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The Habit Podcast is a series of conversations with writers about writing, hosted by Jonathan Rogers. This week, Jonathan Rogers interviews Jen Pollock Michel, author of Surprised by Paradox: The Promise of “And” in an Either-Or World. Jen Pollock Michel is the author of three books, most recently Surprised By Paradox: The Promise of And in an Either-Or World. In this episode, Jonathan and Jen discuss the role of paradox in writing, the difference between either-or and both-and, and the difference between mystery and paradox. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 8 of The Habit Podcast. Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.

As Valentine’s Day came closing in, Jonathan Rogers sent out the following letter on The Habit Weekly. In August of 1988 I went to a watermelon social on the back porch of Furman University’s dining hall. I was more or less minding my own business when across the way I saw a girl who was so beautiful I could hardly believe she existed in the same world where I lived and moved and had my being. I don’t even know how to talk about this without sounding like the worst sort of Hallmark card, so I’ll spare you. I didn’t speak to the aforementioned girl at the watermelon social, but I spoke to her eventually, and eventually we got married and raised six children together. That face that was such a marvel to me in August of 1988 is now more familiar to me than my own face. But every now and then, when we arrive separately at a party or a school event or church, I’ll catch a glimpse of my wife from across the room, and I’m astonished all over again. I’m that nineteen-year-old boy, and she’s that eighteen-year-old girl. The amazement that such a creature exists at all is compounded by the amazement that she’s the most familiar thing in the world to me. Wendell Berry knows what I’m talking about: Sometimes hidden from me in daily custom and in trust, so that I live by you unaware as by the beating of my heart, Suddenly you flare in my sight, a wild rose looming at the edge of thicket, grace and light where yesterday was only shade, and once again I am blessed, choosing again what I chose before. —”The Wild Rose” Valentine’s Day is just three days away. It’s time to get serious about those love letters and love poems. I offer the same advice I gave this time last year and the year before that: Don’t try too hard to put your feelings into words. All those things you feel about your beloved—those are the least unique thing about your relationship with that person. If you don’t believe it, go read the greeting cards at the grocery store. Your feelings, which seem utterly unique when you’re feeling them, are so common that the nice people at Hallmark and American Greetings make a good living selling them at three dollars a pop. If you want to write a Valentine that gets results, start with memory, not emotion. If you give an account of a memory that you and your beloved share, some little scene from your story, you can hardly help but be original and intimate. Be specific. Be concrete. The emotion will take care of itself. If you need a little extra direction, here’s a writing prompt for your Valentine: Wendell Berry writes, “I am blessed and choose again/that which I chose before.” What has caused you to choose your beloved* again? Write about that. *If you aren’t in a long-term romantic relationship, that’s all right. You love somebody, and that love is a choice. Write that person a Valentine. ——————— I’ll be honest, I usually skip Valentine’s Day posts. But, I mean, it’s Jonathan Rogers, so this one I read. The advice he gives is beautiful, and the story more so (having encountered his amazing wife, I can support that not a bit of it is embellished). As is Jonathan’s way, he ended the message with a call to write. As is my way, I completely ignored what he wanted me to write about (I can be cantankerous like that). Somewhere between the lines, the message struck me with what it had to say about love’s connection to memory, and I took about a week wrestling with that connection to offer a response. At the end of every episode of The Habit Podcast, Jonathan asks his guests, “Who are the writers who make you want to write?” Though he might never forgive me for ignoring his actual prompt—and of course it’s unwise to invoke the wrath of one so closely aligned with the alligators—I hope it may assuage him to know that he’s on my list. Love Is This He said love resides in memory. I suppose it can exist in afterglows, in glass-pressed pictures tinted rose, and how the heart holds the mark of a strike far longer than our simple skin, how it can keep a moment sinking in. I guess the scents and touches linger after. The tumbling of your laughter across the grass, the past—fast-fading flash of light— the weight of you inside my arms, our foreheads pressed together, how you never shrank from adoration or ever met my kiss with indignation. I suppose it has some merit, all the dreams we stuff inside each other, straining seams and scribble-scripting words into the reams of all our stories, to make some sense of things that fail and fall from present tense. I guess love cares for memories, if even one can carry them until the road is done, can bear them underneath the heat, and run the race—perhaps alone. Too often it all falls to one to own. But I have watched how memory gathers rust, how time can grind its finer points to dust, and leave it brittle under winter’s gust. And I think more, by now, that love is this: the thing soft-sighing when the memories twist and decompose to sorrow, “Yet, you will find me here again tomorrow.”

Most of the light in the universe is invisible to the human eye. We see an estimated .0035% of the electromagnetic spectrum, and that estimate is based on what we can measure with current information and technology. The eye takes in a tiny fraction of what is real and present. Or, stated differently, the scope of what we cannot see is vast. In the days before Jesus’ earthly ministry began, John the Baptist preached a message of repentance. Though the concept of repentance has gotten tangled up with penance, John’s message was not about a return to morality or a need for sinless perfection. (The work of redemption begins and ends with God.) What John preached was the need for a shift in perspective, for a radical change of mind. The scope of what we cannot see is vast. Helena Sorensen God’s covenant people believed that they understood what God needed and wanted. They believed they understood what they needed and wanted. John asked them to prepare themselves for a shockwave. In the work of Christ, everything would be changed; all history would spin on a new axis. John asked for an acknowledgement of their limited vision. He asked them to open their hearts and minds. Eye had not seen. Ear had not heard. But the Spirit was making ready to reveal it through the Son. The information presented to us in this narrow column of visible light is heartbreaking. Is it possible to take a hard look at the world without quailing? But we don’t stop there. We make predictions based on our limited sight and react accordingly, in fear. Creation groans with the longing of billions of souls who cannot see beyond the frame of their own suffering. As we enter the season of Lent, I am asking for an open heart and an open mind. I am seeking the renewal of hope that comes with a strengthened imagination. I am looking hard for what is happening just beyond the reach of my eyes. Begin the song exactly where you are, For where you are contains where you have been And holds the vision of your final sphere. And do not fear the memory of sin; There is a light that heals, and, where it falls, Transfigures and redeems the darkest stain Into translucent colour. Loose the veils And draw the curtains back, unbar the doors, Of that dread threshold where your spirit fails, The hopeless gate that holds in all the fears That haunt your shadowed city, fling it wide And open to the light that finds, and fares Through the dark pathways where you run and hide, Through all the alleys of your riddled heart, As pierced and open as his wounded side. Open the map to him and make a start, And down the dizzy spirals, through the dark, his light will go before you. Let him chart And name and heal. Expose the hidden ache To him, the stinging fires and smoke that blind Your judgement, carry you away, the mirk And muted gloom in which you cannot find The love that you once thought worth dying for. Call him to all you cannot call to mind. He comes to harrow Hell and now to your Well-guarded fortress let his love descend. The icy ego at your frozen core Can hear his call at last. Will you respond? —”Through the Gate,” Malcolm Guite Helena has a new book coming out this spring called The Door on Half-Bald Hill. This poem was taken from Malcolm Guite’s Lenten book of poems, The Word in the Wilderness. Click here to view it in the Rabbit Room Store.

Our March 17th Local Show is one week away, and we would be remiss not to take this opportunity to introduce you to the inimitable Joseph Bradshaw. A Joseph Bradshaw song is dense as a Steinbeck novel, light as a Wes Anderson film, shocking as a Flannery O’Connor short story, and smooth as Hank Williams himself. He assumes intelligence in his listeners, weaving in equal parts drama and dry humor to communicate immersive, personal narratives that strike at the vulnerable heart of the human condition. Come on out to the Local Show on March 17th to hear for yourself.

Twelve years ago this month, Waterbrook Press released On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, Book 1 of Andrew Peterson’s Wingfeather Saga. I counted it a privilege to be allowed to write the Rabbit Room’s release day review of the book. At the time, the Rabbit Room was barely six months old. There was no Hutchmoot, no Rabbit Room Press, no Local Show, no Chinwag, no North Wind Manor. There was just the blog, with a small but very loyal readership. In March of 2008, the Rabbit Room was just a little seedling of a dream that Andrew Peterson had planted in the world for mere love of things that are good, true, and beautiful. The Wingfeather Saga was another of those seedlings. The Wingfeather Saga wasn’t what you’d call a blockbuster. It was more of a slow burn. The people who knew it loved it, but there are only so many seats in the blockbuster-making machine, and a lot of books that deserve to be blockbusters don’t get blockbustered. Through a series of events that I won’t detail, Waterbrook wasn’t able to continue the Wingfeather Saga beyond Book 2, and Books 3 and 4 ended up being released by Rabbit Room Press. But the people who loved the books kept loving them, and they kept telling their friends, and the slow burn kept burning. The people who loved the books kept loving them, and they kept telling their friends, and the slow burn kept burning. Jonathan Rogers The seedling that was the Rabbit Room has become something more like a tree; birds can nest in its branches. And thanks in large part to the community that has grown up around here, the readership of the Wingfeather Saga has grown so that it does make sense for Waterbrook/Random House to re-release all four books of the Wingfeather Saga in hardback with new covers by Nicholas Kole and forty new interior illustrations by Joe Sutphin. Books 1 and 2 release today. Books 3 and 4 release later this year. So here’s to the Wingfeather Saga. And here’s to you, Rabbit Roomers, for your role in making this re-release possible. Here’s that release day review from March 2008. I still mean every word of it. Janner Igiby lives in Glipwood, a nothing little village in the land of Skree, on the edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness. Manhood is on the horizon, but Janner finds it hard to feel much hope for the future. Skree is ruled by foreign oppressors, snake men called the Fangs of Dang, servants of a shadowy emperor named Gnag the Nameless. The Skreeans are weak and weaponless. They’re even tool-less. Any Skreean who needs to use a hoe has to borrow one from the Fangs (and fill out the requisite paperwork). And from time to time, the Black Carriage arrives in Glipwood to carry young Skreeans toward an unknown fate across the Dark Sea. But once a year the Sea Dragons sing just off the coast of Glipwood. With their song, life reasserts itself in the hearts of Skreeans who have long since learned to numb themselves: A middle-aged man named Robesbus Nicefellow, who had wasted his life balancing records for the famed button merchant Osbeck Osbeckson of Torrboro, decided that he wouldn’t spend another day working behind a desk; he had always wanted to sail. Mr. Alep Brume, who was sitting beside Ferinia Swapelton (proprietor of Ferinia’s Flower Shop), turned to her and whispered that he’d secretly loved her for years. Mayor Blaggus silently swore he’d never again pick his nose. All of the passion and sadness and joy of those who listened wound into one common strand of feeling that was to Janner like homesickness, though he couldn’t think why; he was a short walk from the only home he’d ever known. A homesickness for a place he has never been. A nostalgia for a happiness he’s never experienced. The dragons’ song is a moment of otherworldly beauty and hope—of abundant life. There’s something very big at stake here: you get the feeling that the Fangs would have a hard time maintaining their grip on Skree if the Skreeans heard this song too long or too often. And yet the song does its work on a small and personal scale too—in the realm of personal dreams, of unspoken crushes, of nose-picking. Such juxtapositions are the stuff of Andrew Peterson’s new novel, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness (Book 1 of the Wingfeather Saga). Here is a world where the everyday, the mundane is barely adequate to conceal deep longings that point to deeper truths. It is altogether appropriate that Dragon Day is the day when Janner and his younger brother and sister defy the Fangs. It starts out as an accidental defiance, but its effects are profound and irreversible. The plot unspools from there. I won’t say much else about the plot, but I will say that the Igiby children discover things about themselves, their family, and their fellow villagers that they never imagined. They’ve always known that their grandfather Podo is a retired pirate; but, as they learn, that isn’t the half of it. Their mother, an unassuming householder, has a stash of treasure. And the father they’ve never known—they learn to know him too. Their wildest dreams aren’t wild enough. In On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, Peterson has created a rich, strange, wonder-filled world that somehow manages to be homey at the same time. He has drunk deeply of Tolkien, and yet this is not a derivative book. This book describes a world that is much bigger than the book itself. You get the feeling that Peterson isn’t telling all he knows about Aerwiar (that’s the name of this world)—not because he’s withholding, but because there’s so much to tell. In frequent footnotes and asides, he alludes to little details of Skreean life, customs, and history that don’t play a part in the story itself but add depth and texture, giving the impression that this is one of many stories one might tell about this world. You’ve read tight, precisely structured books in which no sentence is wasted, no action is introduced without its equal and opposite reaction, no minor character is so much as mentioned unless he’s going to be significant before it’s all over. Those books have their pleasures, but they aren’t the pleasures you should expect from this story. This story is wild and overgrown. I mean that as high praise. It has a well-built plot and beautifully drawn characters; it also has throwaway lines and rabbit trails. Picture a well-constructed grape arbor. AP has proven himself a skilled craftsman, building a solid and pleasing structure. He has also had enough confidence in his art to let the vine grow on the arbor-—lush and organic and not altogether manageable. Life is busting out all over the place in this book, often expressing itself in ludicrous details. The bookstore in Glipwood has a category for “Books about Blacksmithing and/or Pie.” In the game of handyball, competitors try to score goals without using their feet, even to move. There is a statue outside town of a man enjoying his soup. The reader never finds out why. By dwelling on the ridiculous aspects of The Dark Sea of Darkness (even the title is a little ridiculous), I don’t mean to give the impression that it’s a ridiculous book. It’s a deep, beautiful, satisfying book, and my heart is still full of it. Ironically, the ridiculous touches make this fantasy story feel more real; experiencing Aerwiar for the first time is a little like experiencing this world for the first time, as a child. You’re not born knowing what’s normal and what’s ridiculous. So you’re forced to take a lot on faith. A pearl comes from an irritated oyster? OK, if you say so. But it sounds like you’re pulling my leg. And of all the crazy stories ever told about where babies come from, none of them is crazier than the true one. As a reader of On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, you’re thrown into a ridiculous, wonderful world where there’s much more than meets the eye. Sort of like what happens when you come into this one. You can take it or leave it. For my part, I’ll take it. Click here to view the new edition of On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness in the Rabbit Room Store. And click here to listen to Jonathan Rogers (circa 2008) read his review out loud for the Rabbit Room Podcast, now re-aired as a bonus episode of The Habit Podcast—including an introduction by Andrew Peterson (circa 2008) impersonating Alfred Hitchcock with relentless zeal and determination.

For many months, we at the Rabbit Room have been eagerly anticipating the day that these brand-new, freshly-illustrated, hardbound editions of one of our favorite stories would be ready to share with readers and toothy cows everywhere. Well friends, today is that glorious day. With gratitude in our hearts and shipping supplies standing at the ready, we release these little bits of magic into the world. We hope they bring you deep delight and renew your enchantment with the worlds both within their pages and without. To celebrate, here are just a few of the many wonderful things the Rabbit Room readership has had to say about what the Wingfeather Saga means to them. “Read The Wingfeather Saga to be thrust into a world of adventure, danger, beauty, and wonder, and ultimately to better know the Maker!” —Scott Neville “Andrew Peterson’s Wingfeather Saga profoundly works on the reader long after the final page of each book is read.” —Nathaniel Miller “In a home full of teenagers, this series profoundly deals with not just the evil without, but the darkness within. It has given us tools for conversation and hope when the way seems treacherous. I am so grateful for this series!” —Carleen Hobbs “You need to read these because they are the best and most entertaining books since C. S. Lewis’ Narnia series, and you will love them—I promise.” —Janice “The Wingfeather Saga is a surprisingly poignant tale of adventure and family that will have readers of all ages up turning pages into the wee hours of the night.” —Savannah Grace “The gift of the Wingfeathers’ is the opportunity to see yourself in each character’s peril and penance and begin to interpret your own story through tragedy and triumph as the plot unfolds.” —Jonathan Lawrence “Honestly, The Wingfeather Saga moved my soul in ways I never thought possible. I was delighted and shaken to my core by its conclusion.” —Heather May Jordan “My oldest daughter (11 at the time) read the first book and then brought it to me to read aloud to all of her sisters. “This is something we need to experience together as a family,” she said. She was right. It remains one of our favorite family read-aloud series ever.” —Melissa McMahan “The themes of The Wingfeather Saga are so rich, and the books are not only excellently written (and hard to put down), but also such a good reminder of the wonder and hope in life despite struggles, pain, and sadness.” —Kelley Post “These books will teach you and your children to be brave and noble in the face of adversity.” —Caleb Cooke “It inspires young and old readers to harness their imagination and spirit and use it for the good of the Kingdom.” —Rachael Alexander “The Wingfeather Saga doesn’t just let our families know that great evils like toothy cows and Gnag the Nameless exist, but to show us that they can be beaten.” —Allison Lee Redd “These books captured our imaginations and gave our family a more visceral understanding of redemption and hope and how to live courageously in the already/not yet of God’s kingdom.” —Rachel Speer Donahue “So excited for these new editions, probably more so than my kids.” —BethAnne Dunphy “This series will encourage kids of all ages to think outside the box and use their imaginations. It isn’t just a good story, it’s great writing. They’ll learn an appreciation of words through the skillful descriptions of the world Andrew has created. These books make my heart sing! The threads of truth that are woven throughout the saga make for excellent conversations around some difficult topics.” —Meg McAusland “My favorite part of the story for my kids was the relationship between the siblings. There was so much love, but also relational difficulty and frustration. It was a hit from ages 7 up to 45.” —Lanette Young Tyler “It’s a wonderfully fun read for different generations to read together!” —Lydia Percival Meuret “The Wingfeather Saga is like The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe taken one step further by a family who knows what it means to truly lay your life down for your friends against great odds and peril. Deeply engaging.” —Tess Cox “Beautifully-crafted, gospel-echoing stories have the power to open our eyes and encourage our hearts, and The Wingfeather Saga has gifted those to me.” —Jomona Williamson “The Wingfeather Saga is a series that begins simply, continues to improve and deepen with each succeeding book, and ends with a journey of perseverance, and hope, and heroism, and rescue in The Warden and the Wolf King (my favorite).” —Sherry Early “Everyone should read The Wingfeather Saga because it’s a story that is wonderful, exciting, sorrowful, joyful, heart-changing, and magnificent—it truly speaks to the struggles, joys, sorrows, & triumphs each of us experience in our own lives!” —Linda Hoover “If you are troubled by the world around you, just wait until you and your children enter the world of Aerwiar where danger, as well as glory, wait around every bend; but fear not, your guide is both trustworthy and courageous and though he will tell the truth, even hard truths, he will also tell it with a gleaming hope, even to the end.” —Kara Chase “The Wingfeather Saga is beautifully crafted story that has terror, humor, compassion, adventure, and of course dragons.” —Marilyn Leslie “My 10yo friend said he likes them more than Harry Potter, and this kid has been an HP aficionado for YEARS. This is the kid who shows up to our community group in his HP robes.” —Bethany Warner “My son loves a good story, but doesn’t like to read books. Once I had read the first book aloud, The Wingfeather Saga was so engaging, my son picked up the next one and read ahead on his own!” —Caryn Caffee “Middle grade adventure novels usually spur young readers to soar to greater heights in their imaginations. The Wingfeather Saga succeeds in that and then propels us into the crucible of taking solid character and selflessness into our everyday lives. Memorable characters, gripping conflict, joy in sorrow, and victory in loss make the Wingfeathers unforgettable and a must own series for every family.” —Sarah Young “This series is a MUST READ for a new generation of believers young and old. Narnian-esqe, Peterson creates a fantastic, fictional world that leaves you longing for heaven and longing for more story. Janner, Tink, and Leeli lead you on many adventures finding out truth about themselves, fighting the Fangs of Dang, and growing into who the Maker made them to be. Join them on a magical and captivating journey!” —Brittany Williams Curd “These books delighted and surprised my kids and me. I love recommending them!!” —Jenn Discher “A series that shows what it means to love unconditionally, trust faithfully, and be brave in the midst of terror; a true adventure for the soul.” —Stephanie Westbrook “Adventuring through the world of the Wingfeathers was one of my family’s most beloved endeavors; somehow we were made more fully alive during our fantastical visits to Aerwiar.” —Stephanie Mueller “My 8yo son said, ‘Dad, I don’t like that book because every night I know I’m supposed go to sleep, but I just want you to keep reading!’” —Stacy Sublett “A book series that leaves my 13 year old son with a face full of wonder and excitement to read them all over again.” —Karla Coffman Sheridan “Everyone should read The Wingfeather Saga, because the stories are true. Not true in the hop-on-a-plane-and-visit-that-place kind of true, but search-deep-within-your-soul-and-feel-the-truth-of-these-stories-resonate-within-your-very-being true.” —Brittany Williams “It’s a whimsical fantasy adventure with beautiful themes of faith, perseverance, redemption, and some of the very best sibling dynamics I have read in my LIFE!” —Shay “This needed series draws you in with frivolity and whimsy, awakens adventure with an important purpose, and nourishes the ache in your heart for this broken world with an example of true greatness, redemption, and hope.” —Blais “Our entire family (including Dad) enjoyed listening to the audio books together; they kept us on the edge of our seats until the very end!” —Maia Chandler “Wingfeather’s deep, experiential themes of brokenness and redemption crack my heart open and hollow me out.” —Laure Hittle “This story causes your soul to long for redemption and remaking… both here and now and in the age to come.” —Sarah Gagnon “This story brings you to a world not too different from ours, where you see brokenness and evil flourish, but inevitably bow to the will of the Maker. The stories are true!” —Heather Denenea “Let’s just say that it did keep me on the edge of my bed the whole time. I finished the second book 2 days ago, and I’m dying for the third. I think these are really great books! Amazing! Original! Extraordinary! It gives me a lot of hope for the future.” —Mandy Erbah “Oh, my children love these SO MUCH! And I had to pre-read to make sure they were appropriate, but I couldn’t stop reading! They are wonderful.” —Rosie Hill “The Wingfeather Saga will take you on a journey in a world that is both foreign and familiar, until at the bitter end, a golden thread of hope emerges; what if the stories are true?” —Jocelyn Marshall “The Wingfeather Saga is a great read aloud for the entire family. Full of adventure, courage, love, and truth. A gift to pass through the generations and read again and again.” —Rebecca Sandstrom “The Wingfeather series are unique books that one reads multiple times, as each time challenges your mind and heart towards right thinking and deeper truths in delightful story form.” —Mary Ann White “This series is so full of truth, beauty, and goodness. A few years ago, I convinced my principal to allow me to test out the Saga with a group of 7th graders. We had so many meaningful discussions on so many different topics. The books make such a good impression on the students that they are now a permanent part of the 6th grade curriculum. All the teachers and students love these books. I highly recommend them.” —April Kadtke Bilton “So many aspects of this story illustrate real-life spiritual truths that will give readers the courage to face their own spiritual battles.” —Jennifer Barker “These phenomenal stories were the catalyst to my son’s enjoyment of reading aloud as a family! Thank you!” —Kristi Salazar “It’s like The Chronicles of Narnia for a new generation!! It captures heart and soul through a fantastical story that brings truth to life.” —Priscilla Burczynski “These books will make you laugh, cry, and every emotion in between!” —Amber Hardison Youngblood “It’s the single greatest book series in the world!” —Eli Jenkins, age 10 “I love the Wingfeather series because—while being a thrilling and suspenseful adventure story full of humor and silliness—it also contains rich characters and themes, capturing the deep longings we all feel as humans to be loved in our brokenness and the ache in our souls for the world to be not as it is, but as it should be.” —Stefanie Mattea Delinois “Andrew Peterson’s storytelling in this series feels like a blend of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien told by a Gen X-er: it is deep and rich, with plenty of chuckles throughout.” —Alicia McArthur “The Wingfeather Saga is an immersive fantasy world with some very real truths. You find out that the stories are true.” —Abigail Boles “It’s funny and entertaining, yet uplifting and encouraging in ways I never expected.” —Cosette Schamberger, age 16 “I’m not sure when I have laughed so loudly or cried so visibly when reading a series.” —Sheri Dawn Cornett “One time I was at a book-signing table with AP. A couple came up and said to him, ‘I wanted you to know that when we finished Book 4 of the Wingfeather Saga, we all cried, and then my son prayed to receive Christ.’” —Jonathan Rogers

The Habit Podcast is a series of conversations with writers about writing, hosted by Jonathan Rogers. This week, Jonathan Rogers talks with Francis Su, author of Mathematics for Human Flourishing. In this episode, Jonathan and Francis talk about revealing the unseen, the ability of math to teach virtue, and what it might mean to re-enchant the discipline of math. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 10 of The Habit Podcast. Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.

Today, again, I am at the wide sink in our kitchen scrubbing up the dinner dishes. We don’t own a dishwasher, and I don’t think we’ve ever owned one. I grew up on a chore rotation of dishwashing, so it never really struck me as a priority to have a dishwasher. Some days, however, I think about our burgeoning family of recently-seven and wonder if we’ve made a terrible error in judgment. But this is not one of those days. The younger kids are all finally down for their naps, and my wife is out with our oldest on a mommy-daughter date. I have pressing things on my mind, but I know that cleaning up the kitchen comes first, so I settle into it. I’m impatient on the best of days, but this simple ritual of taking fifteen minutes to wash up the dishes has become a haven for me. Maybe I just love the minuscule accomplishments of cleaning small things. It doesn’t take a day or two, or even an hour. In five seconds I can have a clean bowl, and I can set it aside. No matter that after breakfast tomorrow it will be dirty again. I can clean it again, without fuss or much energy. And as each newly-cleaned dish gathers in the drainer, my sense of accomplishment grows and grows. I even begin to think, illogically, that I can just as easily conquer the monstrous obligations lumbering in the shadows just beyond the bubble-clad light of the sink. I make the process of stacking them all to dry a sort of Tetris challenge, to see how many I can fit before I have to hand-dry a few. I may not be good at following up on emails or planning ahead, but I am good at Tetris. I kind of wish that my creative life was more like washing dishes. I set goals for myself all the time (don’t we all?) and try to carve out time to meet them. But it always seems like I’m staring at a pile of dirty dishes accumulating by the minute. I keep lists of my artistic dirty dishes: post that thing on Facebook, write another blog, edit those poems, write another chapter, tweet something so people know you actually have Twitter. Once in a while I even compile these lists into master lists. And since going to Hutchmoot, my pile of books I absolutely can’t do without reading has grown from hobbit-height to ent-height. In recent days I’ve mostly just glanced guiltily at this pile while watching another episode of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel with my wife. I’m this way with messages and emails too. I treat these two inboxes like an overstuffed closet—peeking in and mumbling something about “must go through that next weekend” but secretly fearful that the moment I open the door I will be suffocated in a deluge of information that will only serve to stress me out more than I already am. So I let it all linger behind the little red dot, accumulating guilt as I accumulate messages. And this can often become the way of my spiritual life, acquiring nudge after nudge at the base of my skull: “you know, you really ought to pray/read Scripture/confess that thing/call up and encourage that person more than you are now…” until I finally get a free hour. Then, the moment I crack my Bible open, all the other things I know I need to do crowd in on me, and what was supposed to be a spiritually refreshing time becomes a battle to just clear everything out so I have headspace to talk to God. There are ways to combat all of these things, I hear, twelve rules for living, or was it seven habits? Because what I need most when I’m overwhelmed is a dozen reminders of what I should be doing. But right now I’m not thinking about decluttering my inbox, or sorting my to-do list into five other to-do lists, or scheduling out a better walk with God. I’m finding a measure of comfort in washing dishes. It’s the small motion of caring for the things that have been placed in my care. It’s the same comfort I receive from sweeping the floor, or pulling a weed, or taking a walk, or brushing my teeth, or boiling water for pasta, or building a train track with my sons. Ordering the seemingly small and insignificant in my place becomes an act of defiance in the face of a world that pressures us all to achieve. Chris Wheeler Somehow these things seem so unimportant that engaging in them has become a weird sort of luxury. I could consider it procrastination, but it’s not solely avoidance when it’s housework, right? Of course I have to do them, but I care about them more because they are unseen by an online world, unmeasured by a quantity-based economy, untimed by an efficiency-obsessed culture. Ordering the seemingly small and insignificant in my place becomes an act of defiance in the face of a world that pressures us all to achieve. Every moment really does become an act of worship, something holy, when we focus on taking the time needed to do the next small thing well. The first session I went to at Hutchmoot 2019 was John Pattison’s candid discussion on Wendell Berry’s Sabbath Poems. We talked about how the concept of Sabbath, built as it was out of the seventh day of Genesis 2, was akin to the afterglow of birth. After God created, He established a full day just to delight in His creation. At least one-seventh of our time is to be set aside purely for the purpose of enjoyment of God and His works, without the pressure of striving or achieving. We get to be still and know that He is God, and we are His deeply-loved children. We get the comforting reminder that we are not in control and it’s okay. If we take our hands off the wheel for a day, the world will still turn. God holds this rest out to us as a gift, that we may cease striving once a week. Sabbath, at its core, is an essential reminder to ourselves that we do not make the world go round, nor do we cure the deepest ills in our souls, nor does our work hold sway over our value as God’s children. One day a week, we are to receive. But what about those who find it practically impossible to cease labor due to a particular season of life, or who cannot just stop ministering to the sick, feeding the hungry, binding up the broken, or caring for those in their care? Where do we find rest along the way, until we can partake of another Sabbath? The days are long enough as it is that Sabbath days already seem further and further apart, and even when we find them they are interrupted. We know that we need to prioritize rest better and seek out help from our communities in difficult seasons. But as some of us discussed after the session, we still find respite only in quick gulps, like Midwesterners soaking up an hour of sun during a false spring. It’s never enough. But is it not possible to find rest in the unfolding of our working lives as well? We are constantly lifting up our eyes to our Provider, seeking strength for the work ahead as well as rest in our weariness. We join our work to Heaven’s gift, Our hope to what is left, That field and woods at last agree In an economy Of widest worth. “1982: VII,” from This Day, Wendell Berry I’m hoping, in my idealism, to devote this upcoming Sunday purely to resting and receiving. Yet, even on that day, I will still make a meal, wash dishes, change diapers, take a shower, and play with my children—as acts of delight and defiance, a measure of Sabbath. For Sabbath can be found not only on Sundays, even though they act as a tangible reminder to rest. It can also be found in a moment of letting go of all other pressing concerns and doing the next simple, necessary task well. Through this lens, my habits can become havens. I begin to believe that even when I put my hands back on the wheel, the world will still turn. What if I were to submit myself to the task before me, trusting that what I do now is freely done, for a Father who loves me? What if I trusted that God held all the worries and dreams and chores ahead of me, that He knows my weakness and gives me His strength in the midst of it? What if I believed that something as simple as washing a dish, writing a paragraph of a story, or changing my toddler’s diaper carries eternal significance? That would indeed be a Sabbath-filled life, a life that finds comfort in the ultimate rest ahead. Many are the things that must be daily done. Meet me therefore, O Lord, in the doing of the small, repetitive tasks, In the cleaning and ordering and maintenance and stewardship of things— Of dishes, of floors, of carpets And toilets and tubs, of scrubbing and sweeping and dusting and laundering— That by such stewardship I might bring a greater order to my own life, and to the lives of any I am given to serve, so that in those ordered spaces bright things might flourish: fellowship and companionship, creativity and conversation, learning and laughter and enjoyment and health. As I steward the small, daily tasks, may I remember these good ends, and so discover in my labors the promise of the eternal hopes that underlie them. “A Liturgy for Domestic Days,” from Every Moment Holy

Howdy, folks. As everyone knows, the world has gotten a bit more complicated in the last few days. Thankfully, the COVID-19 pandemic doesn’t affect much in the way of the Rabbit Room’s day-to-day operations. But as some of you know, we’re scheduled to participate in several homeschool conventions and a Local Show in the next few weeks. After much thought and prayer, this is what we’ve decided to do in light of these upcoming events: The Great Homeschool Convention in Ft. Worth, Texas, begins today. Our staff is already there and the convention is proceeding as planned. However, we want the Rabbit Room and its staff to model responsible behavior during the event, and as such we’ve asked them to politely avoid handshakes and physical contact with the public as well as to use all means available to ensure that our booth and products are safe and hygienic. Remember that while the virus is relatively harmless to most of us, it can be much more serious for others, and therefore we want to ensure that we do all we can to protect everyone and avoid spreading it as much as possible. To that end, the Rabbit Room has decided not to attend the next two Great Homeschool Conventions (South Carolina, and Missouri). We regret the need to cancel our talks and presence at these events, but we feel strongly that this is the most loving and responsible way to care for our community and the public in general. These events are not critical to our organization, so there’s no need to put anyone at risk. At the moment, we still plan to attend the Cincinnati convention in April, but we will continue to monitor the situation and will let you know if that changes. There’s also a Local Show scheduled for this coming Tuesday, and we’ve made the decision to cancel that as well. All tickets will be refunded and we’ll see about rescheduling the show later this spring. While some may think these measures unnecessary, I think it’s important to point out that the Rabbit Room is an organization that springs from and fosters community, and in that light, our mission rightly ought to drive us to care for, love, and protect that community diligently. By saying no to these three public events in the short term, I believe we’re saying yes to the well-being of our community in the long term. We’re not over-reacting. We’re not freaking out. We’re not claiming the world is ending. We’re just taking a few easy measures to be sure we consider what’s in everyone’s best interest. This too shall pass. And in the meantime, consider this a good opportunity to spend some quiet evenings at home with a book and a loved one.

O Christ Our Healer, There is no end to malady, sickness, injury, and disease in this broken world, so there is no end to the line of hurting people who daily need my tending. Therefore give me grace, O God, that I might be generous with my kindness, and that in this healing and care-taking vocation my hands might become an extension of your hands, and my service a conduit for your mercy. For it is often not an easy place to be— so near to suffering, to injury, to pain, to emergency and fear and confusion, and sometimes even to dying and death and grief— but I believe it is exactly the sort of place you would be, O Lord, amongst those who hurt. So let my practice of medicine be centered in an understanding of your heart. Let me practice medicine because you are a healing God who feels compassion and extends mercy. Let me practice medicine because you are near to those who are in need, to those who face grief and loss. Let me practice medicine as a willing servant of your redemption, pushing back—by means of my vocation— the effects of the fall. Let my presence in this place lend a human face to your compassion. Even when my schedule is crammed with appointments, rounds, or duties, let me never view my patients as mere tasks on a to-do list. Give me grace instead to be always— even in our brief encounters—attentive and responsive to the hearts of human beings made in your image. Let me extend kindness and mercy even to those who are too angry, frightened, bitter, or in pain to respond with anything but venom. Let me especially love them, for they suffer— even more than from physical ailment—from a lack of understanding or experience of your overwhelming grace and mercy and love. Let their time with me be to them a taste that might awaken a hopeful hunger in their hearts. I can do none of these things on my own. Apart from your grace, I have no grace to give. So give me your grace in greater measure, O Lord. Let me find also, in the midst of such constant need, a rhythm of service and rest that will enable my own soul to be tended and nourished— that in the time I spend with patients I will have a deeper repository of patience and kindness to share with them. Teach me how better to balance my duties and my days, so that this work would not make me absent from the lives of my family and friends and church. Let me be well-woven into those communities and relationships, enjoying ample time with them, being available to them, and caring for their needs even as I allow them to care for mine. Let me never be so consumed by my vocation that those closest to me suffer negligence. I would not just be a doctor or a nurse or a medical provider, O God. I would be a minister of your healing and compassion at work in your world. I would be a living witness of your love expressed in a practical care of people. I would be your disciple in this place, at this time, among these people. So give grace, Lord Christ. Give me grace this day and all days, that I might serve you well by loving and serving others in this healing trade, ever laboring in view of that day when your kingdom will be fully realized, at the great mending of the world, at the great ending of all ills. Let me play a small part in that great work, today. Amen. We invite you to join us in praying for our communities, those in medical professions, and those ill with sickness and fear. This liturgy is from Every Moment Holy by Doug McKelvey. We’ve updated the downloads section of the Every Moment Holy website to include liturgies like this one with special relevance to the coronavirus pandemic.

If an individual follower of Jesus might have—in addition to their general calling to imitate their Lord at all times—a more specific calling (or at least a more specific outworking of that general calling) that leads them to particular labors, specific good works, and the focus on meeting needs within or serving some segment of culture, then might specific communities of believers also have distinct callings? If so, how is such a calling discerned, and how do distinct individuals with varying personalities and skill-sets find their places within that larger community calling? On Hutchmoot Sunday two years ago, Lise (my wife—and no, it’s not misspelled) and I were having lunch with Bailey McGee and her husband Wes. Bailey began describing the strong parallels between her vocation as a labor & delivery nurse and the roles she plays in her husband’s highly creative work as a luthier. As I listened, I immediately thought, “Oh, that’s a cool Hutchmoot session topic, this idea of midwifing creativity, of what the larger role of community might be in the creation process.” As Bailey continued to expound on the topic though, I soon realized what she was talking about was actually an essential element of this even larger and more fundamental discussion: a discussion of what it might mean to cultivate a collective vision of ourselves as functioning parts of the body of Christ, mutually nurturing, encouraging, serving and equipping one another unto the end that—as a community—we might multiply the creation and reach of those redemptive works to which we are called. After all, in the kingdom of God, the work of one person is never the work of one person. Doug McKelvey The first step in realizing such a vision is perhaps to learn to recognize how much we truly do need one another, how interdependent the Body of Christ actually is, first on our Lord (whose position as the head of we, the body, should not be under-considered), but also in daily ways on one another. And if scripture is to be believed, that includes all of us. Even those of us who sometimes struggle to see ourselves as anything but weird, awkward, and untalented. Only as we begin to grasp this truth can we rightly begin to see ourselves together offering good service and redemptive gifts to the church, the culture, the world. After all, in the kingdom of God, the work of one person is never the work of one person. When Bailey and I some months later decided to explore these topics in a Hutchmoot session, I offered the title “Midwife Crisis” as a lame pun and it unfortunately stuck. But I think a better title might have been “This Is How the Work Gets Done” so I’m opting for that as a title here. (Any early Charlie Peacock fans out there will get the reference…) More about that in a later post. In this quick intro I’m just trying to lay the groundwork for discussion of the larger ideas we’ll be exploring, which might include: What does it mean to be the Body of Christ? Are communities of believers sometimes called and equipped for specific collective works? What is the role of the individual in the calling of community? What is the role of a “non-artist” in a creative community and why are non-artists essential to the health and functioning of creative community? And what are we, who gather under this curious moniker of The Rabbit Room, particularly about in our shared journey? In addition to each of our personal callings, and the callings of the local churches we are members of, do we as a group also have our own collective calling? And if so, how do we discern, name and cultivate that call together, artists and accountants alike? How do we best use the various resources we have to further the work that we might already be collectively engaged in? Or to pare that tangle of questions into a slightly more manageable tangle: Who are we? What is our collective vision? How do we spur one another on to love and good deeds? How do we function as a community confirming our calling, together enabling and multiplying the work and the reach of it? I don’t envision that Bailey and I will get around to exploring each of those questions in exhaustive detail in these posts. Our intent is more about stirring the beginnings of a conversation here, knowing that others will need to take up those threads if the conversation is to go anywhere productive and have any significance to the Rabbit Room moving forward. Hopefully this will be a good beginning though. And in the final post of the series (if I can wait that long) I plan to unveil what I hope will be exciting news for this community and folks beyond it as well, about a new work we hope to launch in 2020 that some of you will almost certainly have opportunity to be involved in over the years to come. I’m now “passing the mic” to one Bailey Berry McGee, whose presence in the Rabbit Room these past couple of years has been nothing short of a gift.

In a world so wired and interconnected, our anxious hearts are pummeled by an endless barrage of troubling news. We are daily aware of more grief, O Lord, than we can rightly consider, of more suffering and scandal than we can respond to, of more hostility, hatred, horror, and injustice than we can engage with compassion. But you, O Jesus, are not disquieted by such news of cruelty and terror and war. You are neither anxious nor overwhelmed. You carried the full weight of the suffering of a broken world when you hung upon the cross, and you carry it still. When the cacophony of universal distress unsettles us, remind us that we are but small and finite creatures, never designed to carry the vast abstractions of great burdens, for our arms are too short and our strength is too small. Justice and mercy, healing and redemption, are your great labors. And yes, it is your good pleasure to accomplish such works through your people, but you have never asked any one of us to undertake more than your grace will enable us to fulfill. Guard us then from shutting down our empathy or walling off our hearts because of the glut of unactionable misery that floods our awareness. You have many children in many places around this globe. Move each of our hearts to compassionately respond to those needs that intersect our actual lives, that in all places your body might be actively addressing the pain and brokenness of this world, each of us liberated and empowered by your Spirit to fulfill the small part of your redemptive work assigned to us. Give us discernment in the face of troubling news reports. Give us discernment to know when to pray, when to speak out, when to act, and when to simply shut off our screens and our devices, and to sit quietly in your presence, casting the burdens of this world upon the strong shoulders of the one who alone is able to bear them up. Amen. This liturgy is from Every Moment Holy by Doug McKelvey. We’ve updated the downloads section of the Every Moment Holy website to include liturgies like this one with special relevance to the coronavirus pandemic.

The other day my wife found the artifact. While cleaning out the basement, she emerged upstairs with a dusty, unopened box containing a Yeti microphone, an ideal mic for beginning podcasters. Taped to the side was the receipt dated April, 2013. I could only shake my head and smile. I knew I’d felt the resistance for several years but here was proof. A full six years before I’d launched the podcast called The Resistance, a series all about facing your fears, I’d bought the tools to do it only to leave them in a basement. Six years. * * * I couldn’t stop quitting even after I’d decided to start the podcast. In fact, I’d already spent a couple thousand dollars by the time I quit for the tenth time. Those aren’t exaggerations in either direction. I’m the kind of person who needs the perfect environment before I can start something. The dishes in the other room have to be done before I can write at home. My own writing environment has to be pristine. It’s just the way I’ve always worked (really, they’re the excuses I’ve always made). That means I had to spend money before I started the podcast. Forget the Yeti, since that’s for beginners (and so old now). You only get one shot, Eminem once told me, and I wanted to make sure I had it right—at least as right as you can have it when you’re a beginner. Before any guests had been booked or a single practice run had been made, I’d bought a nice microphone and stand, a pre-amp and something called a CloudLifter. I hired someone to create a logo and another designer to make a web site. I commissioned yet another friend to write the theme song. For several weeks, I went back and forth with each creative partner. Less of this. More of that. I’m thinking something else entirely. Even after everything was in place, I couldn’t stop quitting. After holding onto the idea for seven years, after buying my first mic six years earlier, it still took about eleven months to announce that I had a finished product ready to roll out. In fact, I had the interviews finished for every single episode six months before I released anything at all. I quit every single stage of this creative process (and not in a I-just-need-a-day-away-from-this sort of emotional moment). At every turn, it became too much. The fears were overwhelming. The doubts were suffocating. No one was waiting for this podcast. No one was asking for me to do this. I was already plenty busy, and the idea of putting myself out there in this way felt like a needlessly humiliating exercise. I felt vulnerable and alone and reached for every fig leaf I could find for some time. A quick re-introduction for those of you who are new to the podcast. The Resistance is an interview-based podcast inspired by Stephen Pressfield’s book The War of Art. In each episode, we ask various people in the creative arts to respond to a single statement: “Most of us have two lives: the life we live and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands the Resistance.” We then allow the conversation to flow from there. It's my deepest desire that these conversations can offer hope, encouragement, challenge, perspective, and language for the Resistance that you face as well. Matt Conner I’ve been in music/entertainment journalism for nearly 20 years now and I’ve interviewed over 2,000 artists and authors, composers and directors in that time. My conversations have always occupied the deeper end of the pool, and when I read Pressfield’s book the first time, I recognized that most of my stories centered around some form of Resistance. It wasn’t long until the idea of a podcast took shape. It took seven years because of my own resistance, but it was always about a single goal: helping others face their own resistance. * * * Today we’re thrilled to announce The Resistance is back—for good. And we’re bringing a few changes along with us. First, there are no more seasons. What began as “Season One” is now an ongoing podcast. Second, we have a reintroduction episode today and next week, we’ll sit down with Knives Out composer Nathan Johnson. From there, we’ll have a new interview every two weeks! I’m thrilled with our early conversations already ready to go, with poets like Li-Young Lee and Jericho Brown, artists like Sierra Hull, Mindy Smith and Alex Ebert (the man behind Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros), and bands like The Lone Bellow and Stars. Finally, we’ve got a more conversational approach this time around. My close friend Jay Kirkpatrick—who some of you might know as the musical right hand for Josh Garrels—has been the glue all along in this endeavor as the audio engineer, and you’ll hear more from him this season along with a new friend, Isaac Pellerin, who is helping in several ways. As always, it’s my deepest desire that these conversations can offer hope, encouragement, challenge, perspective, and language for the Resistance that you face as well. We look forward to meeting you on the journey ahead. Click here to listen to “The Resistance: A Reintroduction.”

The deluge of frightful information we wake up to daily—though helpful in navigating a disease-ridden world with wisdom and love—ceases to be helpful when it eclipses everything else in sight. So when the Rabbit Room staff gathered on Monday to ask what it means to do the work before us in such a time as this, the answer took the familiar form of providing content that would contribute to the health of our imaginations, the sustaining of hope, and the de-escalation of anxiety—from our homes to yours. So consider this following list to be a sort of digital care package for you and your loved ones. We hope these resources help you retain peace, endurance, and even togetherness (though of the technological kind) in days that threaten chaos. The Local Show: Streaming Edition Last night we began The Local Show: Streaming Edition, an in-the-round show where each artist tunes in from their own homes to share some songs. We’ll be doing our best to host one of these every Tuesday night until social distancing measures are lifted. Our hope is to provide a weekly opportunity to gather together, even if only online, to be nourished by some tunes. These concerts will be accessible via Facebook and YouTube. In addition, we are encouraging viewers to make donations to our Facebook fundraiser for touring musicians. As a result of the coronavirus, many artists have had to cancel their shows, which can be devastating when touring is the main source of income, so we want to do whatever we can to help. 100% of funds raised will go directly to touring artists who have lost shows due to current events. Slugs & Bugs Online Sing-Alongs Yesterday morning, Slugs & Bugs livestreamed a special sing-along. Don’t think they’re not going to do that again! (Psst: rumor has it that their next sing-along will take place on Saturday at 4:00pm.) Follow Slugs & Bugs on Facebook and Instagram to know when to tune in. Gullahorn Happy Hour: Quarantine Edition Andy and Jill Gullahorn went live on Facebook Monday night for what they dubbed Gullahorn Happy Hour: Quarantine Edition. They sang songs, took requests, and provided a bit of camaraderie for all of us stuck at home. They’ll be doing more of those, too—stay tuned at Andy’s Facebook and Instagram pages to know when the next livestream will happen. Wingfeather Saga Readalong with Andrew Peterson Beginning on Friday, Andrew Peterson will be reading On the Edge of The Dark Sea of Darkness every night at 7:00pm via Facebook Live. Tune in nightly at Andrew’s Facebook page to journey through this story together. Fin’s Revolution with A. S. Peterson Now is a great time to dig into the Fin’s Revolution Podcast, wherein A. S. Peterson reads through the entirety of The Fiddler’s Gun (and yes, he does all the voices). If you’d like to read this marvelous book, and you’d like the author himself to read it to you, then look no further. Online Read-Aloud & Resources: Jennifer Trafton Jennifer has an e-newsletter that includes reading recommendations, creative prompts, occasional free coloring pages, and other resources. Click here to sign up. Starting March 19th and continuing through April 4th, Jennifer will be doing a live read-aloud of Henry and the Chalk Dragon every day at 10:00am CST. Join in at Jennifer’s Facebook page. Jennifer teaches online creative writing classes for kids and families. They are independent study and thus open to all ages, though they’re aimed primarily at 8-13 year olds. She’s currently offering a 15% off coupon for any one of her 6-week classes (“Playing with Words,” “What If,” and “Spies in the Universe”)—just use the code BECREATIVE2020. There is also a free Henry and the Chalk Dragon class, plus she plans to add more short workshops in the coming weeks. Click here to register for one of Jennifer’s online classes. Online Classes: Jonathan Rogers Free Stuff Thursday, March 19th at 7:30pm—Jonathan’s free monthly webinar. A scintillating discussion of commas! If you can apply eight or ten clear rules, you can get your commas right every time. The less-good news about commas is that you have to know a good bit of grammar in order to apply those eight or ten rules. In this webinar, we will review the comma rules as well as the underlying grammar that governs their use. Click here to register. Saturday, March 21st at 10:00am—A Facebook Live mini-lesson drawn from Jonathan’s upcoming Writing With Atticus online class. This one will be about finding your unique voice. Scout Finch, the first-person narrator of To Kill a Mockingbird, has one of the most unique and compelling voices in American literature. In this thirty-minute lesson, drawn from his upcoming “Writing With Atticus” class, author and teacher Jonathan Rogers will discuss voice in Harper Lee’s classic and consider ways you as a writer can find and express your unique voice. Click here to learn more. And after Jennifer finishes her read-aloud, Jonathan will run a Bog Owl book club. Details to come. Not-Free Stuff Writing With Atticus. Thursday afternoons, April 2nd—May 7th. Participants will read through To Kill a Mockingbird together with an eye to see what Harper Lee can teach about writing. (For adults and high-schoolers). Click here for more information. Fiction Workshop. March 30th—April 24th. In this four-week intensive on fiction-writing, participants will work on a single story (5000 words max) for the whole four weeks, writing and rewriting, getting feedback from Jonathan as well as from fellow writers. Limited to 6 participants. Click here to register. Great Homeschool Convention Resource Package One especially disappointing result of the pandemic was that we had to cancel our involvement in the next few homeschool conventions. Though there’s no replacement for getting to see you in person, we’re providing some free homeschooling resources for the next month at the following links: Henry & the Chalk Dragon Curriculum Guide (by Jennifer Trafton) The Wilderking Trilogy Curriculum Guide (by Jonathan Rogers) The Angel Knew Papa and the Dog Reading Guide (by Doug McKelvey) These guides contain a wealth of fun activities to accompany the books themselves—hours of learning and fun for you and your family. Hutchmoot 2013 Complete Audio Archive This archive contains seventeen hours of audio from sessions like “The Art of Hymnody” with Keith Getty and Kevin Twit, “Writing Close to the Earth” with Andrew Peterson and Jonathan Rogers, and Leif Enger’s keynote address. Hutchmoot 2014 Complete Audio Archive And this archive includes over eighteen hours of audio from sessions like “The Whole World is Listening In” with Charlie Peacock, “Working with the Better Half” with Don Chaffer, Lori Chaffer, Andy Gullahorn, & Jill Phillips, and Luci Shaw’s keynote address. Both archives are normally available for $30 in our store, but we’re giving them away for free for the next month. Every Moment Holy: Free Liturgy Downloads Lastly, we’ve curated a collection of liturgies from Every Moment Holy that carry special significance for the time in which we find ourselves. Visit EveryMomentHoly.com/Liturgies for free downloads of these choices, including “For Those Flooded by Too Much Information,” “For a Sick Day,” and “For Medical Providers.” All of us are familiar with that tired question, “What use is art?” At times, it’s difficult to answer, and we’re hard-pressed to point to the tangible results of singing, storytelling, and mundane acts of creativity. And yet, when that question exits the realm of theory and enters the world of immediate experience, the answer becomes as simple as it is clear: art pushes against the darkness, fortifies the soul, and lightens our burdens. In times like these, it’s abundantly clear that art is no mere luxury. So as long as the darkness bears us down, we invite you to join us in lighting a candle.

The Habit Podcast is a series of conversations with writers about writing, hosted by Jonathan Rogers. This week, Jonathan Rogers talks with Lee Camp, author of Scandalous Witness: A Little Political Manifesto for Christians. A man of many interests, Lee Camp is a theology professor, the host of the Tokens variety show, and the author of Scandalous Witness: A Little Political Manifesto for Christians. In this episode, Jonathan and Lee discuss Lee’s controversially orthodox assertions, the necessity for a hermeneutic of love, and the inextricability of true hope and the courage to encounter a new story. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 12 of The Habit Podcast. Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.

As a child, I heard a lot about the end of the world—the mark of the Beast, the demise of America, the million-man army that would spread destruction over the face of the earth. Things were going badly wrong, they said, and soon the sun would be darkened. And being an earnest child, I went about gathering fears and confirmations of doom and storing them away like cankerous fruit. I was thirty years old before I considered the possibility that the Apocalypse might not be imminent. I can tell you where I was when it happened. I was standing in a back room of our house, watching sunlight stream through the leaves of the poplar tree. I was talking on the phone with a friend, and he made a comment about the kingdom of God growing and spreading, bringing love and light to everything it touched. I knew that moment was significant, even as I stared out the window, trying to follow his train of thought. Could it be? Was there an alternate ending to the story? What if, through struggle and hardship, we were pressing toward a fuller revelation of the love of God? What if the Spirit was moving and working in ways that brought hope and healing and joy? I could hardly take it in. My understanding of the future had been cemented in my thinking. It would take time to find a crack and grow through it. Turns out, that’s what my writing career has been. I’ve spent the last decade trying to imagine a different ending for the story of humanity. I did it in the Shiloh Series. After ages of darkness, light breaks through the Shadow, and the people are dazzled by the revelation of all they did not see. I’m doing it again in The Door on Half-Bald Hill, journeying with suffering people toward an expected, and terrible, end. And though it is strange to say, I love the people of Blackthorn. I love Idris and Corann and Deirdre and Muriel. I love Barra, the chief with the spear in his hand, and the rambunctious fosterlings and Calder and Shannan, the elderly couple who live by the ash tree. I love them because their imaginations have failed them as thoroughly as their leaders have failed them, as the old ways have failed them, as the world has failed them. They move me because I know just how that feels. They move me, too, with their dogged determination to carry on. They cannot help themselves. It’s the way they see the world. One of the beautiful things about the ancient Celtic people was their concept of flow. As I built the world of Tír Ársa, I read several books of Celtic myths, Irish fairy tales and folklore, and ancient Irish history. In my reading, I came across a description of Celtic thought that stuck with me and ultimately served as the frame for the story. One writer described the Celts as a kind of foil to the Romans. The Romans, he said, insisted on “life marked out in squares.” They built straight roads and sent square units of soldiers, unfeeling phalanxes, to conquer the world, to claim yet more land and draw yet more squares. Their minds were full of lines and corners. What if there is time for the wine to ferment, time to hold a feast in celebration? What if we are not abandoned, and the story arcs toward something wonderful? Helena Sorensen The Celts rejected such thinking. For them, everything was woven together. Everything flowed. Time was fluid. Life was fluid. Feelings arced and curved like the landscape. And all things were bound together, bending over and back again, winding gracefully toward some unexpected destination. They lived with a joyful sense of impermanence. They had no written language, and their houses, stables, and meeting halls were constructed with wood, with no thought that they should stand the test of time. They built walls without mortar, stacking dry stones one upon another, knowing their sons and daughters could reclaim the stones and rebuild as they saw fit. For them, life was rounded, each year a circle, a wheel that rolled on and on. They ran onto the battlefield pell-mell, naked and painted and screaming. The Romans looked down their noses and called them barbarians, but they were terrified by the intensity of their passion. In Roman thought, the Celts saw an ordered, bloodless stagnancy, and they would live to extremes to avoid it. By all accounts, they were glad to die on the battlefield, for the fighting made them feel alive, and death was merely a curve in the endless flow of existence. Illustration by Stephen Crotts. Click to preorder The Door on Half-Bald Hill. I wonder about our inclination to shape our lives as the Romans did. We build houses and cities on square plots of land. Our time is stacked like blocks—square days lining up to make square months that pile into years. We seek straight lines of ascendancy and conquest. But we’re always bumping into limits. We’re blocked by ceilings of rigid thought. Move outside the square and you’re in danger of being impaled on a sharp corner. But where is the turn? The flow? Our imaginations fall short. There’s a scene in The Door on Half-Bald Hill when Idris, the bard, asks Llyr, the old fisherman, how long he’ll continue to sail the seas in his coracle. Llyr’s labor has been fruitless; his one small victory has proven empty. Yet Llyr responds with scorn, as though the question offends him deeply. “As long as the wind blows,” he says. In another scene, Idris is far from the village. It’s time to harvest sloeberries and brambleberries and make hedgerow wine. But Idris realizes with horror that there may not be time for the fruit to ferment. Will they take the trouble to pick the berries, he wonders, when they’re likely to die before the wine is ready? It’s a moment of panic, when Idris bumps against an expected ending. But the people of Blackthorn, knowing what he knows and being no fools, still harvest the berries. They set them in buckets to ferment. They persist in the flow of life, trusting, beyond all reason, in the bends and turns that shape the world into unanticipated beauty. They move forward, afraid and yet determined, until the moment when the ending surprises them. My longing for new endings has not diminished. Maybe I will always be writing my way toward them. How better to stretch my imagination beyond the ordered squares of doom that are every day presented to me? What if there is time for the wine to ferment, time to hold a feast in celebration? What if we are not abandoned, and the story arcs toward something wonderful? What if there is room to imagine a million different endings? Click here to preorder The Door on Half-Bald Hill in the Rabbit Room Store. Illustration by Stephen Crotts

I was supposed to be on a plane to Ireland this morning. We were supposed to spend St. Patrick’s Day with our dear friends Heidi and Glenn outside of Belfast; catch AP’s concert in Newtownards; catch a ferry next weekend over to Scotland. We’d booked our car, our cottage in the Lake District (once owned by Beatrix Potter, no less!), and our city-hopper from London back to Dublin. And we’d reserved our seats, months in advance, at the famed Sheldonian Theatre, for my Oxford Awards Ceremony—a panoply and circumstance to cap off four years of study and ambition (and not a little daydreaming). I got the email from the University on Thursday: the ceremony had been cancelled. Not postponed or rescheduled—cancelled. A word we’ve become all-too-familiar with of late, but which greeted my tear-blurred eyes that morning with brutal finality. Such a sad end to my academic journey. And what was done could not be undone. All the rest of that day I carried the grief of the thing in a heart already over-capacity with anxiety and uncertainty. Should we travel at all? Philip and I asked each other eleventy-dozen times. We messaged our friends in the U.K.; we prayed; we obsessed over Google News. By the time we officially pulled the plug, the decision had all but been made for us. Nevertheless, it all felt so horribly wrong. “Hope deferred makes the heart sick,” I told Heidi. “Yes,” she replied. “But it’s only deferred. As a wise man once said, ‘We’ll look back on these tears as old tales…'” I knew she was right. And I also knew that missing out on a special trip was a very privileged sort of suffering compared to the real hardships others were facing. My own misery, however, was such compelling company that I slouched through the next day or so with the air of one the whole world had injured. Within twenty-four hours, of course, the rest of the world was disappointed, inconvenienced, and otherwise thwarted right along with me. I stood outside Costco, fingering my membership card, wondering if it was worth it to brave those empty shelves and hour-long lines for a couple of cauliflower-crust pizzas and hopefully a pound or two of fresh tomatoes. (It wasn’t.) At Kroger, the wine aisle was the only one that seemed untouched by the pre-National Emergency chaos. “Why aren’t people stocking up on this?” one of my fellow shoppers wanted to know. “I know, right?” I said with a laugh, scanning the selection. I went with a Chianti. In solidarity. Despite such brief levity, however, I couldn’t help but notice that things felt different—charged with a mutual apprehension I had not known since September of 2001. No one was rude or pushy or greedy (I hadn’t been there when the now sold-out toilet paper was delivered, of course). They were just—careful. Everyone seemed extra-sensitive about butting their cart in front of another’s at the end of an aisle, or of displaying the least allergenic sniffle. Most poignant were the older people, threading nearly empty carts white-knuckled among nearly empty shelves. I wanted to stop every one of them and say, “Here—let me shop for you!” Only, apart from the cans of Le Sueur English peas and rag-tag frozen dinners they’d already managed to procure, there wasn’t a whole lot to choose from. Let boredom clear the ground of your soul. Translate your disappointment and fear into something tangibly, defiantly beautiful. Lanier Ivester Later that afternoon, I sat in the waiting room at the vet’s office, my cat Wemmick in a crate at my feet. I usually pass the time in such cases with a book, or a quick perusal of Instagram. But on this occasion, I couldn’t take my eyes off the people around me. Some were clutching leashes, awaiting test results. One woman hustled past, dashing tears away, with an empty collar in her hands. An elderly couple had their eyes glued on the television in the corner, with its relentless red headlines racing across the screen. I caught the woman’s gaze for a moment, and my own faltered under the fear I read there. The last of my self-pity slunk away, I think, under that haunting look. Where would that woman find herself in the lineup of a triage situation if things got really bad? Suddenly, staying home seemed way less of an injustice than a rather chastened act of love. Last week, just days before we were to depart for Europe, our beloved Rabbit Room compatriot and master gardener Julie Witmer came for a flying visit. We walked all over the yard making notes and staking off beds. We drank copious amounts of Yorkshire Gold. We dug iris tubers and daffodil bulbs in a mizzling rain. And through it all we talked about the incarnational work of making a garden, a home, a life. “It matters,” Julie said, looking up from a sketch of my new kitchen plot. “Everything matters—more than we know.” I couldn’t agree more. If we believe that the Kingdom of heaven is already among us, then every creative thing we do is an act of reclamation, be it settling an iris where it really wants to flourish, growing food in our backyard, or brainstorming unique ways to care for people from a distance. Pandemic conditions do not alter the fact that the work of our hearts, hands, and minds enflesh unseen realities, or that redemption is something God invites us to participate in—even in ‘circumstances that seem unpropitious.’ The fact is, we’re suddenly living under a worldwide Golden Rule. Few of us have ever had the opportunity to care for total strangers in such a wholesale, practical capacity. For all its disruptions, this virus is teaching us an unforgettable thing or two about loving our neighbor as ourselves. I’m sad that I can’t jump on a plane and be with people I love right now, and I’m sad to miss a once-in-a-lifetime experience at the Sheldonian. But far more than that, I’m desperately grateful to know that we still live in a world that values some of its most vulnerable. I take heart in the fact that we’re willing to collectively care for our at-risk, be it the ill, the immune-compromised, or the elderly. My newsfeed is thronged with worst-case scenarios and end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it forecasts. But it also tells me that quarantined Italians are singing from their balconies, and that healthy people in my own county are willingly curbing their freedoms for the sake of people they will never know. It may seem counter-intuitive (it certainly seems unprecedented) but we really can socially distance out of love, instead of isolating out of fear. We can stay small, practical, local; we can believe in better days while flooding the present with creative intention. Let me get a little motherly here and say that “this, too, shall pass,” but that we will all come out changed on the other side, hopefully stronger, hopefully cherishing each other even more. Don’t try to carry the whole weight of this thing, even in your imagination. (Especially in your imagination.) Don’t be afraid—greater is He that is in us than all the microbes that are in the world. Turn off the news for an evening, or a day; do a puzzle with your people, or listen to an audiobook together. Don’t buy more than you need. Check on your neighbors. Offer to pick up groceries for an older person (and leave them at the door), or gift them with a delivery service (and give the courier a good tip). Keep sharing the funny memes. Plant a garden, write a song, learn to make coq au vin. Let boredom clear the ground of your soul. Translate your disappointment and fear into something tangibly, defiantly beautiful. And remember to be kind to yourself—these are challenging days, and we’re all dealing with hopes deferred. Remember that kindness is also contagious. Remember that you are wildly, irrationally, unconditionally loved. And remember that, for once, we all have the chance to live the way our grandmothers told us to all along: wash your hands, cover your mouth. And do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

I don’t think of myself as artistic. At best, I can say that I created eight beautiful children of varying hues and temperaments. My love of science and research led to my career as a labor and delivery nurse. That’s not to say there isn’t magic and creativity required in my work, but I felt much more at home in a birthing suite than an art studio. Even now the idea of those parties where everyone goes and paints the same picture at a studio makes me break out in hives. So when I agreed to go to Hutchmoot three years ago with my husband Wes, I worried I wouldn’t fit in at all. Like maybe there would be a screening test to check in: “Do you play guitar, mandolin, or fiddle? Have you recently published a novel, essay, or popular blog post? What is your favorite medium for artistic expression? Nothing? None of these? Okay ma’am, we’re going to have to ask you to wait in your car for your husband to finish the conference.” I went because it was so important to him. He needed community and encouragement in his artistic pursuits, so I was along for the ride simply to support him. I have to admit, I almost chickened out in the car as I watched all these people confidently striding through the doors, some running to hug each other’s necks, others already laughing loudly (side note: I have since learned that this is not actually how everyone feels and that if I had just looked at the cars around me I might have seen others having the same internal struggle). I was fully prepared to be the outsider the whole weekend, and just hoped they had good food and a comfortable couch I could sit on while I waited. But that’s not what happened. Not only did I make a new lifelong friend before I even made it out of the merch area, over the course of the weekend I unexpectedly found my people. These were people who gave voice to ideas that had been forming in my heart and mind unnamed for years; people who sang songs that awakened longing in my soul; people who stirred up excitement and encouragement in me that I felt needed to be shared. In a sort of epiphany moment I realized that since I wasn’t an artist or musician or writer, I actually had more time and energy to encourage and support those doing the work I loved. I spent the next year diving into anything and everything that had to do with the Rabbit Room. I read the back issues of posts, listened to old podcasts, found new writers to read and musicians to listen to. I developed deep friendships with people I met online in the Facebook Chinwag. And I loved it! The next year at Hutchmoot I realized I was now the one squealing with delight over reunions with long missed friends. Everything felt richer. In the midst of all this, however, as I forged friendships with more and more artists, a question was nagging at me: do I really have a place in this community as someone who isn’t an artist? I wrestled with this insecurity, thinking surely I wasn’t the only non-artist at Hutchmoot or in the Rabbit Room extended family. But did I truly belong? Did I have just as valid a reason to claim a seat at the table as everyone else? Or were there “preferred” people, the artists, who alone get to occupy those seats while I have to content myself to just walk behind and pat them on the back? The question at the root of it all was this: Do we all belong, have a role and meaning, within the Rabbit Room, and really, within the body of Christ? It was in this context of considering my role as a non-artist that a conversation with Doug McKelvey took place, and ultimately led to our collaboration on a 2019 Hutchmoot session that focused on that very topic. In that conversation I explained how I was noticing the parallels between my role on the maternity ward and the way I help and serve my husband at home in his creative ventures. It was intriguing to me to think in these terms, because I had never once questioned the validity or importance of my role at work. It was only in other areas of life that I had struggled to see my role, and myself, as valuable. As a labor and delivery nurse I spend my nights helping laboring women make the transition from woman to mother. My job has many roles, and the more I thought about them, the more I could see parallels for how I help Wes bring about the “birth” of his works of art at home. Sometimes I’m a bouncer or gatekeeper, just making sure random unwanted people don’t crash the birthday party at inopportune times. Other times I am an advocate, pleading the case to help buy my patient as much time as I can so that she can try to avoid a cesarean section, or convince the doctor to let her have that epidural now instead of making her wait. I crack jokes and tell stories to help an anxious woman or nervous dad feel more comfortable. I sometimes have to go find that nervous dad who has wandered off for coffee at the worst time and make sure he doesn’t miss anything important—you know, like the birth of his firstborn. I am a guide who has walked the road before, a cheerleader who really believes the patient in my care can do this, a coach telling her how to breathe, a time-keeper who says it’s not time to push yet, a drill sergeant who says forcefully “get it together! You can do this!” and helps them snap out of the despair that tempts them to believe they’re defeated, so that they can muster courage for a final push to get that baby out. Most importantly, I help a woman find the strength she already has to do what she was created to do. And then, when finally the moment arrives and all the sweat and tears and pain and exertion pay off in the welcoming of a child to this world, I am always in awe. It never gets old. I’m there to assist in that intimate moment when the new mom holds her baby for the first time. I see that look of wonder as she meets this new person who has changed her life. I’m not the one giving birth, this isn’t my baby, but in some small way I get to be part of the miracle. The effort and the experience and the joy are shared. We all work together, each playing their part, so that the project comes to fruition and the reach and impact of the work are amplified. Bailey McGee The more I considered this, the more I could see that being present to witness a guitar being created, or to hear the beauty of a song finally coming together, or to read and give feedback or encouragement on the seventh revision of a novel is no less a participation in a miracle of sub-creation. I may not be the one giving birth to those works either, but just as before, I can be a facilitator, an intercessor, an encourager, and a witness. I am as much a participant in the process here because it isn’t just about the physical act of “making” but also about everything that aids or hinders that creative process. I can care and nurture my people as they find the strength to do what they were called to do, then share in the joy and stewardship of this creation as it goes on to fulfill its redemptive purpose. So just as my role at work makes me a participant in the birthing stories of so many women, so my role in relation to craftspeople, writers, artists, and musicians allows me to participate in the birthing of their good works. And every single one of these works, these acts of creation that send beacons of hope and messages about God’s love and redemption out into the world, are important. At least one reason The Rabbit Room exists is to bring into the world art that would nourish the community, the church, and the culture. It was a revelation for me to finally realize that just because I’m not the one actually creating the art doesn’t mean artists don’t need what I personally bring to this community. Community nourishes that art. I love the image that someone offered (probably Doug) that it’s like we’re launching spears into the world, works that might penetrate the shadows and drive back the darkness. But any particular song or painting or book is just the tip of that spear. And no one just lobs a spear tip and expects anything to come of it. It has to have a shaft with weight and length in order for the spear to be balanced, to fly true and to hit its mark with enough power to penetrate. We, the rest of the community, whether we also consider ourselves artists or not, together are the shaft, the binding, the eye that spies the target, the feet planted for stability, and the arm that flings the spear so that it travels far, not to mention those who worked behind the scene in prayer and intercession. We all work together, each playing their part, so that the project comes to fruition and the reach and impact of the work are amplified. I remember a conversation with Carrie Givens and several others about what to call myself as I struggled to find my place in this community. We tossed around several suggestions, some better than others. While I loved the nod to Oscar N. Reteep as an appreciator, I was leaning toward the term patroness (mostly because it sounds like I’m a character in a Jane Austin book) even though I don’t get to spend nearly as much money supporting other people’s projects as I would like. “You’re a namer,” Carrie interjected matter-of-factly (and somewhat ironically, as she was the one doing the “naming” in that moment). But the idea resonated and stuck with me. Carrie further explained how she first encountered this concept of “namers” in a blog post: “Finally, reading Madeleine L’Engle’s book, A Wind in the Door, I found it: Theo (Vincent Van Gogh’s brother) was a Namer. . . Namers remind us who we are and that our endeavors are worth doing. . .” Carrie Givens is, of course, herself a Namer of the first order. Her observations and encouragements have been instrumental in helping me find my own role here in The Rabbit Room. Further along in Carrie’s post she references Diana Glyer’s use (in her book Bandersnatch) of the related term Resonator as a term to describe “anyone who acts as a friendly, interested, supportive audience.” Glyer says that “Resonators give feedback, praise, encouragement, and offer help and promote an artist’s work.” Carrie goes on to say: I would call namers a subset of this category, with the specific role of telling, affirming, and reminding the artist of who he or she is. The Inklings, Glyer notes, served as resonators for one another, exerting a mutual, beneficial, shaping influence on each other’s writings and in each other’s lives. “For All the Namers,” Carrie Givens Also discussing Glyer’s work, Andrew Peterson writes: One of the central tenets of the Rabbit Room is that art nourishes community, and community nourishes art. And to me the profound thing about that idea is that the friendships—the heart-shaping relationships, the Christ-centered community—will outlast the works themselves. . . If you want to write good books, good songs, good poems, you need some talent, yes. You also need to work hard, practice a lot, cultivate self-discipline, and study the greats. But you also need good friends. You need fellowship. You need community. “The Inklings, Diana Glyer, and the Art of Community,” Andrew Peterson So what does this mean for each of us in our families, our churches, our communities—and yes, in this far-flung, sometimes hard to define, but dearly-loved group we know as The Rabbit Room? I would suggest that it first means we should take the Apostle Paul seriously when he writes: For the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. 1 Corinthians 12:14-26 This is the place where we first must meet. We are all part of the body of Christ, and we have come together to make up this unique collection of people. And here, if scripture is to be believed, we are not only all welcome at the table, but we are each individually needed and necessary. We aren’t here by accident. Each of us has a role to play, whether it’s in actively creating, or actively loving, serving, encouraging, facilitating, and amplifying the creativity of another. And a beautiful aspect of the Rabbit Room is that often we can shift between roles, free to use our gifts however they best serve the work and people involved. So I must take seriously my role as a midwife for the creative processes going on around me, because the Kingdom is advanced by each of us playing our part—at the end of the day, this is how the work gets done. This is how we grow, and how we together love the world that so desperately needs the beauty, the wonder, the joy, the hope, the healing, forgiveness, redemption, and resurrection offered in the person of Christ. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. Ephesians 4:15-16. That’s the vision, the blueprint. Okay, so great. I’ve come to recognize myself as having a role to play in that work, as not being an outsider but one who belongs here. Now what does that actually look like? For me, it meant starting at home. When my husband, Wes is working on a guitar or other project, he can lose himself in the process. He becomes intensely focused on his work, sometimes forgetting even to eat. I can step into a role of midwifing that process. I can do practical things like take him some food (in his case, a taco). Keep the kids occupied. Pay the bills and do the dishes while he’s in the frantic last few days before a deadline (because artists never procrastinate until the last minute. Ever.) I can answer those phone calls and reply to texts from his mom. I even listen to him play the guitar in the last stages of crafting, giving my honest but non-professional opinion. We as a community share the privilege, the labors, and the joy of what transpires when we come together, all of us, to make sure the work gets done—that our collective calling is fulfilled, that our peculiar role in the story of God's Kingdom is well-played. Bailey McGee I think it’s important to note here that everyone can do something. You do not have to be a world-class guitarist or know the difference between steel string and classical to just listen and given your honest feedback. I’m happy to read the novel my daughter is writing, even though I’m the last person you should come to for help with grammar (thanks to everyone who edited this for me!). I can help with what I know and show caring involvement, even if I don’t have technical knowledge. Here’s the great thing about the body of Christ: Other people do have that knowledge. That’s someone else’s job, and praise Jesus someone understands commas. We are just called to do what we can, where we are, to build up this community. But just because we aren’t always the ones creating the work of art doesn’t mean sacrifices and hard work aren’t asked of us. Keeping the house running with those aforementioned eight kids while Wes backs up a friend on guitar at a Mass on Saturday evenings can be a lot of work. But I know with my help, new manifestations of goodness and light are being ushered into the world. And sometimes, something else happens. In Exodus 1:15-21 we meet Shiphrah and Puah, Hebrew midwives told by Pharaoh to kill all the Hebrew baby boys. They defy him and let the boys live. The text says they are given families of their own for being faithful. I think something interesting can happen when you spend your time pouring into the lives of others, helping them to live more fully into their own callings. Sometimes God makes room to pour into you when you have poured yourself into others. I am the last person who ever thought I could be creative. But, after being around all you lovely people, I started wanting to create too. My personality tends toward the practical, so since I like to eat, I began to experiment with the crafting of creative—maybe even artistic?—pies. Getting involved in this community helped me to see that even making a pie could be a way to send light into the world. If Doug will indulge the slight change to one of his liturgies: Let us make this day a pie that would point to that day, a meal to remind of the beauty and the love and the promise undergirding all creation. Let us make a pie to remind our pilgrim guests that life will not always be so burdened, that their days of exile will end, and that they will feast at last joyfully in the city of their hope, at the table of their God-King, at the wedding fest of their Prince , at the dawning of a golden age, untouched by mortal sorrows. from “A Liturgy for the Preparation of an Artisan Meal,” Doug McKelvey Here we each steward gifts for the benefit of others, whatever those gifts may be. Each of us steward the power to remind each other (in so many ways) that this life will not always be so hard, this world not always so broken, and that we are standing on that burning edge of dawn where the rising light of redemption is already visible. We as a community share the privilege, the labors, and the joy of what transpires when we come together, all of us, to make sure the work gets done—that our collective calling is fulfilled, that our peculiar role in the story of God’s Kingdom is well-played. We all belong, we all are needed, we all have a part to play to see Christ glorified in our midst and in our world.

The Habit Podcast is a series of conversations with writers about writing, hosted by Jonathan Rogers. This week, Jonathan Rogers talks with Trillia Newbell, author of Sacred Endurance: Finding Grace and Strength for a Lasting Faith. Trillia Newbell is the author of several books including United: Captured by God’s Vision for Diversity, and, most recently, Sacred Endurance: Finding Grace and Strength for a Lasting Faith. She is a former journalist and currently the Director of Community Outreach for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission for the Southern Baptist Convention. Jonathan and Trillia discuss the role of endurance in a writer’s life, the importance of being realistic about what it means to do the work, and writing as bearing witness to reality rather than inventing it. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 13 of The Habit Podcast. [Editor’s note: Next Thursday Jonathan is launching a new online class called Writing With Atticus. Participants will read through To Kill A Mockingbird with a writer’s eye, learning how to apply Harper Lee’s techniques to their own writing. Find out more at TheHabit.co/Mockingbird.] Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.

Nearly four years ago, when Helena Sorensen and I had our first conversations about publishing The Door on Half-Bald Hill, we didn’t have any idea how relevant it would prove to be here in the midst of the COVID-19 quarantine. It’s a tale of an isolated people whose world is on the verge of collapse amid blight and plague, and it’s the journey of a young man who refuses to believe the end is inevitable. Though the emotional and physical landscape of the book is bleak, its destination is bright as the dawn. To find that right now, at this strange moment in history, that we have a beautiful book that can speak directly into the fears and questions that people are experiencing seems more than a little surreal. It seems blessed, if I’m honest. And so, even though the physical book won’t be available until May 22 (and manufacturing delays are likely), we (both Helena and Rabbit Room Press) want to get this story out there so people can be blessed by it right now. To that end, today we’re emailing a PDF of the book (complete with artwork by Stephen Crotts) to everyone who has pre-ordered it. And we’re making it available as a free download for anyone else who pre-orders it through the Rabbit Room Store. Click here to read my introduction to the book (hint: I love it), and then get thee to the Rabbit Room Store to pre-order it if you haven’t already. I hope it’s a balm for your soul. I know it has been for mine.

Dear Ask Doug, My grandparents are always gushing about some dude on the radio® named “Paul Harvey,” as if I should know who that is. Well, I don’t, and I never have. And when I tell them so they just make little huffing noises through their noses and turn to stare derisively into the middle-distance®. They’ve also threatened to write me out of their will because of my so-called historical paucities of the first order® and also for something they refer to as generational insolence of the third order®. I don’t get it. Sometimes I wonder if my family is just weird. Anyway, can you tell me Who was this Paul Harvey?, and what was his enduring contribution to Western Civilization®? Also, do you know if it’s possible to sue your own grandparents, and win, without them ever finding out? —Accused of Insolence in Ipswich Dear Ipsolence, First, I question whether you fully grasp the purposes of a registered trademark symbol. Just a hunch, but I’d hazard the term “Western Civilization” has been used in print before. Also, as a general note, I no longer offer specific legal advice as relates to family squabbles, revokable trusts (or mistrusts), lines of dynastic succession, perpetual right to live in a parent’s basement, etc., so I’m just going to politely ignore those rather too personal aspects of your communication and turn my attention instead to your primary line of inquiry. Inheritance and copyright laws notwithstanding, I was delighted to receive your question regarding Paul Harvey, as that’s pretty much the subject I had already decided to devote this column to anyway. Perhaps the following knowledge, once mastered, will allow you to finally impress and patch things over with your grandsire and grandame. Please try to pay attention. This is likely going to require a rather long and elaborate explanation, perhaps even split into two parts, with each being more impressive than the last! Let’s begin. Who Was This Paul Harvey and Why Should You Care? Beloved radio personality Paul Harvey was a man gifted with a unique voice that, even according to the begrudging praise of his rivals, could “flow over a hot razor like melted butter.” Love him or hate him, listeners always knew who was talking. It was Paul. Paul Harvey. The man who wouldn’t shut up. And people loved him for that. For a period of 68 consecutive years, there was never a moment when Paul Harvey’s distinctive croon was not bouncing somewhere round the ionosphere, owing to the proliferation of his many programs aired on more than 60,002 stations1. At the height of his career, Harvey was hosting four-hundred-sixty-four daily, syndicated, radio programs and employing an army of seventeen-thousand-fourteen2 researchers, mic technicians, and tongue-harpies (a kind of physical therapist who specializes in loosening the muscles of the lips, mouth and throat; also known as an “LMT Man3,” a “speed bagger4,” a “tonsil donkey,” or a “palette jockey”). Harvey’s staff actually represented a greater population at the time than that of the mysterious territories that were soon to become Wyoming, if you didn’t count the Native Americans5. Though all of his radio shows were popular, Paul Harvey’s most successful program was the short, human-interest feature named “The Rest Of The Story” in which the “un-peered potentate of the wireless domain6” would relate some little-known bit of history from a clever angle, giving the story an anecdotal twist at the very end of the telling so that listeners would experience that pleasurable aha! moment of connecting the dots to a larger story: “Ah, so that little orphaned chimney sweep with the oddly prehensile toes rose to become the lion of Britain, Winston Churchill,” or “Oh, so the chemical mixture that frustrated housewife threw together in her kitchen sink became the local anesthetic we now know as lidocaine,” or “Well I’ll be blinkered, Jummy! I never knew that old tom on The Little Rascals was actually a dog in a zippered cat suit!” Listeners loved the program, even forming “Harvey Parlor Clubs” to enjoy the program in the company of fellow Pauly-Philes®, typically while nibbling a bylaw-mandated spread of mashed brazil nuts, curly creamed pork tails, and Flattened Toledo Tea Cakes7, and consuming gallons of the fermented oatmeal drippings popularly referred to as “Van Winkle’s Delight.” These practices now sound like the quaint effervescence (or radioactive decay?) of a more innocent time, but we shouldn’t forget that a generation raised on the program spent their childhoods acting out Harvey’s colorful anecdotes, and slapping one another in the face before shouting “Now you know the rest of the story, Jack!” In fact, the generation that came of age between the turbulence of the idealistic but ill-advised, 1952 “Cub Scout Coup8” and the hopeful advent of the two-fisted-sippy-cup9 in 1974 were generally so shaped by the broadcasts they came to be collectively referred to by sociologists as “The Harvey Quints,” though, of course, there were in actuality more than five of them10. After forty-two years of continuous “The Rest of the Story” broadcasts however, the constant acquisition of new material became an ongoing problem for Harvey’s research team. There simply wasn’t enough history that had happened yet at that time11 to continue to sustain entirely new episodes of the show. Unbeknownst to Harvey, his staff began at that time to cleverly alloy fictitious elements with stories that were mostly true, finding that this little trick would afford them opportunity to repurpose episodes Harvey (whose memory spanned no more than ten years12) had broadcast decades earlier. The war13 was on at the time, and with so much attention diverted elsewhere, the “unsustainable ruse bound to eventually break the heart of the whole world®” actually succeeded for several “happy, golden, deluded years®.” And on that relatively pleasant note I feel we should hit pause, affording you a week or two to digest the happier half of this sad recounting, before we don our metaphorical14 mud-boots and wade into the fetid, sloshy murk ever stagnating within the seedy underbelly of broadcast history® to explore the inevitable downfall of that seemingly innocent and gilded age and of her most noble figurehead, Mr. Harvey and of the small, Spanish goat he was never seen without15. It is not a pretty tale, but perhaps it is at least one from which you might glean the fruit of some very heavy-handed moralizing. Honestly, I still can’t believe you’re thinking of suing your own grandparents. I’m trying to tell this story, but almost the whole time, that’s all I’ve been thinking about. End, Part the First

“As long as we’re singing, we might as well be smiling, too.” As I interviewed Randall about the new Slugs & Bugs album last week, he spoke that sentence so matter-of-factly that I knew he believed it the way a person believes more with each morning that the sun will rise tomorrow, too. And I wrote it down immediately. Among many other things, we talked about making beds, changing light bulbs, and scooping up your dog’s poop, but I found that the thread tying our whole conversation together was an abiding conviction that a child’s sincere laughter can tell us more about what is ultimately true than any number of books. And what is true is that the joy and delight of the Creator himself keeps this world turning, even and especially when we are most tempted to despair of whether it can really be true at all. It’s my delight to share here a transcription of our conversation. I hope it reminds you, as it did me, of this joy that lives at the heart of the universe. If you want to learn more about what Randall & co. is up to, then click here to explore their Slugstarter, where they are raising support for a brand new album full of silly songs: Modern Kid. Drew: So where did Modern Kid begin? Randall: Modern Kid came about because I feel so strongly about the mission of Slugs & Bugs: I want the way we walk around in the world as believers to be reflected in the stuff I make, whether it’s songs, books, or a TV show. We had made four records of scripture songs in a row. And as great as that is, it skews towards the Sundays of our lives. So I started to feel the need for everyday songs, about all the other days—something about the grocery store, or making your bed, or walking the dog, or— D: Pangolins! An everyday Tennessee encounter. R: Why yes, of course! The root of it is that I had wanted to balance out our mission and vision by reflecting in these songs how we walk around in the world, and celebrate it, no matter the context. Jesus comes with us everywhere we go, no matter whether we’re changing a light bulb or singing in a choir. I wanted some changing-the-lightbulb songs. D: That was one of the main questions I wanted to ask you: I’ve sensed those two strands in the voice of Slugs & Bugs, one being scripture songs and the other being silly songs. Those are two formats that convey different sides of the same coin. So I was curious to hear: Has that always been a given for you, those two channels as a writer? Which one came first? R: Sure. So it began with writing songs, period. When my kids were little, I was just writing songs about them, to them, lullabies, silly songs. But even to call them silly songs is to presume I was trying to write something silly. I was just writing songs. I’ve always had humor in my songs, anyway—not in every song, but I’ve always approached songs with the “Cheeseburger in Paradise” influence. As long as we’re singing, we might as well be smiling, too. So it was natural to dig into that more when writing songs for kids. But before I wrote scripture songs, I wrote gospel songs: songs that are specifically about the gospel, where Jesus and his mission are central. So I had songs like “Stop, Christ Is Speaking” and “God Makes Messy Things Beautiful” and “God Made Me Like He Made the Sea.” It wasn’t until we started homeschooling our kids that I started writing scripture songs, and it was more utilitarian then. And it worked so well that I started recording them for Slugs & Bugs, and that was so powerful for me that it occupied my attention for nine years. D: I really appreciate hearing how what has grown into two categories began so organically with the need that you’re filling. R: Thanks. You know, deep in the DNA of these silly songs is the philosophy that by being childlike as adults, we are tapping into an aspect of our personhood that Jesus is calling us to anyway. In three out of the four gospels, Jesus says, “If you don’t come to me like a child, you can’t enter the Kingdom.” Silliness, by its very nature, is childlike. There’s a self-forgetfulness required in order to be silly. It’s also required in order to be a disciple. I usually tell the congregation in my concerts that silliness is discipleship practice: you have to not take yourself seriously and forget about yourself, and it’s really in the service of someone else. You’re being silly for your kid, stepping into what it looks like to be a disciple. Being silly with people is an opportunity to bask in a joyful sincerity. No one's being made fun of and no one's hurting; we're just rejoicing. Randall Goodgame In that way, singing a crazy song about table tennis or a pangolin or poop in a bag is an invitation to joy for joy’s sake; joy is the one thing that remains in heaven, along with love. I mean, it’s not like I’m singing silly songs for the sole purpose of making people better disciples. First and foremost, it’s just fun. Everybody needs to laugh, especially right now. I definitely see the Lord’s hand in the timing of this record. D: I’m reminded of the Wendell Berry quote: “Be joyful, though you’ve considered all the facts.” It’s a tall order, but it’s also kind of imperative, you know? If you’re going to survive, you have to find joy. And there’s something so defiant in a time like this to refuse to give in to despair—it’s worth rejoicing simply that we’re here and alive. And that sounds like what you’re doing. The invitation to silliness and self-forgetfulness—it’s impossible to remain in control while you’re laughing. R: Because the gospel is true, we as believers get to step into it with this joy and play and silliness, with this great power that is proclaiming, defiantly, the truth of what’s really most true about all of creation. As opposed to the nihilist who says, “Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” There’s no power in that. It’s really just despair. D: There’s really no joy in that, either. R: Right, it’s intellectually dishonest, a sort of fabricated, false joy. But we get to rejoice in the Lord always. D: Another element of a child’s joy is sobriety. When you talk about the nihilist and that joyless attempt at some sort of pleasure—that’s not sober; it’s not fully present in the way that a child’s laughter is fully present. There’s something even more dignified about an unbridled silliness that confounds the wisdom of the world. R: It’s also so completely earnest and sincere. It’s trusting. When you’re being tickled by your dad, you’re not scared, even though you’re completely vulnerable. Being silly with people is an opportunity to bask in a joyful sincerity. No one’s being made fun of and no one’s hurting; we’re just rejoicing. D: There’s something so medicinal about that invitation. R: It’s very grounded in what is most true about the world. As believers, we get to know that truth: it’s that Christ has the victory. When we sing, “Catapultanaugahikawallawallarickitikianapoodloodlakastanvilletown”—there’s this instinct in all of us that says, “How dare you sing a thing like that in a time like this?” Well, let me tell you how I can. Because I’ve been invited to “be joyful in all circumstances.” D: It is daring to sing like that in a time like this. R: It’s a daring characteristic of a healthy disciple. Because if you’re despairing, you’re really not reflecting the final word. D: That’s so beautiful. Let’s take a minute to talk about the particulars of this record. You said you wanted to lean in the direction of writing about changing light bulbs. So where did that take you? Take us through some of the daily life that’s being covered by the songs on this record. R: Part of the DNA of Slugs & Bugs is planting our flag in the ground that Jesus is the Lord of dish-washing and diaper-changing as much as he is the Lord of baptisms. Every moment holy, so to speak! So my son Ben and I were out walking our dog, and you know, it’s the worst scooping up that poop. Like, am I really going to pick up this animal’s poop? You know, yes I am, because it’s right in front of this neighbor’s mailbox. So I scooped the poop, and we’re walking along, and then I just start singing as I’m swinging it, “Poop in a bag, poop in a bag! I’ve got hot, fresh poop in a bag!” That grossed out my son and made him laugh. And I thought, “I love that melody. This has got to be a song.” D: And it’s such a memorable melody. You sure did work it up! I was so beside myself while you were playing it at the Local Show on your piano, and just how through-composed it is. You took it to its absolute fullest fruition in a way that was delightfully surprising. R: Oh my gosh, Drew! That is food for my soul. That’s always what I’m trying to do. Well, I spent a good, long time working on it. So there’s that one, and then there’s a song about a balloon. You know how when a kid’s got a balloon, it’s very important to them! But I wanted to try to find a way to say that a balloon can’t last forever, and it’s okay to just love it while you’ve got it. While it won’t be here forever, it’s awesome while it’s here. There’s another song about making your bed, and it sort of ended up taking the form of an old-fashioned folk song—“fi diddle-diddle aye-yay”—you know that song that goes, “There’s a hole in my bucket, dear Liza”? D: Yes, the boy in that song is so clueless! R: Yeah! Well in this one, there’s this poor little boy who can’t remember to make his bed. So he ties a string around his finger to help him remember, but he forgets there’s a string on his finger. So he doesn’t make his bed. So then he puts a feather in his bible, but he forgets to read his bible, so he doesn’t make the bed. So then he tries putting his cat in the bathtub. That kind of thing. D: So what ends up doing it for him? R: Well I’ll tell you—spoiler alert! As a consequence of trying all these other things, finally the song goes, “the bugs flew in and the bat chased the bugs, and the cat chased the bat and the dog chased the cat, and the goose chased the dog and mom chased the goose and dad chased mom, and now everybody’s gone, so I tried to pick my nose. And then I felt the string around my finger, so I made my bed.” So he makes his bed! D: It worked! R: Yeah, and then the end is this great anthem where there’s this shouting, “I made my bed!” And Don Chaffer is to thank for that. D: That sounds marvelously like Don Chaffer. R: Oh yeah, man. D: Well the last thing I want to get some information about for people is of course the Slugstarter: what exactly is happening, how folks can get involved, and where the Slugstarter idea came from. R:  Well, it’s our version of a Kickstarter campaign. I had crowdfunded the last five or so records through Kickstarter, but I wanted this one to be more personalized for our website. So the other fun, new thing about this record is that there are characters from the Slugs & Bugs Show all over the record. So Doug the Slug and Sparky the Lightning Bug both appear, and many others. That was a lot of fun, working with puppeteers, having them come in and sing. But also bridging the worlds together—the books, the show, the raccoons, and now Doug and Sparky—lots of kids out there have fallen in love with Doug the Slug, so it was a real treat getting to have him come in. Watching a slug play the melodica is really a sight to behold, so that alone was worth the price of admission for me. D: I can only imagine. Well I’m so excited, and I really resonate with what you’re saying about the timing. On the one hand, it’s really hard to release anything into the world right now. But on the other hand, we’ve got a lot of time on our hands and a huge need for joy and delight. I think it’s the perfect time for a record like this, that’s so intent on celebrating daily life. This is what we need, and I appreciate you laboring to put it into the world. R: It was a deep joy to make, and I have to thank Ben Shive and Don Chaffer for their unmistakable influence on this one. I’m in some seriously blessed creative company. This project started in joy, so I’m hoping that joy is what listeners will hear through their speakers.

When I was in high school, I carved out a piece of my humanities education to study stained glass windows, old cathedrals of European kingdoms, and the men who made them fine—medieval artists smelling strong of a long day’s labor, Middle Age wet mortar, and musty, dark communion wine. These men made beauty meant to age, with secret dyes that centuries of chemists in white lab coats have not yet learned to redesign that grow bolder and brighter year after year of sun and dust and time—years longer than any artist can survive. The moment those windows were made was the moment they were most decayed, and that is all the artist ever saw, and every generation watched the colors slowly come alive. My own sunlit halls of memory are not segmented in perfect cuts of colored glass but blurred in pink and white calico, my face pressed up against the apron you always wore when you were in the kitchen—smelling either of fresh-brewed, hot mint tea or taco meat, depending on what you just made for me—and your old living room is filled with Christmas gifts, wrapped, colored bright, to open soon, mysterious to me as tumbled piles of old medieval stone. Your sacred intercession for me all those years, starting from before I was born, is still carrying me home. Hannah Hubin I remember sitting in your living room in my turquoise one-piece fleece pajamas with the teddy bear embroidered on the right shoulder, forcing my bare toes into the loose, unraveling weave of your couch, watching Little House on the Prairie reruns on the Hallmark channel. Except we never made it very far into the episode because all I ever wanted to see was the opening scene, when little Sidney Greenbush playing Carrie face-plants into the field. I thought it was cute, and I guess you thought I was too, because you would stand behind me, leaning over against the back of the couch, with the old TiVo remote in your hand for a good several minutes, rewinding the opening over and over again. I didn’t know when I was four how well-acquainted of a person I would become with falling down, but maybe you did. Anyhow, I’ve always known you didn’t mind. In the autumn, we went to the pumpkin patch and had our picture taken with a scarecrow wearing a Cubs shirt. On Saturday mornings, we pulled out the newspaper, circled the ads, and went to all the garage sales listed, you and me and my mom: three generations, centuries removed from medieval cathedrals, rummaging through garages to find something beautiful. We both know I could be a perfect devil as a little girl—fully-equipped with a pink and purple My Little Pony Pitchfork—and for the sake of Mom’s sanity and the paint on our walls, you would come over in the afternoons and sit me down next to one of Mom’s overflowing laundry baskets and match socks with me and talk to me and listen to me talk. Sometimes we had tea, and I still drink coffee out of your old china often, sometimes when I write, like this. We took a lot of walks together, I remember that. I remember one walk later on, towards the end. Still, even that close, I don’t think I knew you were sick. I remember we walked to the end of the subdivision we shared, and when we came to the last house, I sat my stubborn butt down on the sidewalk and told you I was too tired to walk back and proceeded into a good summary of how difficult my life was at five years old. You must have been very weary by then. Everyone I’ve ever talked to knows chemo is exhausting. You carried me home on your back. Until I grew up and started trying to be “literary”—whatever that means—you were the only person I knew who wrote poetry. It’s how you prayed for grandkids. I might be a little less stubborn and a little less lazy than that little girl plopped down on the sidewalk—maybe—but I know your sacred intercession for me all those years, starting from before I was born, is still carrying me home. I think about you a lot, and how I was given your name and your dark hair, how your care of me for the few years our two lives overlapped continues to press into me and hem around me and push me on into something more of grace than I ever could have sought out on my own. I think often of who you were as a grandmother, a poet, a cook, an artist: sleeves rolled, apron on, making beautiful the ancient art of loving people you would never live to see grow old. And though it’s been, I guess, just fifteen years of sun and dust and time since you first left us for the old and high cathedral of the sky, I’ve seen enough to say: the grey is now an azure shade, and I wish you could be told that all your yellow has been turning gold.

To kick off Season Two, Drew Miller talks with Sara Groves and Brown Bannister about the first album they ever made together, Add to the Beauty, and specifically the song “Why It Matters.” In this episode, Drew, Sara, and Brown talk about the deceivingly difficult task of telling the truth in a record, the under-publicized connection between beauty and justice, and the magic of a well-written bridge. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 1 of The Second Muse. Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.

The Habit Podcast is a series of conversations with writers about writing, hosted by Jonathan Rogers. This week, Jonathan Rogers talks with singer-songwriter Jeremy Casella. Jeremy Casella is a singer-songwriter in Nashville. In this episode, Jonathan and Jeremy discuss songwriting as a means of processing life, the abiding value of failure, and the centrality of truth-telling. Click here to listen to Season 2, Episode 14 of The Habit Podcast. And click here to view Jeremy’s newest record, Spirit, in the Rabbit Room Store. Special thanks to our Rabbit Room members for making these podcasts possible! If you’re interested in becoming a member, visit RabbitRoom.com/Donate.