1. There are life-saving wellsprings of the gospel I would have never tasted if I had not left vocational ministry and entered the business world.
2. Roger Angell says that baseball is sport about losing. The best hitters only get a hit 1/3 of the time. Most teams are happy to win just above half their games in a season. You lose? There’s always tomorrow. Maybe that’s why it mirrors life so well. Dealing with loss over a long season.
3. “Ham is the taste of life.” – 6 yr old
4. Mississippi John Hurt
5. The lens through which we see the world wil color the world we are trying to make our way through. Sounds obvious till you realize what lens you are wearing.
6. Our shepherds are more vital than our politicians.
7. There is a second lawsuit coming against SGM and its leaders. When it comes there will be no statute of limitations. There will be sworn testimony. This is being called the largest child sex abuse scandal in evangelicalism and the evangelical elite remain silent except for their support of CJ Mahaney.
8. I now understand how my Dad felt when he would watch me play baseball, having played and loved the game himself.
9. Your arguing about politicians and who is better is like arguing about which poison to ingest.
10. It dawned on me that I’ve not a whole lot of vocational ambition. My ambition? To spend as many moments with Bethany as I can before one of us goes on ahead. And then pick it up again later…
Echoes and Stars 
#7 – I just stumbled on this story about a month ago – at that time I’d never even heard of CJ Mahaney. So disturbing…
9. is pertinent for me lately reading Jacques Ellul on propaganda. He was writing about political propaganda but it’s been inescapable for me that what he was describing about political propaganda machines describes megachuches on the one hand, and the balkanization of American politics on the internet on the other hand.
Reading Ellul describe the work of a propagandist provided a startlingly clear framework in which to interpret somebody who left Seattle, not as a pastor/shepherd but as a propagandist.
Amen on #10. I am now retired and look forward to as much time as I can have with my dear wife Mary.
Grew up with my dad having a Guild acoustic guitar similar to the one pictured. Thanks Matt!