Tag: Faith
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Detox
Since leaving the career I’d once given my life to, I’ve felt the cold and calloused fingers of an identity crisis gradually tightening their grip around my neck. I guess that’s what happens when you morph from a teenager with a crystal clear picture of what your life’s supposed to be into a 30-something with…
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An Awkward Exchange
I’m sitting at the car dealership, waiting on an oil change and new brake pads for our beloved family minivan. It’s fall break, and this is a long way from where I want to be. But with the responsibilities of adulthood and car ownership being what they are, here I am. Sitting, waiting, trying to…
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Some Other Beginning’s End
The end is near. Almost. After four installments and over 8,000 words, my quest to pull back the curtain on my faith evolution is finally approaching its end. I’ve tried my best to distill a years-long process into a few key turning points. Despite leaving out plenty of details and glossing over numerous issues that…
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Closing Day
Faith evolution is like selling a house. It begins with a series of small detachments: planting a sign in the yard, letting strangers wander through your rooms, packing possessions into boxes, entertaining offers, negotiating terms. These are the initial, necessary steps toward no longer living where you used to. They’re partial little goodbyes. But the…
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Truck Shopping
If I had to catalogue all the dates that have been noteworthy in my journey of spiritual evolution, December 10, 2017 would definitely be on the list. At the time, I was the preaching pastor of a church I had served for over seven years, and I was in the middle of a holiday sermon…
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Sleeper Agents
Here’s a plot idea for an action-packed summer blockbuster: A quiet suburban housewife lives on a tree-lined street with her clean-cut husband and a pair of well-groomed kids. She drives a station wagon, attends the school PTA meetings, and occasionally bakes casseroles for her elderly neighbors. Anyone who drives past her house while she’s outside…
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Back to the Start
The spiritual road I’ve traveled hasn’t always been the one I’ve expected. I’ve taken turns I didn’t plan to take and ended up on roads I didn’t know existed. There have been dead ends, detours, and more than a few flat tires. If you trace my steps (Family Circus style!), the resulting path would look…
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Reflections from the Winding Road
How did you get here? What glitch in the GPS accounts for this increasingly twisted route that once seemed so direct and predictable? You’re not quite sure where you are, but wherever it is, it’s nowhere on the map. At least not on the map you were given back when the journey began. Back when…
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God Bless the Skeptics
Officiating funerals is never an easy gig for us clergy types. And when the funeral is for someone we’ve never met? Well that certainly doesn’t make the job any easier. I’ll never forget the memorial service I was leading a few years ago for a young woman who had died tragically and unexpectedly. I didn’t…
Drew Thomas Humphrey 