Category "Life With God"

Hitting The Wall

Brian Dolleman - January 21, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

Doubt, uncertainty, the “dark night of the soul,” finding yourself in unknown territory where the faith you’ve always known doesn’t seem to be working, hitting the wall…

Nobody wants to be there. And when we find ourselves there, we wish we could just cancel it, wipe it off the books entirely.

But hitting the wall is a necessary part of our growth and development.

In Brian Zahnd’s new book Water to Wine, he describes developmental psychologist James Fowler’s insights on the matter (I will paraphrase):

There are stages of spiritual development in… Read More

Daily Rituals

Brian Dolleman - January 20, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

Shari checked out a library book for me the other day called Daily Rituals: How Artists Work. It’s a fun book I’ve enjoyed reading. One of the highlighted “artists” was Søren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, and social critic. Here’s what the book had to say about his daily ritual…

The Danish philosopher’s day was dominated by two pursuits: writing and walking. Typically, he wrote in the morning, set off on a long walk through Copenhagen at noon, then returned to his writings for the rest of the day into the evening.

The walks were where he had his best ideas, and sometimes he would be in such a hurry to get them down that, returning home, he would write standing up before his desk, still wearing his hat and gripping his walking stick or umbrella.

Kierkegaard kept up his energy with coffee, usually… Read More

Most Of Us Have To Hit Some Kind Of Bottom Before We Can Even Start The Real Spiritual Journey

Brian Dolleman - January 14, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

From Richard Rohr’s Falling Upward…

God must say after each failure of ours, “Oh, here is a great opportunity! Let’s see how we can work with this!”

After our ego-inflating successes, God surely says, “Well, nothing new or good is going to happen here!”

Failure and suffering are the great equalizers and levelers among humans. Success is just the opposite. Communities and commitment can form around suffering much more than around how wonderful or superior we are. Just compare the… Read More

If You Want To Be A Better Christian, Work To Become A Better Poet

Brian Dolleman - January 13, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

From Professor Richard Beck…

A few months ago I was giving a chapel talk to ACU Honors students about what I called “the poetry of the Christian life.” The ideas were taken from Walter Brueggemann’s book Reality, Grief and Hope.

I shared three things with the students.

First, I said, when you look at the poetry of the prophets you see three different sorts of poetry, each with a different emotional tone. The prophets sing three different songs.

The first song is prophetic rage and indignation. This is the cry, “Let… Read More

Killer Mike Shines The Spotlight On This Police Officer…

Brian Dolleman - January 12, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized, Video

Last year, I uttered the words #BlackLivesMatter in church and what came next took me by surprise… I wrote about it here and here.

Part of the push-back had to do with police officers… an assumption was being made somehow that if black lives matter, police don’t.

For some reason, if bad policing was called out or critiqued, folks assumed what’s being said is that police are evil. This logic just doesn’t add up though. If someone takes a stand against an abusive father, it doesn’t mean they are against fathering. They’re merely against abusive fathering.

I’m certainly not against policing ( I will admit there have been a few times while getting a ticket that I considered being against policing, but I’m over it now). I have friends who are police officers and can honestly say that I am thankful for their work and service.

And while I am not against police officers, I am against 12 year old boys like Tamir Rice being gunned down by a police officers. This is not acceptable. Never. Ever.

But this post today is not about bad policing. Actually, it’s quite the… Read More

Shouting About These Three

Brian Dolleman - January 10, 2016 - Guest Posts, Life With God, Uncategorized

On Sundays I like to share, you know, a few shout-outs. So today I’m shouting about these three… great posts I appreciated this past week. Hope you enjoy!

1. This post: What To Do When The Idea Won’t Show Up by Amena Brown. Here’s my favorite line(s):

“Creative ideas are funny creatures. They are more like cats than puppies.

They will most likely not jump up and down when they see you; tail wagging, wanting your attention.

They notice when you arrive at the page/screen/studio, walk by you, rub against your leg, and then jump on the kitchen counter, then on top of the refrigerator and stare at you. Laughing. Proving to you that you will not control them.”

Amena continues with a few practical points on what to do when… Read More

Where The Kingdom Of God Is Located

Brian Dolleman - January 7, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized, Video

I love what Richard Beck has to say about the Kingdom of God…

Jesus is telling us in the Beatitude where the Kingdom of God is located.

And it’s located Jesus says, among the poor in spirit.

Christianity is fundamentally about learning to see.  That is what Jesus said, over and over.  The Kingdom is near. The Kingdom is at hand. The Kingdom is in your midst.

But the Kingdom is small and unnoticed, like a… Read More

I Want To Be Like Tommaso, Not Ikea

Brian Dolleman - January 6, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

My family has been on a “Tiny House” TV show watching-kick for a while. The latest variation of this sort we’re especially loving is called Tiny House World. We watched an episode the other night – it was set in Rome, which had us even more intrigued as we’ve been there a couple times.

Tommaso Garavini, the co-founder and co-owner of Rota-Lab (a furniture design and manufacturing company in Italy) was looking for an apartment in the heart of Rome, something around 300 square feet. The show gave brief glimpses of his shop and handiwork. You could tell Tommaso is a… Read More

Why I’m Choosing Beautiful As My Word For 2016

Brian Dolleman - January 5, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

Each year, for the past several years, I’ve chosen a word or theme or idea to inspire and influence me. A couple of years ago, my word was HUSTLE (not like the illegal sales of drugs or conning people – but the idea of working hard, showing up early, staying late… stuff like that).

Last year my theme was HUMBLE • GENTLE • OTHERS-FOCUSED. I figured if I could grow in these areas, I’d be more like Jesus.

So, for 2016, my word is BEAUTIFUL.

No, I wasn’t inspired by that James Blunt song from 2004. Remember it? YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL.

Funny quick story about that song… Read More

Maybe The Worst Days Are The Most Important Ones

Brian Dolleman - January 4, 2016 - Life With God, Uncategorized

I’ve been playing around with this idea… what if our worst days – the ones we would cancel if we had the power or ability to – were, in fact, the most important days?

There’s a growing trend with churches in our area to cancel services on the Sunday following Christmas. One leading church has been doing this for years – they now call it “Volunteer Appreciation Sunday.” I think what they’re saying is: thank you for volunteering all year – our gift to you is a Sunday off.

I’ll be honest. I’m skeptical.

I think the real reason for cancelling services isn’t gratitude. I think it’s… Read More