Faith, Life, and being held together by grace
The future of the Church in the west is at stake. Today we know the name of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. This is in large part because he denounced the fascists of his day while most of the church was silent and complict. I pray that this time there would be too many names to remember as…
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This night we remember two teens who found themselves alone on a cold night. Alone in the stable. These two faced childbirth without any help. Jesus, Emmanuel, born in the quiet of night. The heavens erupted in praise. The long awaited king has come, humanity and divinity in one. He would proclaimed his kingdom that…
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This is the transcript of a talk given earlier in the summer of 2020. I was one of a dozen or so presenters looking at how the church might need to adapt for the future. There is the global pandemic, climate change/catastrophe, beginning of the end of the American Empire, the rapid secularization of the…
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110 days after my covid symptoms started I’m sharing what it has been like for me.
Read MoreWith all happening in Minneapolis (Justice for George Floyd) and around the country it should be clear. You are either anti-racist, or racist. The years of me believing that racial justice wasn’t my fight are one of the reasons that George Floyd was murdered. I believed passive support of others was enough to bring change,…
Read MoreToday I lead a group of ministry peers in a conversation about what might come out of this current pandemic for the church. Through shortened breaths (due to still being in recovery from covid-19) I read the following notes. Normally I don’t prepare notes like this, but my mind has been so scattered I felt…
Read MoreWe are in a season of life unlike any we, or our parents have lived through for a century. People we know and care about will get sick, we will get sick, and many more than we want to will not survive. With all that said I want to make a few points: It is…
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Nearly torn apart in grief and gripped by fear Mary Magdalene returned to the empty tomb alone.
Read MoreI’m in the process of relaunching the Nonprofit Coffee Break and really want to be able to hold interviews and conversations with people. The technical question arose about how to go about doing this. For the audio portion of the podcast having separate tracks of the guest and myself would be nice, but not a…
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My heart is weak. Yesterday a man overcome by evil killed scores with a truck in Nice, France. I’ve grown tired of being surprised, shocked, or acting as though the attack was unexpected. This is a sad reality of our world today. That a 24-hour news cycle hunts for tragedies affecting a group of people to grab…
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The only home I remember as a child stood firm on a winding cul-de-sac. When I was old enough to care I found out it was bought from the developer who was living in it at the time. It turns out his money had been tied up in the different homes on our street and…
Read MoreIt’s been a little over 24 hours since the most recent attack in Paris. This was not an isolated event, it was not the first, and will not likely be the last (thought I pray for a long break). There is hurt, pain, and death in life. I believe that the best of humanity surrounds…
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I was lucky enough to spend a few minutes this last spring with a few of the team from Power Moves. They wanted to know what it was like to start a software company in Minneapolis. It has been a rocky road for Fresh Vine – as all start ups. We’ve become profitable and outdone…
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I’ve heard that several prominent suburban churches in Minnesota announcing plans to open locations downtown. As an urban dweller – who is also a missionary and student of the church – I thought I’d share some major reservations about this development. At the core this is an issue of culture and world view. A mentor…
Read MoreEver need a link shortener for a project your working on? Want something you can host? I put something together this weekend specifically designed for saas style companies. Drop three files into your project, and then make short links to your little hearts desire. The application itself can be hosted on it’s own domain –…
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I’ve been working on a startup, Fresh Vine, for the better part of a decade. Up until this point we have kept what we’ve been doing pretty close to the chest. It wasn’t out of some grand strategy of ours. Rather its from person struggle to not be the slimy person always talking about themselves.…
Read MoreI’m in the middle of migrating the Check-In application for Fresh Vine from Adobe Air into HTML5 wrapped in QT. One of the things that I love about Fresh Vine is how graphical it is, and that so many people add in their profile photos to their accounts. One of the challenges in making the…
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I enjoy biking into work. It is only a mile and a half, but it is all urban biking next to and in between cars. It’s a fun way to get around town, and it feels great. I also never wear a helmet. There are looks that people give me for it, but it is…
Read MoreThere have been pastors I’ve spoken with who have felt a bit lost when considering software for their church. With so many options out there that it’s overwhelming. It is with that in mind that we created the Church Software Guide: Everything you Need to Know. The goal is not to dig in deep, but…
Read MoreI’ve been rebuilding our check-in application for Fresh Vine this past week in QT. Moving away from Adobe Air has been a while coming since it seems like they are abandoning the environment. Developing our app in HTML5/JS/CSS will allow our team to fix/improve the app more rapidly. As a part of my dev environment…
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