Posts by parkejladd
Dentistry From The Heart in Kokomo: Smile Portraits
For the past five years, dentists in Kokomo, Indiana, have been partnering with Dentistry From The Heart to give away free dental care to hundreds of local residents. Eager patients, having camped out the night before, were treated throughout the day. A multitude of dentists, hygienists, assistants, office administrators and local volunteers worked tirelessly to welcome and care for those...
Read MoreHow to Criticize the Church and Still Be Considered Cool
Criticism is one’s ability to complain about anything not personally appealing by wrapping harsh, hyper-emotional rants into slick, counter-cultural, spine tingling rhetoric. Criticism is perceived as–for lack of a better word–edgy. To criticize is to stand in opposition, to evoke a seemingly preeminent attitude against the establishment. And where we stand in opposition is where...
Read MoreReligious Christianity Is Like Transactional Sex
The religious pursuit of Christian domestication is not what Jesus died for. The book of Acts regularly identifies scholars and gurus of the law; religious lab rats of the day spinning round and round on self-invented wheels of spiritual disconnect. Religious advocates of self-centered irrelevancy based their lives on comfortable yet mendacious realities. Contradictorily, the apostles lives were...
Read MoreHow to Fake Friendships With Church Newcomers and Still Keep Your Real Friends
Let’s face it, there are people in our lives whom we consider to be our friends, and then there are people we don’t care about. We maintain and regulate our few, coagulated homies like Mr. Rogers used to maintain his golden, button-up sweater and blue suede shoes–daily and exclusively–the same, basic outfit every single show. Walking into a church for the first time on a Sunday...
Read MoreThe Threat of Generosity
Talk of generosity is on the rise. All the indie kids are singing about it in their basements. Like Donald Trump on a good day, we can’t spend our generosity quickly enough. We’ve more generosity than we know what to do with. Generosity lining our pockets, spilling from our cars; we’re up to our ears in the stuff. We’re saturated. Our cups runneth over. Generosity here, there,...
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