Hello Friends.
It’s been a while since I’ve sent anything out here. As many of you know, my dad passed away early in March and so I’ve been taking some time, creating some space to feel all of my feelings and process this very significant loss in my life.
Sigh.
Grief is hard, isn’t it? I’m typically one to stuff my feelings aside and just “push through” to do what I need to do (keep going, keep creating content, keep working, keep on keeping on) … something that I picked up in my years of pastoring (I think) because when you’re the pastor of a church you don’t really have time to grieve or feel your feelings, you know?
It sounds weird to say that, but it’s kind of true.
Why?
Because the elders expect you in the pulpit every week, the congregation wants to listen to someone who seems to have it all together, the community looks to you to be strong, to have the answers, to never flinch in the face of … anything. The slightest misstep could mean people leave for another church, which means they take their money somewhere else, which means - you get the picture.
The wheels of the church and the wheels of ministry keep going and going and going and if the pastor stops or flinches or blinks. Well. His/her job could be at risk. People start talking - “maybe he’s not the right one of this job?” Meetings start happening. Families start looking for other churches. Questions start being raised.
And so I was sort of groomed over the course of …
8 years of Private Christian School.
4 years of Bible College.
8-ish years of Seminary.
4 years as a pastor.
Countless internships.
… to feel my feelings for a short time, but stuff them away and focus on the good that is to come when I get to heaven. After all, “there’s work to do here! Souls to save! A Gospel message to spread! We have to grieve our losses to an extent, but we must keep our eyes locked on the bigger prize of eternity - the world is counting on us!”
Double sigh.
With this being one of the biggest losses of my life so far, I felt the need to really “deconstruct” my approach to grief and just take time to feel … everything.
And so this is month 2 that the podcast has been quiet.
I thought about starting it up again in May.
But it’ll probably June.
Likely on a bi-weekly basis through the Summer, then weekly again in the Fall.
I haven’t sent anything out here on Substack.
I have zero mental space to record interviews.
The blog has been quiet.
My social media pages aren’t all that active.
I haven’t recorded any podcast episodes since the end of February.
I can barely even read a page of a book without being distracted.
I cry a lot.
I’m angry sometimes.
I laugh on occasion.
I drink a lot of coffee.
Eat a lot of ice cream.
Watch TV.
Play a lot of Barbies with Jordan.
And watch her a little longer than usual when she’s sleeping.
… I’m all over the place, really. And rather than tell myself to “get it together” for the sake of everyone else, I’ve opted to take the time I need to do whatever it is I need to do in order to find even a small amount of courage to move forward.
Those who love us will understand.
Those who don’t understand … oh well.
One of the things I have done, though, is I finished my book. Yes - the manuscript for my second book is done and in the second round of edits. Writing is therapeutic for me and the content of this book has been especially so. It will be self-published in the next few months and the forward will be written by Alexander John Shaia. The book walks us through various stories from the Gospel of Matthew and looks at them through the lens of Matthew’s first century readers who were living in the wake of Rome’s destruction of their Temple, the very center of their universe. It encourages the reader to get in touch with their own “collapsed Temples” …
Broken relationships.
Shattered dreams.
Job loss.
Divorce.
Health problems.
Death and loss.
Unmet expectations.
… as we wonder what Matthew’s stories about Jesus might have meant to those first century readers and what they might mean to us as we all find ourselves beneath the rubble of our fallen Temples and imploded universes.
For me? The collapsed Temple is the passing of my father. I began writing the book shortly after he was diagnosed with cancer in December 2021 and finished the book shortly after he passed away … and so the book is very much a picture of my own wrestling match with grief and the many questions this loss has brought into my life as I bring it all before Jesus and the Scriptures I’ve been studying since I was a kid.
It’s a personal book.
It’s a raw book.
And I wrote it through a lot of tears.
I haven’t decided how I will handle the “launch” yet, but will likely release it without a lot of noise and just let it make it’s way out into the world, going where it may and landing into the hands of whoever it will. I don’t care much about sales and rankings and being number 1 or 2 or 3 or whatever … I just want the book to help people (which I believe it will) and so all I’ll likely ask of you (my Substack friends) and our Patreon friends is to pick up a copy, share it on social media, and leave some love on Amazon reviews.
ALSO.
The book reads like a “devotional book” where we look at 1 or 2 stories from each chapter of Matthew over the course of 30 days, and each chapter ends with a couple of reflection questions … and so I might be creating a “reading group” of sorts where we read through the book together and discuss the questions via chat (likely Discord) and maybe hop on Zoom to talk about them a few times as well … more details to come on that too.
All of that to say, I wanted to say thank you - thank you for your prayers, for reaching out to check in, and for sending Good Vibes to me and my family … we are grateful.
I’ll be back in the next couple of weeks with details about the book and probably drop another excerpt or so to our paid Substack friends. BUT. Like I always say - if you can’t swing the $7/month for Substack or Patreon or even money for the book or whatever - just let me know and I’m happy to send you whatever I create or whatever communities we have for free.
Cool?
Cool.
Thanks again and much love,