The Mockingbird

BibleConferencesFeatured A Talk from Our Recent Conference in NYC Todd Brewer / 7.1.26 In the centuries since Jesus’s life, death, and ascension, Christians have tended to focus on defining Jesus’s nature (Nicaea, Chalcedon), salvific work, or moral teachings. In his excellent NYC talk, our own Todd Brewer–an immensely gifted writer and New Testament scholar–asks a different question: what was Jesus like? Todd focuses on three traits: Jesus was humorous, playful, and type-B.

ChurchRelationshipsReligion The Church Confident Tony Robinson / 6.30.26 True story. It was some years ago now … I was in the second or third interview with the search committee of a congregation, one to which I was eventually called. A member of the search committee said, “I have a question … What’s your thing?” He elaborated, “Most ministers have a cause or an issue that is sort of their thing.

BooksIdentityRelationships From Paul F.M. Zahl’s Peace in the Last Third of Life: A Handbook of Hope for Boomers Paul Zahl / 6.30.26 The following excerpts come from the Introduction and Chapter 1 of Paul F.M. Zahl’s Peace in the Last Third of Life: A Handbook of Hope for Boomers.

FilmMental HealthPsychology Backrooms (2026) and What Happens when Therapy Becomes a Totalizing Ideology Blake I. Collier / 6.29.26 The terror of this year’s Backrooms lies in the architecture of the film’s sets as we are ushered into a corporate nightmare that seamlessly begins to invade the private spaces of our homes as the movie plays out.

Music A mid-summer soundtrack featuring new faves from Andy Squyres, Olivia Rodrigo, Brian Fallon, and the Jackson 5 David Zahl / 6.29.26 Click here to listen on Spotify, or simply press play below: P.S. Did you know that there is a Mockingbird Masterlist playlist on Spotify, featuring every track we’ve included in a monthly playlist since December 2007? That’s over 3,100 songs, AKA 205 hours of listening goodness.

FilmSportsSuffering Games Are Won and Lost, But Grace Has No Judgment Duo Dickinson / 6.26.26 We are in the summer season of the sport-ification of our lives: the World Cup following the NBA Finals, during Major League Baseball, playing into the Full Obsession of Football — on all levels of society. The human body is on full display: some of us remember the line “The Joy of Victory, The Agony of Defeat,” where judging was as relentless as the final score.

America / Bible / BooksLiteratureReligion Reform or Recovery? Will McDavid / 6.25.26 / 1 I recently read Mark Allan Powell’s excellent book about preaching reception, What Do They Hear?, where he discusses the impact of social location and personal context on biblical interpretation.

ConferencesReligious A Talk from Our Recent NYC Conference Tim Blackmon / 6.24.26 In the closing talk of our 2026 NYC conference, our good friend Tim Blackmon explores how we receive the consolation of the gospel in the present tense. In preaching, God’s Word — something infinitely solid, objective, beyond us — makes concrete contact in the very heart of our affections. Sign up for the Mockingbird Newsletter COMMENTS Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published.

AnnouncementsConferences Oct 2–3 in Bloomington, MN Mockingbird / 6.24.26 Welcome to the prime of summer! Hopefully the air where you are is full of the sound of baseball bats and the smell of grilling hot dogs. When the sun starts setting sooner, your grill has gone cold, and exhortative PTA emails start filling your inbox, we have something for you: Mockingbird’s 2nd Minnesota Conference! This October 2–3 at St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Bloomington, MN (a first-ring suburb of Minneapolis).

Bible / Family / RelationshipsReligionSuffering It Don’t Come Easy Melvin Woods / 6.23.26 Having God’s favor might not be what it’s cracked up to be. You would think being one of God’s favorites would be a really great thing. And it is, but it often doesn’t look that way. The favor of God in the Bible rarely looks like worldly success. It often looks like the exact opposite. Psychologist Edward Edinger writes, “The favorites of God receive the severest ordeals…” What does a favored person look like?