I have just opened a new free mini class, and I would love to invite you in.

It is called:

Learn Lectio Divina: Paint Isaiah 60

This class is for anyone who wants to come close to Scripture in a slower, more creative, more embodied way.

It is for the spiritually curious.
It is for the artistically curious.
It is for the lifelong believer who wants Scripture to feel fresh again.
It is for the reconstructing believer - because “deconstruction” is so 2020.
It is for the person who has always wanted to make art but felt a little shy about beginning.
It is for the person who suspects that beauty may be one of the ways God is getting their attention.

There is a theology floating around out there, well-meaning, earnest, occasionally a little smug, that goes something like this: “Real church is people, not buildings. Real faith doesn’t need four walls and a mortgage. Buildings are a distraction, maybe even a spiritual liability, evidence that a congregation has gone soft on mission and started loving its own comfort a little too much.”

I see people nod along to this, the way you nod along to things that sound humble and therefore must be true. I understand the point, and I know they mean well, but you need to know I have never once nodded my agreement to any of those opening statements.

I hope to explain myself.

For early access to this work-in-process, I invite you to subscribe to my Substack called “Middle Kindling”. Link is in the blog post.

I hope this message brings deep comfort to those of you who are, like I am, “in the middle” of some long process. YES, the Lord is the God of the “suddenly”.

But He also loves to tell a long, long story. He’s with you, in your middle.

Discover what it means to administrate the covenant “in your middle” - meaning: the covenant you are under. The Gospel. With all its new covenant, new and better promises.

There's a hummingbird who flew past my studio window last week. I have’t even put out a feeder yet this year, but there he was, hovering in that impossible way they do, wings a blur.

I think about the hovering, sometimes. And I hope to make it make sense to you by the end of this post. My brain is a kaleidoscope of associations, which can often make me sound…well, “eccentric”.

Because that hummingbird made me wonder if you are already living the thing. The actual thing. The sort of life you’ve been dreaming of and saving to Pinterest boards and praying for.

Did you know that all the poets and real people have mostly left social media?

They have.

And they’ve (mostly) gone to Substack.

It’s the most non-performative space where a real exchange of ideas can still occur. And…it’s impossible to ghost people there.

It’s a place for the writer’s writer.

And so, I’ve also created a Substack for all who want to escape the cold paper-fires of Instagram. It’s called “Middle Kindling”.

Here’s your link , and here is an excerpt from my latest post there: