I’m looking at you in hopes we will forego some of our own comforts to support those coming after us . . . because Jesus.)

What can we do as disciples of Jesus?

• When unused church property can be made available for housing that Millennials can afford – even though those new more modest homes border older neighborhoods – do we support those efforts? Where I live in North Carolina, many churches were established on farmland with many acres of unused property around their buildings. Jesus said something about hoarding. Believe me, those churches do not need to save that acreage for future Christian Education buildings or parking lots.
• Just as term limits are good for politicians, they are good for church leaders. In my denomination, officers are limited to serving only two consecutive three-year terms as elders or deacons. And after a year “off” they can be elected for one or two additional three-year terms. Instead of saying that “nobody else is willing to serve” as the excuse for electing the same people over and over again, ask why that’s the case. Maybe you have too many people on your boards. Maybe you refuse to consider younger members (whether “younger” in your congregation means teenagers or fifty-somethings.)
• Apart from officers, have the same people been in their volunteer positions for more than ten years? Have we enjoyed the leadership of the same person to be the Vacation Bible School Director or the Lady in charge of Coffee Hour, or the Confirmation Teacher for as long as anyone can remember because “nobody else will do it” or “it would break their heart to take that job away from them” even though (respectively) they no longer like children or they grumble about baking cookies or they complain about “young people today” while fulfilling those duties? In healthy congregations, there are also term limits for volunteer positions.

Apart from what church people can do, I like Samuel Moyn’s idea (again, read the Kahloon article):

The wealthiest Social Security recipients, for instance, could forgo some of their scheduled benefits, which could instead be contributed annually to “baby bond” accounts for America’s children, a source of capital to be used in adulthood.

Love this idea. I, for one, am wealthy in spite of the fact that in the first 27 of 42 years of professional ministry I earned the minimal pastoral salary and it shows if you knew my net worth. Nevertheless, compared to the rest of the world, even those of us who made financial sacrifices in order to serve in the non-profit sector are rich. Sharing is not “socialism.” It’s the way of Jesus.

I’m guessing that many of you, Readers, will take issue with this post. But we have a great opportunity to crack open the old ways of being leaders, investors, and disciples. Let’s do it.

“When you can buy your way out of any mistake, when you can fire anyone who disagrees with you, when your social circle consists entirely of people who need something from you, the basic mechanism by which humans learn that other people are real goes dark.” Noah Hawley in The Atlantic April 20, 2026

After my double knee replacement, I had a handicapped parking placard hanging from my rearview mirror for four months and I loved it. At first, when I could barely walk, it was so helpful to be in the closest possible parking spaces to every office and store. Later in my recovery, it was simply helpful as I carried groceries.

Also, every time I pulled into a designated space with a sign like the one above – warning that those parking in those spaces without a placard would be charged at least $250 – I thought about Jeff Bezos. While $250 (“minimum”) would be a hardship for many of us, it would not make a wealthy person blink.

Let’s say that money is not a problem for me and it’s raining hard and I don’t want to get wet and I happily risk paying $250 to park closer to the coffee shop. It’s only $250.

Only empathy would keep a wealthy person – who could easily pay the fine – from parking in those spots. This article by Noah Hawley is an excellent explanation of how billionaires lose their sense of empathy as their bank accounts exponentially grow. This is also true for millionaires, but – and I’m just going to say it here – I believe that there should be no such thing as a billionaire. I believe that billionaires need to pay their fair share of taxes even if it means that they become mere millionaires. It’s the right thing to do for the wellbeing of our nation.

“When Musk took a chainsaw to the federal government as part of the inside joke he called DOGE, he did so with the air of a man who believed that nothing matters—poverty, chaos, human suffering. He was having fun.” 

According to the Vaia educational app, it would take about 2738 years to spend a billion dollars if you spend $1000 each day. It would take almost three years to deplete a billion dollars if you spent 1 million each day. If you are a multi-billionaire like Jeff Bezos or an Elon Musk – or even a philanthropist like Mackenzie Scott (formerly Bezos) it would be almost impossible to spend those billions of dollars in one lifetime.

Although Mackenzie Scott has donated over $26 billion – mostly to HBCUs – her wealth continues to grow at a pace that will never be even slightly exhausted much less drained. She’s an example of a wealthy person whose life’s meaning involves transforming the world for good – and not in a performative way. (Note: Bezos granted the actor Eva Longoria $50 million in his annual “Courage and Civility Award” a couple years ago which feels a little showy. Ms Longoria is herself a millionaire.)

We cannot force people to do the right thing. We cannot compel people to to share.

But people who have experienced hardship are more likely to be generous to others if we feel gratitude. We who have been blessed with some semblance of suffering ourselves are not repulsed by the suffering of others. Our own President, who is currently a billionaire even if he’s never been one before, seems to be repulsed by injury even in the sacrificial cause of freedom.

(General Mark) “Milley had chosen a severely wounded Army captain, Luis Avila, to sing “God Bless America.” Avila, who had completed five combat tours, had lost a leg in an IED attack in Afghanistan, and had suffered two heart attacks, two strokes, and brain damage as a result of his injuries. To Milley, and to four-star generals across the Army, Avila and his wife, Claudia, represented the heroism, sacrifice, and dignity of wounded soldiers.

It had rained that day, and the ground was soft; at one point Avila’s wheelchair threatened to topple over. Milley’s wife, Holly­anne, ran to help Avila, as did Vice President Mike Pence. After Avila’s performance, Trump walked over to congratulate him, but then said to Milley, within earshot of several witnesses, “Why do you bring people like that here? No one wants to see that, the wounded.” Never let Avila appear in public again, Trump told Milley.” Source.

Unimaginably sums of money can destroy the soul. It’s biblical. Again, Noah Hawley:

The world has always been run by rich men. But they directly engaged with the world around them, using their wealth and power to muscle it into its most profitable form. And although today’s billionaires are clearly manipulating society to maximize their own profit, something else is also happening—a disassociation from the reality of cause and effect, from meaning and history. These men no longer feel the need to change the world in order to succeed, because their success is guaranteed, no matter what happens to the rest of us.

As our nation celebrates 250 years, the divide between rich and poor is expanding. And it’s making us less the country our nation’s founders intended, less the people God created us to be. It’s a spiritual problem that I hope those in power – both the politicians and the theologians – will address with courage.

This post is for those solo pastors without much staff who preach almost every Sunday of their lives. Last week – the Sunday after Easter – is commonly known as a High Holiday for Associate Pastors and Guest Preachers, unless you are a solo pastor. Fortunate solo pastors took a vacation day. Many did not.

Even if you’re the Senior Minister of a multi-staffed congregation, you probably don’t have to preach every Sunday. And some pastors rarely preach because they have a different role (associate pastor, assistant pastor, parish associate.)

Again, this post is for those solo pastors who stand in pulpits almost every Sunday of their lives. And then they wake up on Monday morning and have to/get to start thinking about next Sunday. The relentlessness of weekly preaching is not for the fainthearted. Some of our sermons are gold and some are – frankly – dross because we can’t humanly create brilliance every single week.

After many years of preaching almost every Sunday and later loving people who do that, I have some ideas. These ideas are not about being lazy pastors. They are about the spiritual health of congregations.

• Negotiate a plan between the solo pastor and the church leaders that every six weeks, you will not be the preacher because one of the elders will preach that day. (!) In my denomination – the PCUSA – elders can preach “when appropriately prepared” and – as spiritual leaders – elders are expected to be able to articulate their faith and study Scripture. Youth often preach on “Youth Sunday” and preaching “on a regular Sunday” conveys to the congregation that the faith and leadership of young people is not “cute;” it’s as powerful as that of any member. Share that pulpit.
• Invite a local leader to do a dialogue sermon with you about what they do at work. This still takes preparation but not as much preparation as a standard sermon. Especially if your congregation needs to broaden their awareness of what’s going on in the neighborhood, invite the guidance counselor from the closest school or the local sheriff or a county medical clinician and practice sharing this kind of dialog on a Sunday morning:
  • Pastor: We welcome today ______________ whom some of you might know from the community. They are the ___________ for our town. It’s great to see you, _____________ and thanks for being here. We are First Church in the Valley and we are active in the community with ____________ but we want to hear about what you see as the needs in our neighborhood from your perspective. Maybe you can share what an average day looks like on the job.
  • Guest: Well, every day is different. (And then person gives details about what things come up at their school/fire department/health clinic/jail/shelter/Head Start Center/Community Center. It’s great to give as many specifics as they can.)
  • THE CONVERSATION CONTINUES TO GO BACK AND FORTH NATURALLY IN TERMS OF WHAT THE GUEST SEES AS NEEDS IN THE COMMUNITY.
  • Pastor: So what could a congregation like ours offer to address these needs. (This question requires preparation on the Guest’s part.)
  • Guest:
    • We could use 4 hair dryers for the unhoused girls who have permission to use the teacher’s lounge for showering.
    • We don’t need any more socks or gloves at the shelter. But we really need new packages of underwear.
    • We do Senior Projects in our high school every year and there are applications in the back if any of you would like to be mentors for Senior Projects.
    • We have a clothing closet with winter clothes at our elementary school and we’re handing out lists of particular needs and sizes.
    • The morale of our teachers at the Head Start Preschool is very low. If you’d like to donate fast food gift cards, we would love to share them with our teachers.

Okay, whew. I didn’t intend for this post to be a workbook. But there is no reason why Sunday mornings – including the message proclaimed – needs to be the way it’s always been.

Preaching is about interpreting Scripture and proclaiming Good News. It would be good news to solo pastors if the Sunday Preaching duties could be shared a few times a year. And it would develop the spiritual leadership of the Body.

And finally, a special thanks to all who filled pulpits on the First Sunday After Easter whether you are a solo pastor or a student pastor or an associate pastor or an elder: it’s helpful to hear a different voice tell us about Doubting Thomas.

Image is the pulpit in the Castle Church in Wittenburg, Germany.

Everybody needs their people. We need people who get us, who have shared laughs and traumas with us, who make us better than we are without them. As I’ve shared before, I am ridiculously blessed with such people. You know who you are.

As HH and I relocate in a few weeks from The Queen City to a new city (albeit the place where we raised our family) we will need some new people. Some of the people we knew before have moved away. Some have died. Some are former parishioners and our roles have changed. Some are old friends who will once again be close enough to meet for coffee.

Over the weekend, I was blessed with a delicious sample of what being with my people might look like in the coming years. I took a short road trip for the purpose of enjoying three meals:

• A lunch with five brilliant retired women who are definitely my people, two of whom I’ve known for years.
• A dinner with about sixty exceptionally gifted people, most of whom were college seniors or graduate students – my people for many reasons including the fact that we all know the words to “Hark the Sound.”
• A brunch with three funny and smart longtime friends I first met in Chicago with whom I share clergy life.

With every conversation it felt like I was in the presence of greatness. And even though I’m not even a month into retirement, it’s clear that we are profoundly blessed if we 1) can find our people in this life and 2) can serve in meaningful ways while earning enough money to live.

Retirement offers time to stare into space and think about things like – in my case – why billionaires exist, whether or not song birds will eat from a feeder on the seventh floor and if it’s true that all great novels reveal something about the meaning of life. And retirement is also a time to sit and talk about random things over multiple meals with our people.

So far, I love retirement. But I miss my work people.

And yet, those connections will always exist. And there will be new people if we are curious.

Image of a group of women I observed last summer in what will be our new neighborhood in late May. I want to be the one with gray hair and her face resting on her hand.

I volunteered with a suicide prevention hotline in college and was working one Good Friday when a sobbing woman called. As trained to do, I said encouraging words (“It’s okay” “Take your time“) until she could share what was going on.

“Jesus was crucified today.”

Literally, that’s what she said. At first I thought she was punking me. But then I realized she was seriously in need of hope, that life was rough/overwhelming/excruciating and that Good Friday was as good a day as any to add the death of Jesus to whatever crises her life was enduring that day. She continued to weep.

If she was faking it, she was an excellent actor. I’m talking dying animal sounds.

I have made my own dying animal sounds. There have been moments when I felt alone and hopeless. It’s a horrible place to be. Jesus is a part of that story for me too but the context was different.

On the day I took the suicide prevention call, what I wanted to say was:

“Can you hang on for three more days? I promise it will get better.”

(I foolishly thought her biggest issue was Jesus dying on the cross.) I don’t remember if that’s actually what I said, but honestly I said something like that, and I wasn’t being flippant. Surely, this woman had heard the end of the Holy Week story – that crucifixion was not the last word.

But sometimes, we simply need to wait for three days.

Some agonies indeed pass in a matter of days. Our perspective improves with a good night’s sleep or a helpful therapy session or a weepy phone call with a friend.

And sometimes the pain feels endless. It feels impossible that we can ever recover and find peace. It’s cruel to tell someone in that kind of pain to “wait three days.” Today I’m thinking about . . .

• The countless victims of assault at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein, along with tens of thousands of others who have been assaulted by tens of thousands of other abusers.
• The innocent people living in war zones (and other zones like schools and hospitals that only evil agents would attack.)
• The people weeping in the throes of psychological and physical illness in our personal circles and all over the world.

It will not help any of them to say, “Can you hang on for three more days?” Three days will – most likely – not make a difference in the overwhelming tragedies that burden millions of people every day.

Nevertheless, we who call Jesus our Savior find hope in those three days.*

This is our calling. We are called to be with our friends when they are making dying animal sounds. We are called to accompany people as they pick up the pieces. We are called to pick up the pieces with them.

God has done this for us. We were born to do this for others. And we don’t have to wait until Sunday to step up.

*Note: It seems like Jesus rose in just two days in our current way of counting. But in ancient Palestine “inclusive counting” marked three days from Jesus’ death (he died Friday before sunset which was Day One) from sunset Friday through sunset Saturday (Day Two) and rose in the morning of Sunday – so after sunset Saturday (Day Three.)