Red Shoe Pastor

Writings of Rev. Robert Glen Brown (Robby)

A space for compassion and love.

Category: Oddities

  • “Where are you, God?”: A lament

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    I wake up almost every morning and look at my phone. My social media reads a litany of pain and suffering. The news reads a litany of ever-evolving chaos and glaringly inadequate response. Fear, anger, sickness, hopelessness; we have almost nothing else to share in this time, they have nothing else to report at this Read more

  • Opening Too Early

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    Our concern lies with the second wave because the second wave will also exacerbate these things, likely exacerbating them longer than if we had just stayed closed long enough. Opening too early will not have a lasting positive effect. It will temporarily relieve it, but the ensuing wave and closing will re-exacerbate everything, and for… Read more

  • Let Me Lament

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    But please, let me lament. Let me be sad and angry at things. Let me not be okay with the fact that things go wrong. Let me want to do better and struggle with the reality that I cannot. Let me feel frustration when things outside of my control derail my effort. Read more

  • I Am Weary

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    I have grown so weary. It was supposed to get easier after Easter.  For some pastors it did.  My problems seem to not stop. When do I get to rest?  When do I get to breathe?  Why am I so worn when I am not anything but a worship leader? My therapist told me to Read more

  • No More Heroes

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    I recently had two thoughts. Thought 1:  I have grown weary of “thought leaders” and famous pastors.  Nothing new – I rant about that all the time – but they keep getting shoved in my face.  One, in particular, has “Stuff That Needs To Be Said” at the top of his website.  I also have Read more

  • I Love/Hate My Voice

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    I have a naturally loud voice.  Just…loud.  As a kid I could never automatically speak in an “inside voice”; it always required conscious modulation.  I constantly got told, “Be quieter!  Talk quieter!  Use your ‘inside voice’!”  Constant, unending admonitions to “be quieter” when I simply used the voice God gave me. It constantly frustrated me.  Read more

  • A Random Memory (And a Rabbit Hole)

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    I had a memory flood back to me like that I hadn’t thought of in a while: When I was young, I really struggled with spelling.  I mean, I still struggle with spelling, but I have those wonderful red squiggles to help me out now.  Anyway, I remember sitting at a parent-teacher conference in fourth Read more

  • Do Something

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    I awoke at 6:30.  Yesterday my big toe hurt a little; today it was killing me and, come to find out, I am struggling to walk (and Dr. Google diagnosed me with gout, which is a bit deflating, not going to lie).   The dog was very sluggish this morning, which caused me to worry Read more

  • Grumpy, Grumpy, Grumpy

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    This should be a tweet, but I couldn’t make it a pithy little quip.  Just…if you don’t care about my inane intolerance of just annoyingly edgy and confident media…like…just…go do something else instead of reading this.  I’m just…tired… But really, I listened to Benjamin Walker’s Theory of Everything today, most notably the episode on the Read more

  • Innocence by Dissociation

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    There is this great Imgur album that makes me smile and is a fun reference for when you need to explain why an argument doesn’t work. Ed Hochuli throwing flags at your logical fallacies. Just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside for some reason, and I don’t even like Ed Hochuli (zebras = Read more