I suffer from foreboding joy as a Minnesota Twins fan. I’m still a devoted fan. I still watch on average 100 games a season. But as this season ends, it will be the fourth season in a row that we finish at the bottom of the AL Central and September baseball looks like amateur baseball. I had some hope back in April only to finish in September with distaste. This isn’t the only bad run of Twins baseball. We’ve had this back in the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s. I’ve lived through this before. I’ve experienced the joy of our many division championships and two great World Series with the 1991 World Series declared as one of the best of all time. But this joy is tempered because we always seem to have gutter baseball before the exciting wins. I’m in gutter baseball season.

My September Twins got a rare win last night. And against the now-division-leading Detroit Tigers. One of our young and future pitchers had a game to remember. After two bad opening innings, and he would have been pulled except the team needed him to pitch longer to save the tired and injured bullpen, Kyle Gibson pulled it together and got a win.

I lead you through all this misery to give you this brilliant insight from Kyle Gibson. These are words to define your life with bravery. Continue reading →

Halloween and the Church has gone through many seasons of change. First it was okay to trick-or-treat. Then it was dangerous. Then it was giving the devil extra glory. Then we created the Fall Fest so kids could dress up and get their candy and stay safe. First it was Bible costumes only at those Fall Fests. Now any costume usually passes. Halloween has been made safe and alternative by the church.

Over ten years ago I began speaking often about a “Wild Frontier thought” I had about Halloween. Why on the one night of the year that the neighbors are coming to your door, is your house darkened because you are at your church? This is the night you get to be neighborly and appreciated as a neighbor. Be home. Be present. Do it up. Talk to your neighbors. Get to know their names. And then continue talking to your neighbors post-Halloween. Call them by name and have real conversations with them. Love your neighbors! (Have you heard that before?)

This upcoming year Halloween falls on a Friday night. No school the next morning for the kids. (To which the teachers rejoice because they will not have sugar-hyped kids the next day for class.) Stay home and be a neighbor. And with this early notification, plan something special. Continue reading →