From “Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation” by Steven Johnson A metropolis shares one key characteristic with the Web: both environments are dense, liquid networks where information easily flows along multiple unpredictable paths. Those interconnections nurture great ideas, because most great ideas come into the world half-baked, more hunch than revelation. […]

From “Listening to Your Life: Daily Meditations with Frederick Buechner” by Frederick Buechner At its heart most theology, like most fiction, is essentially autobiography. Aquinas, Calvin, Barth, Tillich, working out their systems in their own ways and in their own language, are all telling us the stories of their lives, and if you press them

From “The Discipline of Inspiration: The Mysterious Encounter with God at the Heart of Creativity” by Carey Wallace To explain inspiration as a product of the unconscious holds some obvious attractions for an artist.  First, it’s wonderfully flattering. Under this theory, an artist is no longer the victim or devotee of a mysterious external force.

From “Wired to Lead: Being the Leader the Church Didn’t Think You Could Be” by Suzanne Nadell If you feel as if you are on the fringes, or if you are frightened by the idea of opening up opportunities to everyone, maybe you are too far from the margins. Maybe you are living inside your

From “The Language of the Soul: Meeting God in the Longings of Our Hearts” by Jeff Crosby  A person who has wrestled as much as and as deeply as anyone I know with questions of vocation and occupation is Steven Garber. He founded a not-for-profit called the Washington Institute for Faith, Vocation and Culture, designed

From “Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life” by Richard Rohr This pattern of resistance is so clear and even so defeating for Jesus that he makes what sounds like one of his most unkind statements: ”Do not give to dogs what is holy, or throw your pearls before swine. They will

From “Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation” by Parker J. Palmer A third shadow common among leaders is “functional atheism,” the belief that ultimate responsibility for everything rests with us. This is the unconscious, unexamined conviction that if anything decent is going to happen here, we are the ones who must

From “Trust the Whisper: How Answering Quiet Callings Inspires Extraordinary Stories of Ordinary Grace“ by Kathy Izard From Denver Moore to Livvi and all the God Dots in between, each story I’ve shared in this book is evidence to me of a greater weave in the world. As I’ve tried to understand how all the

From “What Makes You Come Alive: A Spiritual Walk with Howard Thurman” by Lerita Coleman Brown Vital to the exercise of Inner Authority is the practice of discernment. Discernment is the spiritual practice of decision-making by which we bring decisions into prayer. Spiritual leader Rose Mary Dougherty notes, “The eye of the heart grows accustomed

From “Healing the Heart of Democracy: The Courage to Create a Politics Worthy of the Human Spirit” by Parker J. Palmer  As I listen in on private and public conversations about the problems of American democracy, I’m struck time and again by how often our political talk is about people who aren’t in the room.