Author

I just deleted the extensive and nearly invasive profile I had written for myself and posted here. That probably happened because I don’t think that a person can be defined as a list of facts, and that I know that I am different than any cyber profile could indicate. I feel like I have, in some sense, deconstructed myself by erasing that former explanation of the entity I call “me.” Yes, this a semi postmodern concept of language and identity and self. Long and short of it is, I change and am unknown to myself to the degree that I cannot begin to present myself to you because you will know me as a different person than I would know myself as. So I’m going to give a brief bio, because I think that personhood can only be found in story, and self-stories are called memories. But I will only include the things that have shaped me the most, and let you discern who I am based upon those influences and interpreted through my writing as my thought processes develop and are shared in this forum.

I was born in Canada and have lived in five different regions.

My dad and hero has been a pastor most of my life, and my mom focused on raising me and my three brothers.

Tennessee is where I call home because my heritage and most consistent memories are there.

My three younger brothers teach me more than I teach them, they are my best friends.

I love the outdoors, reading, poetry, choral music; cycling, Autumn, denim, and coffee; hiking, fishing, camping, playing guitar, depth, and simplicity.

I believe that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. I believe that there is one seamless narrative of Scripture. I believe that those who follow Yeshua are called to live lives of no compromise, though we fail. I believe God is perfectly sovereign over all reality.

I’ve been to Israel twice on study trips. I did a worship internship in a multi-ethnic church in Toronto. I’ve been west of the Mississippi these four times and don’t expect to go back east.

I have a passion for finding a cohesive philo-theopoetic that paints all of reality as a God-glorifying story.

The authors with greatest influences on me have been: Wendell Berry, Henry David Thoreau, Bill McKibben, John Piper, C.S. Lewis, Louis L’Amour, Cornell West, David Foster Wallace, Kenneth Rexroth, Gary Snyder, Fyodor Dostoevsky, William Faulkner, Paul Auster.

Specific books: Torah, Romans, Walden, The Silmarillion, Blue Like Jazz, Infinite Jest, Hope on a Tightrope, Deep Economy, The Way of Ignorance, Desiring God, The Way I Was Made, and Chosen By God.

As a musician, there have also been a few artists who have contributed to the development of my own music: James Taylor, Keith Green, Bob Dylan, Jack Johnson, Johnny Cash, Matt Redman.

My identity must be found, though, in the fact that I am known by God. And He never changes. He knows who I truly am. I cannot truly change because nothing can change in Him, and definitely not His understanding of me. So I must be concrete, somewhere, somehow, I think, maybe. Because I have faith in Him, and though the “me” that you and I know is always changing and deceitful, the person that He knows does not because He grants it Being.

Shalom.