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Jeffrey Bilbro, a professor and multi book author, has written an article that offers words of caution to some ideas that are just generally accepted. Our current landscape applauds scalability and metrics, but does not account for how overwhelming these ideas and the problems we seek to solve can become. Bilbro makes some great distinctions while checking our perspectives. All the while defining hope and our responsibilities in the present, which again reminds me that the habits and disciplines of my life matter.

In today’s blog post, I want to encourage you to hit the refresh and restart button this summer. After the past fifteen months, this might be more important this year than any other time in recent years because of covid. Some of us have returned to post covid activity while the rest of us are still transitioning back to normalcy. In case you have not heard it, let me remind you of the quote that made the rounds at the beginning of the lockdown, “In our desire and urgency to return to a normal life, make sure that we are rushing back to things worth returning to.”

Even though we are in the middle of the craziness of May, now is a great time to pause for a few minutes to consider what your summer reading might be.

Photo credit: Tom Hermans

It is hard to believe that almost a third of the year is gone and with it has gone most of our new year’s resolutions. Even if we have failed to execute, we should not give up and every day is a good time to jump start them again. One of mine for the past several years has been the pursuit of beauty.

Today’s blog is by current Orlando Fellow Kerri Shook, who is doing her internship with Second Harvest Food Bank of Central Florida and has the pleasure of working for Amy Lein, the Director of Human Resources. There are a number of overlapping circles here because Amy Lein is both a Gotham Fellow and member of The Collaborative’s Advisory Board. Kerri’s article provides outstanding insight while offering a peek into both her work as a Fellow and lessons learned in real time. Enjoy!

One of the lessons coming out of Covid-19 is the assessment of the stewardship of our lives. In the conversation with Ken Myers his comments regarding renewal are great fodder for how we should think about which things to rush back to when life returns to normal.

Today is the second installment of our audiocast, Feast of Ideas (see previous blog post for the first episode.) The discussion picks up with Ken Myers unpacking the premise he put forward in the first audiocast that the renewal of theology and the renewal of the church are fundamental to all other renewals.

This Feast of Ideas audiocast is a three-part series and is made possible by the joint effort of Made to Flourish and The Collaborative. Today we are publishing the first installment with Case Thorp and Justin Holcomb as the co-hosts for this one as well as the second and third installments. Their commentary ensures that we don’t miss anything.

As we come to the end of the first month of 2021, it may be a good time to reflect more intentionally and without the distraction of the holidays. Today’s article is timeless except for the fact that it is looking back at the year of 2020. Wait! Don’t stop reading. If you are like me, I am weary of rehearsing the challenges of this past year. However, Philip Yancey in the article for today’s blog, reviews 2020 in a manner that moves our hearts and minds from all the Why God this? and Why God that? to responses of compassion.

With the dawning of any new year, there is a sense that we get to start over with a clean slate. As we begin again, there are important lessons we should have learned from 2020. It is not enough to just remember them, but rather we need to find ways to incorporate them into our lives.