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Lent-ish

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People Who Live (A Lent-ish Benediction)

By Megan Westra | April 12, 2020 | 0 Comments
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Today is not Silent

By Megan Westra | April 11, 2020 | 0 Comments
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Expand

By Megan Westra | April 10, 2020 | 1 Comment
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A More Complicated Table

By Megan Westra | April 9, 2020 | 0 Comments
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Unconventional Praise 

By Megan Westra | April 6, 2020 | 0 Comments
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See, Your Savior Comes Weeping 

By Megan Westra | April 5, 2020 | 0 Comments
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Our Daily Bread

By Megan Westra | March 27, 2020 | 0 Comments
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Nourished

By Megan Westra | March 25, 2020 | 0 Comments
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The Puzzle

By Megan Westra | March 23, 2020 | 0 Comments
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The Bent Fork for Bravery

By Megan Westra | March 19, 2020 | 0 Comments
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“We miss the immense impact of the Gospel when we fragment it into pieces we can consume for our own benefit.”

Born Again and Again 

Recent Posts

  • People Who Live (A Lent-ish Benediction)
  • Today is not Silent
  • Expand
  • A More Complicated Table
  • Unconventional Praise 

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“Despite evangelicals’ frequent claims that th “Despite evangelicals’ frequent claims that the Bible is the source of their social and political commitments, evangelicalism must be seen as a cultural and political movement rather than as a community defined chiefly by its theology. Evangelical views on any given issue are facets of this larger cultural identity, and no number of Bible verses will dislodge the greater truths at the heart of it.” 

MY GOD. Kristin Kobes Du Mez knocks it out of the park with Jesus and John Wayne. I’ve spent many, MANY hours of my life trying to unwind and detangle the evangelical beliefs I grew up with, and she seamlessly and thoughtfully brings together in 300 pages what I’ve been so far unable to name or coherently talk about for ten years. 

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
I’ve struggled to find words this day rememberin I’ve struggled to find words this day remembering Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 

Pulling quotes in abstract to pat ourselves on the back for progress that we believe we’ve made has always been inadequate. This year, it feels downright profane. 

I’ve been sitting with the words of the poet Carl Wendell Hines Jr., brought to my attention by Rev. Otis Moss III in a recent sermon, “Dead men make such convenient heroes. For they cannot rise to challenge the images that we might fashion from their lives.”

White American’s have been so busy concocting our own twisted version of Martin’s dream that we’ve let nightmares flourish in our homes and churches unchecked, and often, unwittingly or not, encouraged. 

We like to remember Dr. King as a peacemaker, but in reality he hoped for peace and flourishing for all as a possibility if we could honestly and boldly name and then dismantle evil from within our structures, systems and, yes, individual lives.

In “Beyond Vietnam” he named the three biggest perpetrators as racism, militarism and materialism. There can be no peace or unity as long as we shy away from naming what is wrong and then working to create different systems, structures and patterns of relating with one another and ourselves. 

The poet continues, “It is easier to build monuments than to build a better world.” 

May we each be more prone to look to build the latter this year of all years.
Circle. Circle. Dot. Dot. Guess who got her COVID Circle. Circle. Dot. Dot. 
Guess who got her COVID shot! 

#grateful #YayScience
My new planner arrived and I am obsessed. My new planner arrived and I am obsessed.
I love “fresh slate” moments. Mornings. Monday I love “fresh slate” moments. Mornings. Mondays. New months. New years. 
Each an opportunity to say “but what could this be?” regardless of what it is or was. 

This year I’m thinking a lot about the very basics of “self-care.” Not like massages and weekend getaways, but like “what if I drank enough water every day?” or “could I floss my teeth every day for a year?” 

Sometimes I tend to lump “care” into extravagant things and neglect the simple, daily practices that return back 100 fold on the effort. 

This week I’ve been slowly making my way through @yearcompass to reflect on 2020 and look ahead to 2021, and I’m struck how it really is the small moment that stick out, despite my deep love and undying attention to any and everything I can turn in to a Big Freaking Deal. 

Maybe that’s yet another paradox in life? That the small and mundane and the Big Freaking Deals are closer together than we think, and every moment is both of immense importance and also is just a drop in the bucket.
I’ve chosen a word of the year for almost a deca I’ve chosen a word of the year for almost a decade now. In 2020, I chose “and” as my word, a nod toward my desire to stop dwelling in the polarities and see more nuance, feel more complexities and...damn. DID 2020 EVER OPPORTUNITIES FOR PRACTICING THE “AND’s” OF LIFE. 

This year as I reflected on 2020 and looked ahead to 2021 I kept circling back to the idea of gratitude. I felt incredulous that this was where my reflections kept leading me, which is usually a good indication that I’m getting close to a growth edge. So, “grateful” is the word for 2021. I’m already annoyed about it, but here we go. 

“In the end, maybe it's wiser to surrender before the miraculous scope of human generosity and to just keep saying thank you, forever and sincerely, for as long as we have voices.” - Elizabeth Gilbert
I promised Cadence she could stay up till midnight I promised Cadence she could stay up till midnight this NYE. We both made it. She could keep partying all night. I on the other hand was done two and a half hours ago. Welcome 2021! Please be kinder.
This was the year everything shook. It was the ye This was the year everything shook. 
It was the year I laid my life bare and took inventory to see what I wanted to carry with me, and what it was time to let go of. 
I have wept, grieved, been scared out of my mind, and been filled with more joy and gratitude than I thought possible. 

It was one for the books, but the kind of book you read once and it changes your life but you dare not revisit again unless you’ve got some serious fortitude in the moment. 

Here’s to a more mellow 2021, please.
Baby’s first Catan. Obviously, we had to call in Baby’s first Catan. Obviously, we had to call in @ksasperez to teach her. Raise ‘em right 💪🏼

RSS Latest podcasts

  • S2 Episode 18: Michelle Van Loon Helps Us Prune
  • S2 Episode 17: Pandemics and Prosperity Gospel with Stephanie Tait
  • What You Should Know About Minneapolis, Part 2: Reflecting on How White People Showed Up
  • What You Should Know About Minneapolis (and probably your town too) with Rev. Lawrence Richardson and Nathan Roberts
  • S2 Episode 14: Learning to be More than Kind with Beth Watkins
  • S2 Episode 13: D.L. Mayfield and the Myth of the American Dream
  • S2 Episode 12: Journeying through Grief to Healing with Tracie Loux
  • S2 Episode 11: Working With Our Emotions with Robert Vore
  • S2 Episode 10: Elizabeth Behrens Helps Us Talk About Hard Things
  • S2 Episode 9: Imagining Economic Justice with Eric Atcheson

Megan Westra

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