Our family just returned from a fall break trip to the beach. It was good to get away and relax for a few days. Of the many hats I get to wear – minister, pastor, preacher, counselor, professor – the most important roles that I have are that of husband and father. On the trip, I started reading an insightful new book by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks titled Morality: Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times. Sacks is a well-known British rabbi and a public intellectual. In the fourth chapter, he talks about......

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My undergraduate course this fall at Vanderbilt is called “Faith, Politics, and Polarization in American culture.” We are closely studying the research of NYU’s Jonathan Haidt and Harvard’s Arthur Brooks. Haidt is a social psychologist who has done significant research on morality and the basic moral foundations of liberals and conservatives. In his book The Righteous Mind, Haidt defines moral systems in the following way: “Interlocking sets of values, virtues, norms, practices, identities, institutions, technologies, and evolved psychological mechanisms that work together to suppress or regulate self-interest and make cooperative societies possible.”......

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I recently sat with a heartbroken family who tragically lost their husband/father to suicide. It came out of the blue – no hints, no warnings, no signs whatsoever. I was there because I lived through the same thing years ago with my own mother. The only difference was, we knew she was sick and had done everything in our power to help. This family didn’t have that chance. There is comfort, I believe, in talking to others who have been through similar tragedies in their own life. We don’t suffer alone. We......

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I want to continue to encourage all of you to remain engaged in the life of the church during this time. We are working very hard to carry on the mission and ministries at Woodmont during this pandemic. Lots of exciting things are happening. We are thinking outside the box. Before Covid-19 started, secularization was well underway in America. For years, church attendance has been declining, especially outside of the Bible belt. Younger generations do not seem to be as interested in organized religion as their parents and grandparents. Statistics show that......

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I invite you to join us Wednesday nights for our Racial Reconciliation conversations.  Here is the Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/96103564378. This series is being sponsored by Woodmont’s Task Force for Racial Reconciliation as an educational opportunity. We hope these conversations will be meaningful and beneficial. The invite is open to friends and neighbors as well. Anne Marie Farmer (our Connections Director) and I are proposing a new small group concept for this fall called “5 at 5.” We are encouraging Woodmont members to gather on porches and patios outside in small groups of......

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This Sunday, August 23rd, is Homecoming Sunday. Obviously things look different this year because of the ongoing pandemic. We will not be packed into the building, pancakes will not be served, and the Kids Commons will not be overflowing with children running around. But I want to challenge everybody to reengage and recommit as summer winds down.  We are now offering three weekly services on Sundays: Online available at 7 am, Drive in at 9 am, and a new socially distant sanctuary service at 10:30 a.m. (RSVP on website). Also, a new monthly worship service geared......

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Life is still very different in so many ways. The virus has not gone away. Many kids are not back in school and are doing distance learning. It has taken its toll on marriages, families, mental health, and businesses. Recently, Arthur Brooks wrote an article in The Atlantic where he distinguishes between happiness and success and warns about what psychologists refer to as life’s “hedonic treadmill,” where satisfaction is never attained as human beings constantly race towards the next goal. Brooks says, “American culture valorizes overwork, which makes it easy to slip......

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