Category: Post
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New Book Idea: The Loss of Belonging (How To Survive When Your Tribe Abandons You)
My latest book idea is in response to the dramatic feedback about a blog post a few weeks ago. My website traffic the next few days was 100 times greater than normal. Following is a rough draft of Chapter One. I would greatly appreciate you taking time to read it and then expressing your thoughts,…
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The Loss of Belonging: Ten Steps To Finding A New (And Better) Tribe
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes, 10 seconds. On a fateful day in June 2011 over 10,000 of my Christian family, friends, and peers abandoned me. In one day. My social networks and the Christian Arts conference which provided my income became a wasteland. Of course, they say I abandoned them, and perhaps they…
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Ten Crazy Weird Things I Love After 3 1/2 Years Living In The Wilderness
Estimated reading time: 11 minutes 15 seconds. “Are we weird?” I suddenly asked Gina a few mornings ago as we savored an extended coffee hour on our lower porch surrounded by trees, deer, turkeys, groundhogs, singing birds, the buzz of cicadas, and…utter solitude. Sitting in the epicenter of 54 acres allows (with the exception of the…
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How The Church Made Me Rich (Confessions of a Former Southern Baptist Minister)
Estimated reading time: 9 minutes, 6 seconds. If you are not careful, success can make you forget how far down you began. That’s why I write so candidly. I hope the point of view I lay before you is a challenge to your spirit and evokes an active response if you have ever felt within yourself…
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“God, I Have A Question…or Two” Videos and Study Guides by Randy Elrod
Video Talks by Randy Introduction (Duration 7:49) Guilt (Duration 9:16) Loneliness (Duration 10:51) Fear & Anxiety (Duration 10:10) Doubt (Duration 10:09) Video Discussions with Panel Introductory Panel Discussion About Questions (Duration 8:55) Guilt (Duration 8:10) Fear (Duration 7:51) Downloadable Study Guides Introduction & Instructions Guilt Loneliness Fear
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An Elrod Update (For Those Who Care And For Those Who Don’t)
After seeing out latest social network posts, many of you have asked questions about our current status. Here is a very succinct synopsis: Gina and I have purchased a delightful (circa 1955) beach cottage three blocks from the Gulf of Mexico in quaint and charming Dunedin, Florida. We have named it Cocomo. We plan…
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Dunedin, Florida—My Top 10 Favorite Things
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes, 30 seconds. So proud to be a new resident of quaint and charming downtown Dunedin, Florida.* Here are my Top Ten favorite things so far. I’m sure there will be many more… 1) The Seafood—I love fresh seafood and Dunedin has it in spades. Jensen Bros. Seafood Market is only five minutes…
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The Natural Life
Take A Walk In The Tennessee Woods with Artist & Author Randy Elrod, Whose Everyday Explorations Provide New Recipe Ideas, Art Projects, And Feed His Love Of Nature. by Sharon Franklin Estimated reading time: 2 minutes, 27 seconds The sun is just coming up when Randy shuffles into the kitchen to brew hot water and…
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Our Cozy and Private Mountain Cottage Is Now on Airbnb
View On AirbnbCozy & Private Mountain Cottage with a View
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Ten Lies Most Christians Believe About The Bible
Estimated reading time: 7 minutes, 54 seconds. Especially in light of the events today in Jerusalem when many human beings are dying and are being murdered because of American and Christian Biblical beliefs, and after a search for meaning and truth, this sixty-year-old has been researching, reading widely, and asking probing questions about my religious upbringing, faith,…
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My 60 Favorite Songs of All-Time At Age 60
(In No Particular Order) I’ve Been) Searchin’ So Long by Chicago Just You ‘N’ Me by Chicago Happy Man by Chicago Long Black Veil (Live) by Dave Matthews Band What’s Been Going On by Amos Lee You’ve Made Me So Very Happy by Blood, Sweat & Tears I Can’t Make You Love Me by Bonnie Raitt…
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A Few of My Favorite Things Alphabetically…Musicians, Artists, Authors, Food, and Drink After 60 Years of Life
A—Allmans, Amarone, Ambrose, Asparagus B—Bakewell, Blue Cheese, Berry, Bolognese, Bradbury, Buechner C—Cabernet, Cahill, Campbell, Clapton, Chicago, Csikszentmihalyi, Caviar, Cognac D—Decemberists, Desclos, Dostoyevsky, d’Yquem E—Eagles, Edmundson, Elbow, Emerson F—Fleetwood Mac, Firenze, Fowles, G—Gire, Garam Masala, Gelato H—Heinlein, Hemingway, Hollis I—Iver J—Jackson, Jones, Joyce, Jung, K—King, Krause L—Lawrence, L’Engle, LeGuin M—Manchego, Manhattans, McCammon, McCullough, McLachlan, McKennit, Miller,…
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A Year at Kalien (March)
Estimated reading time: 16 minutes, 22 seconds. The chill, frost, and precipitation have not abated. Even the locals are saying this is the worst winter ever. Old Man Winter engaged in a cataclysmic tug-of-war with Mother Nature this month and he will not let go. In February the NFL hosted the Super Bowl, while here at…
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Would My Thirty-Year-Old Self Know Me Now At Sixty?
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes. If youth is a curable disease, I must be getting healthy. A few days ago I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a sixty-year-old man staring back at me. Even a mention of the year 1958 seems long ago and oh so far away. And now I sit here…
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Seven Powerful Questions For A Better Life
Estimated reading time: 1 minute, 13 seconds. Researchers say we have over 50,000 thoughts per day, and over half of them are negative. If we instead make the time and effort to focus our questions in a positive direction, we give ourselves the opportunity for a better life. Here are seven compelling questions that have greatly enhanced…
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Where Have All The Readers Gone?
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes, 27 seconds. Knowledge is power. Francis Bacon made this powerful statement in his Meditationes Sacrae (1597). If this statement is true, it follows that reading and writing bring power to literate societies. These abilities enable the transmission of knowledge with far greater accuracy and context and in far greater quantity and…
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A Year at Kalien (February)
Estimated reading time: 15 minutes, 59 seconds. All this month we sang new lyrics to The Arky Arky Song that we learned in Sunday School as kids. “It rained and rained, for twenty-eight daysies, daysies, it rained and rained for twenty-eight daysies, daysies, nearly drove those horses crazy crazies, children of the Lord.” We planned a…
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Porn Stars, Preachers & The President (A Candid Tribute on President’s Day)
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes, 20 seconds. The evangelicals know that Trump has been whoring around for years, but his speeches at prayer breakfasts, his judicial appointments, and occasional coddling of his pastoral advisory board give the Christians a comforting warm glow. It makes them feel solid, substantial, and virtuous. It makes them think of their…
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A Year at Kalien (January)
Estimated reading time: 14 minutes, 33 seconds. Many people long for a farm in the country someday, but with only my wife and a small dog in tow, at the age of fifty-seven, we decided to go for it. We purchased fifty-four acres in the remote foothills of the Appalachians and spent three years clearing the…
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My Purpose (Part Two)
Thanks for stopping by. These popular posts have become a book and it is available exclusively on Amazon in paperback, Kindle, and online versions HERE.