Some songs find us at just the right time. During the summer of 2025, while on sabbatical, my daughter June and I took a trip to my home state of Vermont. Having grown up there, it was a chance to return to familiar places, reconnect with a part of my story, and enjoy some time together. One night, we found ourselves spending the evening in Middlebury, a beautiful Vermont town that has played a significant part in my journey, where I was excited to discover that a concert was happening on the town green. We had stumbled into a performance by a duo we had never heard of before: Ordinary Elephant. What began as an unexpected stop on our trip became one of those memories that stays with you long after the vacation ends. Looking back, I see that evening as a sacred moment in my journey toward standing in the Messy Middle for those who are marginalized and overlooked. And then there was the music. Since that night, Ordinary Elephant has been on repeat across my music apps. Their songs...

  Sometimes the first step toward loving our neighbors better is recognizing what we have that others may not. For much of my life, I believed that if you worked hard, treated people well, and made good choices, you had the same opportunities as everyone else. I did not spend much time thinking about how my own circumstances shaped my experience. I am a white, cis gendered, heterosexual, married, middle class American man. I did not choose those parts of my story, but they have influenced how I experience the world and how others experience me. Growing up, I heard racist comments and absorbed assumptions about people without always questioning where those ideas came from or whom they harmed. Over time, I began to understand that my experience was not everyone's experience. Some doors opened for me without my even realizing they were closed to others. That realization helped me understand a phrase I return to often:  I didn't choose what I was given, but I can choose what I do ...

  Over the past several years, God has been changing the way I see people, understand my faith, and carry my convictions. Some of that growth has been uncomfortable because it has meant facing ways, I've hurt people while believing I was doing the right thing. That experience has left me increasingly frustrated with what we often refer to as "the Big C" church. Sometimes it feels that our need to draw lines around what we believe pushes people away from the very place where they might encounter the love of Jesus and experience the transforming power of the Gospel. I know this personally because there was a time when being right mattered more to me than understanding the people I was talking about or to. I held tightly to my convictions without thinking enough about the hurt my words and actions caused. I can't change the past, but I can own my mistakes, listen to people I once failed to hear, and change how I approach them today. I hold a Side B theology for myself an...

  In my life I have noticed something profoundly sad: we tend to honor the successful. We notice the people who have accomplished something, the people with influence, the people whose names we recognize, and the people who already seem to have a place at the table. Our culture has a way of teaching us who deserves attention and who doesn't. But Jesus entered creation to turn that way of thinking upside down. His kingdom is a kingdom where the lowly, the overlooked, and the marginalized are given dignity and honor. People who may receive less honor from the world are not less valuable to God. As a pastor, that matters to me a great deal, especially during LGBTQ+ History Month. There is something important about remembering people. What we choose to remember says something about who we believe is worth remembering. That is part of why we have moments like Black History Month, Women's History Month, Hispanic Heritage Month, Disability Awareness Month, Veterans Day, and LGBTQ+ His...