Randall J. Greene

This is the story of how I became the Keeper of the Flame, and how the world became the Keeper of the Flame, and how the fire – inside me – changed me.

I never saw myself as a storyteller. I saw myself as a listener, a reader, a lover of stories, not a teller of them.

We often seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding that Scripture - Jesus and Paul and the prophets - are guiding us toward a particular destination, an afterlife. But the more I read and study Scripture, the more I think that's wrong.

The biblical story of the creation of the world is not one of defining binaries, but of recognizing the beauty inherent in each of us.

There's one really great thing about this writers strike.

God's holiness and justness are products of God's love. They don't exist as independent characteristics, creating conflicts in God's character. Holiness and justice are outflows of God's nature, which is love.

A Good Friday meditation on why Jesus suffered the cross.

I exist at the intersection of three groups that are really bad at expressing their feelings. I’ve spent a lot of time in therapy working through this problem, and I want to share what that intersection has looked like in my life.

Words, if you look at them, are a binary of black and white, ink on a page. But when we listen to them, when we see them for what they mean, they shine.

Continually I find myself unable to capture the details in my imagination as words on a page. It's an awful cycle. I love it.

I was fortunate to have three grandpas in my life. It’s strange having all three of them gone. An entire generation of men in my lineage has passed. I feel the weight of it, as if a mantle has been passed to my father, and the mantle he wore has been passed to me.

Despite what Paul says, I don’t think God desires us to be slaves of God.

When I asked ChatGPT to write a sonnet about socks, it did! And a surprisingly coherent one, too. But then I wanted to see if I could take what it created and turn it into something new.

Yesterday I said I was starting something new: a “web log” or “blog” for short. That was a joke, because blogs have been around for a long time now. What I actually mean is that I’m going back to something old.

So here I am. It’s the second day of January. I’m starting something new. I’m calling it a “web log” or “blog” for short. (It's okay to laugh, that was a joke.)

A very short story about a man longing to return to his past.

A verse reflecting on myself and the things most important to me.

I want to tell stories of majesty and grandeur, but it's far more important to me that my stories be honest, true, and those majestic stories aren't mine to share.

When people criticize the idea of online church, they often talk about how online worship services feel disembodied, disconnected from the physical experience of community. Is there another, better way for us to think about online church?

We, the body of Christ, cannot content ourselves to sit back and watch as these new media become the message without us; the world needs God’s story of hope and humanity to be woven into the fabric of its life, everywhere that life is found.

Part of the challenges to doing church online is in actively managing conflict, protecting privacy, encouraging participation in local communities, and gather together in-person as a church body for sacraments and celebrations.

Church culture is dramatically different than what we see happening on social media, and members entering an online church for the first time will bring their assumptions about social media into this new context. How might we bring people into this posture of cruciformity and reconciliation, when that posture is so foreign to today’s online experiences?

How can we translate Paul's concept of the church into an online context? How can we match his understanding of community, mission, and service with the technological tools and resources we have available to us today?

Let us consider how Paul structured worship and leadership in the Corinthian church, as well as how he handled conflict within the church body to maintain growth and faithfulness.