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Veritas

by Tyler Dirks

A guy named Solomon stopped by my office last week. Solomon is from Nigeria, and he’s currently enrolled at Harvard Divinity School (45 Francis Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138). We got to talking about the allure and deceit of consumerism, palatability, aggressive appeasement, and salesmanship. We spent a lot of time talking about the emphasis of […]

2023 Sermon Series (Blurb)

by Tyler Dirks

The book of Judges reads like a series of bizarre dreams. The array of unusual stories is unparalleled. It is a saga of completely off-the-wall, utterly unexpected and shocking events. And the deeper you go into the narrative the more you realize that this dream is actually a nightmare. You come to find that the […]

יִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל*repost

by Tyler Dirks

Let’s think about the motion picture Nacho Libre. The film is loosely based on the story of Fray Tormenta (“Friar Storm”, a.k.a. Rev. Sergio Gutiérrez Benítez), a real-life Mexican Catholic priest who had a 23-year career as a masked luchador and competed in order to support the orphanage he directed. There are a few things […]

Excerpts From The Gospel of Mark

by Tyler Dirks

I briskly traversed through the Gospel of Mark this morning. I normally progress ploddingly through the Γέγραπται, but sometimes it’s helpful to conduct a sprightly trot through a gospel in order to obtain a better sense of the surplus and sundry instances of Jesus offending people. It is absolutely vital that we come to grips […]

Ruth Limerick

by Tyler Dirks

Boaz was taken Ruth brought home the bacon The optics were bad Naomi was sad From such scandal God did David maken

Miraculous Ordinary Help

by Tyler Dirks

Once upon a time, Eugene was asked a question about “spiritual direction.” And here’s how he replied: You seem disappointed that I am not more responsive to your interest in “spiritual direction”. Actually, I am more than a little ambivalent about the term, particularly in the ways it is being used so loosely without any […]

What’s Next for ECPC (2021)?

by Tyler Dirks

The best thing about ECPC has always been fellowship (with God, and with one another). The foundation, framework, and wholistic flavoring of our fellowship with God is found in simply sitting on the floor at Jesus’ feet and listening to Him tell stories (Luke 10:39, 42). And our shared obsession with the stories of Jesus […]

No Christian Is An Only Child

by Tyler Dirks

“Whether we like it or not, the moment we confess Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior we are at the same time a member of the church. Even if we do not permit our name to be placed on a church roll, or decline to identify ourselves with a particular congregation. Even if we […]

Introverts & Extroverts [Helpful Thoughts From Jessica]

by Tyler Dirks

I am an introvert. Some of my best friends are extroverts. Of course God has Authored our community in His own image (diverse yet not divided, united but not uniform), and therefore we are a blend of of sundry branches united in by a common trunk (i.e. Christ Crucified …the epic story of God’s seemingly […]

Racial Reconciliation

by Tyler Dirks

Yesterday I studied the Bible with a man who doesn’t (physically) look like me. We are both of the same race (the human race), but our ethnicity is different. Also, our life experiences and cultures are a bit different. As we talked about what we see God saying to us in Scripture – our interpretations […]