Writing
Essays and working ideas from more than fifteen years of writing about faith, leadership, discipleship, the church, family, and life in Austin.
Start here
New here? These four pieces offer a way into the writing: what shapes the church, how we lead, and how faith takes form in community. Begin with the recent essays, then explore the earlier work that helped shape those questions.
The church and the Spirit · 2026
The Organizing Principle of the Church
Start with a recent reflection on how spiritual gifts shape the church, and why I’m revisiting an old conviction about mission.
Leadership in practice · 2026
Leadership and Administration
Why leading people and bringing order to the work are gifts to recognize and steward, and what gets lost when we treat them only as skills.
Community and mission · 2013
What is a Missional Community? – Definition
A short introduction to the definition we used at The Austin Stone, and why a community of Christians is essential to a faithful witness.
Leading through change · 2013
Transitioning Your Church to Missional Communities
The opening of a practical series on our transition at The Austin Stone, with lessons about patience, learning, and the time real change takes.
For sustained explorations of a topic, browse the Selected Series.
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Missional community · Leadership · Christianity · Church · Personal · Austin Stone · Discipleship · Theology
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Great Vision Creates Liminality
I enjoyed reading these thoughts from Alan Hirsch on the power of future vision to shape the present. Using his language, a bold future vision contributes to liminality, or an out of balance state, which in…
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unChristian 3
Working on Chapter Three right now, which is titled “Hypocritical”. The basic premise is that the common perception of Christians is that we are two-faced and have double standards. Simply put, we do not practice what…
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unChristian 2
Chapter 2 presents some of the research findings about the perceptions of outsiders toward believers (the terms “evangelicals” and “born again Christians” are used), and breaks down the rest of the book on the lines of…
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unChristian 1
Just started reading through the book unChristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons in anticipation of the Q conference here in Austin in April. Here are my thoughts from Chapter 1: “We are not responsible for…
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Merry Texas Christmas Y’all
We’ve had a lot of fun this Christmas, in spite of me having an ear infection and our dog fighting a bout of kennel cough. We haven’t done much, but it has been great having chill…
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Parenting is a Leadership Incubator
Tonight I was forced to make a decision with GTB: Teach him to obey his earthly father as he would his heavenly Father, and simply eat the food in front of him because he was asked…
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Relevant
A student from The Austin Stone has a story featured on the front page of relevantmagazine.com with his article “Poetry That Slams Through Barriers“. Clay Robison is a senior journalism student (by way of Chemical Engineering…he’s…
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christmas shopping
out shopping and running errands, and it is crazy. i guess there are more procrastinators like me in the world than i thought.
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Working Together
Some campus ministers have been working toward a unified strategy in reaching UT’s campus. Collaborative work amongst college ministries tends toward the abstract and non-committal variety, but God has been stirring to move the various directors…
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When Peace Like a River
There is something uncomfortable about silence and free time when you are used to busyness. It’s like a shock to your system when you suddenly realize you can’t even remember how to have a deep thought. …