Over the past few months, I’ve had the absolute privilege of completing my Summer Parish Internship in İzmir, Türkiye (the new official name for Turkey).

It’s Valentine’s Day and as the saying goes, “love is in the air,” but what is love anyway? Ask a few different people what love is, and you will quickly discover that love, like ice cream, comes in different flavors that can be enjoyed on their own or mixed together for an extraordinary treat.

Israel is where I have family. It is the country many of my friends, and coworkers (Jews and Arabs both) call home. My heart is weighed down at the recent manifestation of violence and hatred that we have seen erupt there.

How is a Christian to make sense of it all?

“You are dust and to dust you shall return.”

To say that COVID-19 has brought many unwanted challenges into our lives is a blindingly obvious statement. We are weary of the isolation and loneliness.

We are a people who have been made right in our relationship with God through the sacrificial life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The path we’ve travelled in being made right is the path of forgiveness and reconciliation; it’s what it means to be Christians.

I divide my professional life between teaching at Wycliffe College and working as a clinical psychologist in private practice.