It feels like midnight is falling on the world.

I cannot bear to look at what is happening in places like Aleppo.

And I cannot see eye-to-eye with half of my fellow Americans who cast a different vote than I did on November 8.

Every time I spend five minutes on my news feed or social media, my vision dims. My mind goes dark. A shadow falls across everything I love.

In the darkness, next to my little boy’s bed, I sing Christmas carols to him as he falls asleep. My favorite carol to sing to him this year is ‘It Came Upon a Midnight Clear.’ It reminds me that the angels sing their announcement of “peace on earth and goodwill to all” at “midnight.” It is in a dark hour that the light of heaven shines forth.

Everyone knows the first verse. The second and third verses, however, strike a chord with me this year. These words were written 167 years ago during a season of similar division...

The Christmas lights are brighter on a dark and dreary day.

The warmth of home is cozier when it’s cold outside.

Hot chocolate tastes better when you come in from shoveling snow.

Family is made dearer by difficulty, distance, and loss.

We plead with God to take away cold and darkness, hardship and loss.

What if these are God’s gifts to make life lighter, sweeter, warmer?

Grace and peace.

Do make sure you wake up before anyone can make demands on your time. If the kids wake up at 7 o'clock, make sure you’re awake at 6:30.

Do not look at your phone. DO NOT LOOK AT YOUR PHONE.

Do not get online to look at email, the news, or social media.

DO NOT GET ONLINE TO LOOK AT THIS STUFF.

Do not turn on the TV. DO NOT TURN ON THE TV.

Do make a cup of coffee if that’s your thing. Smell the coffee brewing. Listen to it bubble and drip. Feel the warm mug in your hand. Savor that first hot sip of “Good-morning.”

Then sit down in the calmest, quietest place you know in your home. Take out some paper and a pen. Start writing all the things that happened the day before for which you are thankful.

When the page is full of thanks, turn it over. Write down the names of some people in your life and, as you do, whisper a prayer of blessing over them.

Now you’re ready to face the...

A default is a “pre-selected option.”

It is what the system gives you when you don’t specify an alternative.

The popular culture–that is to say, the culture in which you live–has its default definitions for:

Freedom.

Happiness.

Love.

Power.

Security.

Success.

Wealth.

The essential practice of Christianity is to daily challenge those cultural defaults…and replace them with alternatives that are beautiful, humane, true to life.

God can reveal those alternatives to you.

But only you can choose them.

Most Christians are aware that it is their season of Advent.

That is to say, it is the season when Christians prepare and “wait” for the arrival of the Christ.

It is the season when Christians lean in to listen for messages from God.

Us Christians would do well to remember this:

We use the expression, “That guy is talking through his ass.”

God is the only one who has ever actually done it (Numbers 22.21-39).

In the Gospel of Luke, God first sends an angel to a priest (Luke 1.5-25). A priest is a professional intermediary between God and humanity. This priest has one job…and he blows it. He fails to receive the message of God and therefore God takes away his ability to speak the message to the people.

From that point on, God chooses to speak to and through people who polite folks could only describe as unacceptable, unfit, unqualified, and unusual: An old woman, a pregnant...

I barely remember my wedding (it could be that I didn’t get a bite to eat at my own reception).

I do remember in fine detail how my wife and I used to cuddle and talk in bed for hours on Saturday mornings.

I can’t recall a single thing I got for Christmas last year. Sorry, everybody.

I can tell you what it feels like every time my four-year old kisses my cheek.

I don’t remember much about those big New Year’s Eve parties we used to throw for 100 or more people. They cost hundreds of dollars, took weeks to plan, and we didn’t get home until 3 a.m.

I do remember the friends who came from out of town for those parties. I remember how we would sit around the kitchen table and visit for hours the next day.

I don’t remember much about the first and second birthday parties we threw for my son. There were big expenses, big stress, and big work. And he seemed bored by it all.

Oh...

In marriage, it is impossible to win a fight.

If you are fighting, both of you already lost at the start.

In marriage, you will have many disagreements.

You will cajole and compromise, debate and discuss, negotiate and re-negotiate. Great partners do these things well.

Put another way, great partners know how to dance together.

Dancing together is creative tension in a safe embrace.

Dancing together is being different while also being the same.

Dancing together is beautiful to behold and lovely to experience.

What does it take to dance this way?

You want to be together more than you want to be right.

It’s a dance; not a heavyweight prize fight.

If it is a great marriage you want, then learn to dance you must.

And so it goes with a great family, a great friendship, a great house of worship, a great workplace.

Or a great democracy.

All fighters lose.

All...

Choosing Christianity is choosing the short end of the stick.

On purpose.

In a world that demands fairness, you choose what is unfair to yourself.

In a world that defends privileges and demands rights, you give them up.

In a world that sues for justice, you let your perpetrators off the hook.

The story of Jesus Christ is no comfort if you’re looking to make a case for what you think you deserve. The founder and namesake of Christianity gave away what little he had and made no effort to get more.

You can do no better if you wish to associate with him.

The cheerful choice to give up what we have and what we are owed is what makes us Christian in this world.

It is our choice to forgive, show mercy, and practice grace that is the last hope of humanity. Choosing the short end of the stick is precisely what Jesus Christ commissioned us to do. It is precisely what it means to be...

My office is a short walk from the biggest, most upscale shopping mall in Michigan. Once in awhile, I’ll take a break and a walk around the mall.

For most of my life, a place like a shopping mall inspired my aspirations. I would window-shop and, as I did, vow that I would someday be rich enough to buy whatever I wanted.

And then I would be happy. Someday.

Last week, I took an afternoon walk around the mall and what I felt there surprised me: Boredom. Exhaustion. Fear. Yearning.

Let me tell you about each of those feelings.

Boredom. As I’m getting into my forties, new stuff doesn’t seem that new to me anymore. I’ve been going to the mall for decades now and the more things change the more they stay the same. All the new stuff that promises to change things…doesn’t change anything. How much is that new smartphone really going to change my life? And they’ll come out with an even...

Twenty-sixteen feels like my best year ever.

I haven’t been my best this year. I made some big mistakes. I was a sinner or a slob over a few stretches.

My dad got cancer. Bad cancer. So did my friend, Mary, who is healthful, young, and raising two children in grade school.

My business will not make a profit this year.

I’m struggling (and failing) as much as ever to figure out how to be the husband my wife wants me to be.

We’re still in debt up to our eyeballs and we still own a second home in a bad neighborhood that is $25,000 under water.

I had to live through the 2016 presidential campaign.

How can I say 2016 feels like the best year ever?

It’s this daily discipline (started on January 1) that made all the difference: Each morning, I write down blessings and gifts for which I am thankful. The list has to fill an entire page of my journal before I can move on to the...