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I'm reaching out with something a bit special — an invitation to join me on a reflective journey called Deep Calls to Deep.
Here is some honesty and vulnerability: I sat down to write a note to you about how tired I am. How I need a break from writing each week.
What our kids need most is not a multitude of things to keep them occupied but rather our presence and engagement.
We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts.
Embracing childlike qualities opens our hearts and awakens our lives to awe and wonder.
There are thin spaces between us and something outside of ourselves, something profoundly holy.
Maybe that’s what we need right now more than ever- more people reading meaningful stories that help us grow in empathy and understanding.
Sitting in the Shade of Another Tree emphasizes the importance of challenging stereotypes, breaking down barriers, and engaging in genuine interfaith dialogue.
Rewiring Your Brain and Finding Peace in Your Heart Takes Intentional Work
I reflected on how life-giving these boring moments can be and how I needed more of them in my life, how we need more of them in our lives.
If I’m honest, I allow too many distractions to rob others of my full attention and presence.
We should afford people the space, patience, grace, and mercy to change, just like we would hope to receive ourselves.
A gripping tale about the complexities of human emotions and the search for truth in a digitally-driven world.
Maybe there’s more to life than rushing through it to get to the next thing or our intermittent explosive disorders or being micro-offended about everything.
Misunderstanding is difficult. And it is the foundation of much of our relational and societal dysfunction.
As I took a deep breath, I realized in that moment that it was truly the greatest day ever.
From the depths of our souls and with every breath, we give thanks.
Thanksgiving is our perpetual expression of gratitude regardless of our life situation or our changing condition.
When you don't feel like you are cultivating anything generative in your life, the best place to start is by giving and serving others. 
I learned a profound life lesson that day- sometimes you just have to stop and breathe and enjoy the present moment.
What we cultivate and nourish within ourselves right now will determine how we respond to these changing circumstances.
I always wondered why someone didn't notice I was by myself and invite me to their table.
This miraculous vibrating air that manifests into exquisite expression can either be a weapon or a healing salve.
Have you ever judged another person as a “lost cause?” What opportunity might have been missed with that person?
Through conversations, relationships, and life experiences, we begin to evolve beyond judgment into understanding and empathy.
Moving Beyond Nice Gestures Toward the Richness of Diverse Relationships
Without the discipline of constant prayer and centering, my ego (and its self-serving agenda) can quickly become my motivating force.
When love is allowed to become our center, it is the ground upon which understanding can flourish and hearts may change.
Yes, we may disagree with one another, but Divine love transcends our every difference and loves us despite ourselves.
God can not force a person to receive or reciprocate love, or force a person to live in greater wholeness.
It is only Divine love that can break through the clouds that occlude our vision, that can pierce the veil shrouding our true reality.
There is no distance we can travel where love is not inviting us back into its full embrace.
As you listen to your body, what is it telling you? What would it look like to travel to the source of your wound?
My goal over the last six months has been for us to take steps together out of the muck and mire and into wonder.
In 1992, four teenage girls (three of whom I went to school with) tortured and murdered a twelve-year-old girl named Shanda Sharer. 
Forgiveness is never be dependent upon another person. Forgiveness begins and ends with you.
Today’s post is an excerpt from my novel What Can’t Be Hidden and explores one character’s realization that inner peace is essential for relational and communal peace.
We can allow our pain to become toxic and spread through our words and actions. Or, we can use our wounds to benefit others. 
Solitude is not a one-time remedy that heals us but instead a necessary beginning point for the regular rhythm we need in our lives. 
It is always easy to find people who will join you in your anger and misery but who have no interest in journeying deeper with you.
We live out of our wounds because it is easier than sitting with them and facing them.
We stand in the wake of heartaches and missed opportunities and decide how we respond and who we will be.
Is it possible to become a community that mutually encourages and sustains one another so that all may not just exist but thrive? 
In a hyper-stimulated world, there is something renewing and refreshing about purposefully removing oneself to find refuge in the stillness and quiet.
Presence is permitting yourself to turn down the volume of all distractions and be here, now.
What we cultivate within our hearts manifests in our words. And those words have impact and consequences in how they may wound or heal another. 
In quieting the mind and moving into the steady beat of our spirit, we return to the peace that resides within each of us.
Developing an Inner Self That Can Withstand Changing Life Circumstances
It takes humility to recognize and admit what is destroying you. Even more, it takes courage to step away from the cycle and to choose a kinder, more generative path.
To become a person that can begin to love yourself, and then love outside yourself, love must be cultivated within.
That which we invite to be our emotional center can either ravage our spiritual well-being or bring us to life.
How I care for my inner self affects my entire being, from how I see myself and my relationships to how I relate to my community and environment.
The incalculable toll of the pandemic is its impact on our mental health.
When all we see every day is fighting back, retaliation, and getting the upper hand, there is something within us that deeply desires a better way of responding, of being.
How can you move beyond what people have told you about God in the past to discover God's true heart toward you?
When kindness confronts us through undeserved mercy, undeserved grace, or undeserved love, it can be transformative. 
There is an intentionality to this transformation, to traveling from one destination to another on this spiritual journey. It does not magically happen.
Deep Calls to Deep is insights, stories, and lessons with the intention of cultivating a deeper level of contemplation and wisdom within us.
Let today be a day of introspection and prayer in how we can be better toward one another.
Now Available: A dystopian psychological thriller- What Can't Be Hidden by Brandon Andress
A short Question and Answer with Brandon about his new novel What Can’t Be Hidden.
A short Question and Answer with Brandon about his new novel What Can’t Be Hidden.
My first novel, What Can’t Be Hidden, will launch on September 7 and you can be a part of the team.
The last couple of weeks have been a huge reminder to me that there is still more goodness in this world than bad.
One of the most contentious topics within American Christianity is the role followers of Jesus should or should not play within politics and government.
God was there, as God is here now, appealing to all people to resist the ideological forces that are working to strip others of their humanity.
It is always the transformation of the smallest part that leads to the transformation of the whole. 
We groan and cry out in this painful life experience together. 
The cold, hard fact is that there are prayers that God does not answer.
Who can stand before this cosmically-sized love without being completely transformed?
Either way, you will ultimately face then refiner’s fire.
The problem is that Hell is never once mentioned in the Bible.
When you are confronted with the reality of an undeserved kindness, it can be transformative.
The word wrath isn’t an unloading of God’s fury and rage on the unrepentant.
Should we pray for the president?
The judgment of God is simply giving a person what they have freely chosen.
We have only ever been alienated from God in our minds.
I was told that I needed to be saved from my sins so that I wouldn’t go to Hell when I die.
The idea of burning in Hell for eternity is utterly inconsistent with a God that we are told looks exactly like Jesus.
We are not being saved from something, but saved into something.
The most misunderstood word in all of Christianity.
Hiding behind the phrase “biblically correct,” is actually a convenient way for those who wear a “Christian” label to completely ignore Jesus.
The love of God is radically offensive to those who do not understand it.
These small moments are gifts, if we will receive them and let them teach us.
But what if, in the midst of celebrating the peace of Christ through ritual and routine, we have actually neglected peace in our lives?
There is a crushing agony to experiencing so much stillness and peace and serenity, but then walking back into so much antipathy, hatred, and division. 
So what exactly is the good news?
God has unconditionally and preemptively forgiven all people, all people, all people, for all time.
There are many people who struggle to understand a God who unconditionally and preemptively forgives everyone.
The forgiveness of God is unconditional and preemptive.
Where O Light are you in this darkness?
You may not trust these words now, but there is hope in your pain and suffering.
I resided in a relatively joyless existence for the majority of my adult life
'Love your enemies' ought to be sufficient.
The issue of arming our churches is now more relevant than ever.
Joy is an ever-present reality to which we open wide our souls to receive, but it is also a remembering and a longing.
God, I am done with you.
"Thoughts and prayers" are devoid of meaning, of value, of consequence, of participation, of action, of change.
Maybe my struggle has been with the way in which our culture has always portrayed prayer.
We live in an age in which stimulation and consumption are all too normal in our lives.