The foundations beneath the walls of my life
Core values are not formed in a single moment. They are shaped over time — through experience, loss, joy, regret, growth, faith, and reflection. They become the foundation beneath the walls of our lives. Every choice we make rests upon something deeper. These values are the floor beneath my story — learned on a Mississippi farm, refined through ministry, tested in tragedy, and strengthened through love.
Life is sacred
I came to believe life is sacred not through doctrine, but through experience — through the fields of Mississippi, through Native American spirituality, through the Genesis creation stories where God calls everything good.
When God breathed into formed dust, the image of God filled humanity with the capacity to love, to rejoice, to live in peace, to be patient and kind, to practice gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. The breath of God made us more than creatures of instinct — it made us beings capable of relationship, responsibility, and growth.
Yet that sacred breath was paired with freedom. God gave humanity choices. Life unfolds as a journey of choices and events that shape and form us, slowly transforming us into who we are becoming.
Life, then, is not something to fear. Each day presents opportunities for growth, awareness, repentance, courage, and deeper love.
I learned over time that transformation is not driven by fear of God’s judgment, but by God’s steady love. God’s holiness is not harshness; it is wholeness. It is love inviting us to become fully human.
If life carries God’s breath, then everything carries sacred potential. Rather than dividing the world into “good” and “bad,” I have come to see life as a movement toward good, better, and best — a continual unfolding toward deeper love, deeper truth, deeper compassion. Sacredness is not perfection. It is possible.
When God breathed into a form of dirt, God’s image filled humanity with the ability to love, have joy, be at peace, have patience, be kind, be gentle, have self-control, and be faithful. Yet, God gave humanity a choice that spans a life, a process or journey filled with choices and events that shape and form humanity, transforming or changing the person. Life is a gift from God to be opened daily. Each day presents opprtunities for for growth and change. I learned it is not fear of God’s judgment but God’s way of loving me and shaping me into the image of God.
I no longer see life divided neatly into “good people” and “bad people.” I see a sacred journey of becoming — choices that move us toward good, better, and best. Even in failure, there is an invitation. Even in brokenness, there is potential for growth.
Life is Relational
I did not learn this truth on the front porch first. I learned it in an Ethics class in 1969 at Welch College. Professor Leroy Forlines spoke of four basic relationships: God, others, self, and the universe.
At the time, I heard the words, but I did not yet understand them.
The idea was a seed. It took years for that seed to mature.
It needed love over fear.
It needed growth over protection.
It needed the realization that truth is bigger than tradition.
Over time, I came to see that Jesus’ Greatest Commandments — to love God and love neighbor — are relational at their core. And I John’s simple but profound statement, “God is love,” changed the way I understood everything.
I also discovered something I had not understood as a boy: we cannot truly love God and others until we learn to accept and love ourselves — not an idealized self, but the real self with scars, insecurities, history, and longing.
But long before I could explain a relationship, I experienced it.
Danny was the first friend my age who felt like an equal. His family was poor and often looked down upon in our community. Yet when we were together, none of that mattered. We did not measure who was better. We did not compete for worth. We simply played. We dreamed. We built a church floor out of scrap lumber and imagined a future bigger than the one we had.
We accepted each other without reservation.
I did not realize at the time how rare that was.
After Danny was killed, something shifted in me. I think his loss created a vacuum. I never quite felt that same equality again. I often felt like an outsider — the last chosen for ball games, swimming upstream when others were floating easily downstream. Somewhere deep inside, I think I learned that closeness could disappear without warning.
It took decades to understand that wound.
Life is relational, not because relationships are easy, but because they shape us — even in loss.
To love God with heart, soul, mind, and strength is to love with the whole person — physical, emotional, rational, and spiritual. And to love another person means seeing and honoring all four dimensions in them as well.
Love is not reducing a person to usefulness or appearance.
It is seeing the whole person and allowing them to see the whole of you.
It is accepting someone where they are in this moment, if you hope they will accept you where you are in this moment.
Relationship is sacred ground.
It is where we are formed, wounded, and healed.
For many years, I did not realize how much Danny’s death shaped my relationships. I carried an unspoken assumption that closeness could vanish without warning. I guarded parts of myself. I tried to prove my worth. I swam upstream, often unaware of why the current felt so strong.
But over time, something shifted.
Healing did not come in a single dramatic moment. It came slowly — through reflection, through faith, through friendships that endured, through learning to accept myself as I am. I began to see that relationships are not fragile accidents. They are sacred invitations.
I cannot go back and change how I sometimes treated Danny. I carry both regret and gratitude. But I can live now in a way that honors what we shared — equality, imagination, belonging.
Life is relational means this:
We are formed in connection.
We are wounded in connection.
And we are healed in connection.
God meets us there.
And perhaps that is where you might pause.
Who first taught you what friendship felt like?
Where did you learn to guard your heart?
What loss shaped the way you love today?
We cannot rewrite yesterday. But we can understand it. And understanding opens the door to freedom.
Relationships are not about perfection. They are about presence.
They are not about control. They are about courage.
Life is relational — and every relationship, past and present, still has something to teach us.
Life is a process
I did not arrive at my understanding of faith in a single moment. I grew into it.
Life has taught me that truth is bigger than tradition, love casts out fear, and growth is more faithful than control. What the Methodists call sanctification — becoming holy over time — is not instant perfection but steady transformation.
Life is not a fixed state. It is movement.
I once believed faith meant defending what I had been taught. Over time, I learned that faith means growing into deeper love. I once thought certainty was strength. I learned that humility and accountability are stronger. Responsibility matters. Choices matter. What I do shapes who I become.
Traditions can guide us, but they are not the whole truth. Truth is alive. It stretches us. It invites us to mature.
Love, not fear, is what transforms. Fear tries to control. Love allows freedom. And freedom does not mean chaos — it means choosing what is good, better, and best. It means accepting accountability for harm done and continuing to grow beyond it.
Life is a process of becoming.
I have changed. I have unlearned. I have repented. I have healed. I am still becoming.
Growth is not betrayal of where we began. It is faithfulness to what God is still doing.
Living Forward
These three values — life is sacred, life is relational, and life is a process — are the foundation of who I am now.
I feel like I have grown into William — not separated from my past, but connected to it. Connected to my family. Connected to the Mississippi soil that formed me. Connected to the wounds and the healing. Living fully in the present. Hopeful for more days to grow, to love, to become.
I no longer see life as something to defend or endure. I see it as something to participate in.
I want those who read these words to see possibility. Not to settle for the status quo. Not to remain trapped in fear, shame, or old definitions of themselves. I want them to glimpse who they could become through love.
We are not finished products.
We are sacred.
We are relational.
We are becoming.
And love is still shaping us.
The Curious Pilgrim 