Thousands (or more) people are fasting and praying for Sierra Shields.

She is a 30-year old Christian ministry graduate student and a resident of New York City. She disappeared without a trace on January 14.

The church to which I belong cares deeply for Sierra. Her brother is our minister of worship. Many members of our congregation are Sierra’s personal friends or one-time schoolmates at Rochester College.

You could say that praying for Sierra’s safe return is at the top of the “trending” list at church. It was the unofficial theme of our Sunday morning worship gathering this week.

This got me thinking.

The 20 days since Sierra disappeared feel desperate, empty, terrible.

Perhaps because her absence is not something we chose and her return appears to be out of our control.

But what about the people whose absence we could change and whose return is completely within our...

Living life–your best life, your truest life–really comes down to facing your fear.

What frightens you most?

It’s the door to everything you desire most.

Sad, but true: Most people waste their lives avoiding their fears or trying to manage them.

“…the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it.”

Faith is running headlong toward the scariest thing and coming through it with a hope that is out of this world and love that is unstoppable.

“Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life will preserve it.”

Admitting what you fear and owning it is the first step.

My three-year old, Daniel, woke up at 6 a.m. this morning.

That happens to be the middle of my reading/reflection/writing time.

He wanted to watch Disney Junior. I turned on the TV and turned to go back upstairs to my writing corner.

He called out to me: “Dad, I want to sit on your lap. I want you to watch a show with me.”

I didn’t want to watch ‘Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.’ I wanted to write.

On a dime, I headed back to the couch and let Daniel curl up on my lap.

This morning, I wrote. Not on a computer screen or page, but on my son’s heart and in his memory.

Whether or not you consider yourself a writer, you ARE writing every day.

Every person with whom you have contact has a big (or small) part of their personal story that comes from you.

The question is not IF you will write, but HOW and WHAT and for WHOM.

It’s more than nude pictures and sex videos online.

It’s any fake thing that takes the place of the real thing.

It’s spending an hour a day reading sports websites (guilty) instead of going out and living like a champion myself (so hard I’m afraid I might fail).

It’s the empty calories of a big cookie and hot chocolate at 2 p.m. in the afternoon (guilty) instead of eating an apple, drinking some tea, and going for a walk (which would actually make me feel better).

It’s hanging out in my inbox for 90 minutes at a time (guilty) instead of going out and finding new clients face-to-face (afraid they might reject me).

It’s watching an hour of TV with my wife every night (guilty) instead of having deep conversations (might be misunderstanding).

It’s going to church religiously (guilty) instead of giving away all that own to the poor, holding dirty and sick people close to my heart...

Your time is running out and you cannot, cannot, cannot get more.

The things you do to “get more time” (an illusion or an outright lie) may decrease the quality of the time you have left.

It’s the law of diminishing returns. You waste more time trying to find time that is impossible to find because your life on this earth is finite.

Could it be that what you’re doing to “make more time” (either today or at the end of your life) is just a way to avoid doing what you know you should be doing right now?

And what is that?

It’s not doing more chores and working more hours.

Do you want to know what you should be doing with the time you have right now? Ask yourself: What am I afraid to do?

Dance? Paint? Sing? Travel? Write?

Love somebody like I’ve never loved anybody before?

Let someone love me like I’ve never been loved before?

Reconcile with someone who lost my love (or...

Yesterday, I found out my dreams have come true.

I made it to 40.

I’m married to a loving, loyal, and interesting–pardon the expression–MILF. And she’ll eventually forgive me for writing that.

My son is a fantastic little boy with who alternately likes to bodyslam me like a 33-pound WWE wrestler or curl up in my lap like a puppy dog.

Beautiful, connected, educated, influential, popular people want to hang out with me.

I earn a living doing work I love with a growing and profitable company I started myself.

I belong to an excellent church that manages to suit my conservative upbringing and liberal tendencies at the same time.

I own a nice home within walking distance of a trendy little downtown in suburban Detroit.

My Starbucks card automatically reloads itself when the balance drops below $10.

My life is everything I dreamed and hoped and prayed it would be when I was...

It turns out faith is a hell of thing.

When I was young, it was listening to worship music under an open sunroof.

It was a five-finger kind of thing that I could practice on a Friday afternoon.

It was daydreaming about how I would change the world for God while growing handsome, popular, and rich (and having lots of great sex).

It was knowing my prayers were a divine “On Demand” button.

I got older. I lived through some stuff (with more to come, I know).

Faith is darker, edgier, makes less sense.

It’s outreached hands groping the empty space before blind eyes.

It’s clinging to heavenly driftwood in an ocean of hell.

It’s climbing a mountain to get to the moon.

A close friend of many of my friends is missing since last week.

I only know her as an acquaintance. Yet news of her disappearance alarmed me as if I woke in the morning to find that my front door was standing open all night. As a brother, father, husband, and son, I have no difficulty using my imagination to enter the determination and hope, the tension and terror family members and friends feel as they wait for news.

On Sunday, our pastor recruited us to pray around the clock for the woman’s safe return. From the pulpit, he asked for a show of hands from volunteers who committed to pray every hour on the hour for 36 hours. He called out every hour starting at 1 p.m. on Sunday and ending at noon on Monday and waited until someone raised their hand to pray at that exact hour.

I’ve been in church all of my life and never saw anything like that.

Only once in my life do I recall the...

What can we make of the world, what can be made of us if our prayers are:

Conception rather than description?

Doing rather than telling?

Going out rather than ordering in?

Motion rather than inertia?

Energy rather than information?

Abiding rather than asking?

Communion rather than calculus?

Reception rather than transmission?

Navigating by the stars rather than by roadmap?

“I’m waiting for inspiration to strike.”

Why not strike inspiration first?

“I need something to motivate me.”

What are you waiting for? Motivate yourself.

“I just don’t have any good ideas.”

So, start with bad ones and let them lead to good ones. It’s more fun.

“I need to get into the right space before I can get creative.”

Make your creative space–starting inside your own mind.

“I can’t do my best work in these conditions.”

Your best work starts internal. You have a choice.

Your muse is you. Just choose.