https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dEf7TmM0b8 Trying a new approach to my blog by uploading video recordings of the thoughts I would normally blog and sharing them through multiple platforms.
Author: llongard
I grew up in northeast Wisconsin. After high school, I moved to Minneapolis, MN to attend North Central University and graduated 1992 with a degree in Biblical Studies and Humanities. I spent most of the next fifteen years in the Twin Cities area until my family and I moved to Indiana in 2007.
For most of the first seventeen years after college, I was involved in university ministry either as a volunteer, bi-vocational, or full-time campus minister. Through those years, I also worked in the main street marketplace as a retail manager/trainer and as a service representative in the insurance industry. I've also worked in various education roles. Most recently, I have been working on various projects addressing homelessness in Indianapolis and as team lead for Diakonos Community, a Communitas International missional initiative. Through this ministry, we seek to build missional communities in Indianapolis that serve and bring the life of Christ to those on the margins of society. Our strategy is to collaborate with community agencies that serve those in need and share Christ through meaningful relationships.
I am blessed with a wonderful wife, three amazing daughters, and two cats (can't forget the cats, LOL). As a family, we enjoy camping, hiking, gardening, and going to the YMCA together. I also enjoy fishing, riding bicycle, and being involved in whatever my daughters are doing. Though I have not lived in the Green Bay area for over 20 years, I am still a major Packer fan.
Pulling Together Some Dangling Conversations
Like most of us, I have spent a lot of time pondering the events at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. I've processed some of those thoughts through social media posts and comments on other people's posts. Still, thoughts about an event like this in history need to be brought together in one place …
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Why I’m More Likely To Kneel
After concern about whether or not there would be a season due to COVID-19, the NFL is beginning their regular season this weekend. The pre-season games were eliminated from the schedule, but the regular season is going on with a lot of modifications. For now, Football (and other sports) are back, though. This year, player …
Are We Trusting in Chariots and Horses?
In the middle of a political season, I need to note at the beginning of this post that this is not a political post. With so many people approaching this year's general election in a binary good vs. evil attitude it may be easy to interpret this as being either an endorsement for or an …
Willing To Be Scattered?
Over the past few months, I have been pondering a new song by John Mark McMillan titled, "The Road, The Rocks, and The Weeds." It is part of his newly released album, Peopled With Dreams, that may have been missed by some due to it's release date just prior to the onset of the COVID …
Quiet Too Long
Last fall, God began to speak to me about writing more. One specific application He spoke to me about was making this blog more active again. Aside from the occasional book review or repost of an update regarding Circle City Village there has been very little content written for this site. I can give a …
Learning To Talk Again: A Review of “How The Body Of Christ Talks.”
Like many, I am becoming weary of the tone of conversation in America today. It seems as if conversation is a lost art and we prefer to yell (or tweet in all caps) at each other more than talk with each other these days. It's easy to give up hope that conversation is even possible …
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Different Approaches to Changing a City
About a year ago, I attended a webinar with David Fitch and Geoff Holsclaw of Northern Seminary on the different approaches to changing a culture used by different segments of the church. David Fitch essentially defined the two approaches as Enlightenment Evangelical and Post-Enlightenment Anabaptist (or perhaps Neo-Anabaptist). As we enter a local government election …
Where Are We: Babylon or Postexilic Jerusalem?
I have been pondering this question for a while. Recent posts and articles about the state of the Evangelical church two years into the Trump administration, the aging church, and issues within the megachurch world have only made the question speak louder in my mind. It's long been the thinking of those of us in …
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Thankful For Those Who Are Eating Elsewhere Today
The preparations for Thanksgiving dinner have begun in the Longard house. The turkey is in the roaster (an 11 lb turkey seems like a piece of cake after cooking 2 20lb turkeys on Sunday for our friends at Penn Place). Various family members are working on starting their parts of the meal (Our middle daughter …
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