I have been wanting to write for a long time. While I don’t fancy myself a “writer,” many people over the years have encouraged me to take the time to share through the written word some of my ideas, reflections, and experiences.

I have entitled the blog, “In Face of Mystery” because those words describe perfectly the approach I try to bring to my encounters with those I meet on my path (I stole the name from the title of the theological magnum opus of Gordon Kaufman, Jr., one of my divinity school teachers). For many years, I was a man on the move in search of answers. There was little room in my world for mystery, ambiguity, or what the Zen masters call the “don’t know mind.”

I devoured books, shredded ideas, and inhaled systems and ideologies as if there were no end to my appetite for “truth.” For me, however, my crusade to be “right” and “know” everything ended in spiritual exhaustion, moral bankruptcy, emotional burn-out, and near ruin.I learned the hard way that many of the things I clung on to – whether theological concepts, political causes, substances, activities, or spiritual practices – had more to do with my ego-driven projections than the mystery of the Love in which we live, move, and have our being.

After two decades of restless searching – and causing tremendous pain to the ones I love the most – I am reaching a place in my journey where the focus of my life has become connecting with the Divine Mystery, one joyous breath at a time.

The world looks very different to me today, and I have many teachers, friends, and loved ones to thank for helping give me a new set of eyes with which to see the world in all of its comedy, tragedy, complexity, beauty, and grace. So this blog is my own little “experiment in truth” – albeit a very different kind of truth than I used to pursue in ideas, ideologies, and systems. The truth I experience now is one of God made flesh and dwelling among us as the weakest, most vulnerable, and marginalized members of our human family. In my writing I hope to share with you some of my musings as one who is trying to live as a follower of the Jesus Way. I feel rusty as I begin this venture. Bear with me. Pray for me. Struggle with me. Thanks for being here.