The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose for an Age of Distraction

by Justin Whitmel Earley

In China—and in many other places in the world—learning the language of a people is a way to show honor and respect; it’s the way to speak a language the heart understands.

weekly habit of sabbath is to remind us that God is God and we are not.

someone whose work is parenting may sabbath with email writing. Someone whose work is email writing may sabbath with parenting.

Marking time matters,

God’s love for us really can change the way we live, but the way we live will never change God’s love for us.

Sabbath is a gospel practice because it reminds us that the world doesn’t hang on what we can accomplish, but rather on what God has accomplished for us.

because failure is where we live.

When we trip on failure, do we fall into ourselves? Or do we fall into grace?

Failure is the path; beauty is the destination.

It isn’t about trying to live right; it’s about curating a life. It is the art of living beautifully.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Those Winter Sundays.

a great life comes not by the way you avoid failure, but by the way you handle failure.

You are God’s pot, with cracks inlaid with the gold of grace. You are more beautiful now because of the fault lines.

the gold of the resurrection inlays all our fault lines.

something worth doing is worth doing badly.

you lose yourself enough to embarrass yourself. You’ll try anything, because you’re lost in the one you love.