Camaron G. W. Smith

Tonight I opened a new book, "Haiku Japanese Poems For All Four Seasons" and decided to try my hand at it. Might write some for Scribbling Theology in the future.

Image crowned with light,
grace shapes dust toward glory’s form,
God becomes our life.

The Way Back to Orthodoxy Is Through Beauty and Transcendence If the church drifted into quiet heresy by losing its wonder, then the way back to orthodoxy is through beauty and transcendence. This reflection explores how the recovery of awe, sacrament and imagination can restore depth to our faith, drawing on voices like Lewis, Tolkien, Schmemann and Balthasar. Beauty is not decoration. It is the path home to God.

The Way Back to Orthodoxy Is Through Beauty and Transcendence

If the church drifted into quiet heresy by losing its wonder, then the way back to orthodoxy is through beauty and transcendence. This reflection explores how the recovery of awe, sacrament and imagination can restore depth to our…

Without Beauty the Church Drifts Into Quiet Heresy Orthodoxy remained, but the world around us lost its depth. This reflection explores how the Western church held onto its doctrines yet drifted into a thin and disenchanted faith, drawing on voices like Charles Taylor, Underhill and James K A Smith. It is a call to recognise the ache beneath our modern Christianity and remember that the world was once alive with God - and can be again.

Without Beauty the Church Drifts Into Quiet Heresy

Orthodoxy remained, but the world around us lost its depth. This reflection explores how the Western church held onto its doctrines yet drifted into a thin and disenchanted faith, drawing on voices like Charles Taylor, Underhill and James K A…

Why Christians Should Celebrate Halloween Halloween is not a night to fear but a sacred evening to remember. The Celts called it Samhain, a time when the veil between worlds grew thin. For Christians, it became All Hallows Eve, a night to honour the saints and the dead. In the quiet dark we remember that the light makes its home in the night, and even here, God is near.

Christians often fear Halloween. But what if this night is not a celebration of darkness, but a reminder that even the dark belongs to God?

The Celts called this season Samhain, when the veil between worlds grew thin. The Church called it All Hallows Eve, a vigil of light and memory.

The Shack: A Reflection When William Paul Young wrote The Shack, he was not trying to explain why terrible things happen. He was writing his way through sorrow. Like Job, he sat among the ashes, surrounded by questions that would not rest. Out of that ache came a story. Not a sermon, but a parable about the God who meets us in our broken places.

The Shack: A Reflection

When William Paul Young wrote The Shack, he was not trying to explain why terrible things happen. He was writing his way through sorrow. Like Job, he sat among the ashes, surrounded by questions that would not rest. Out of that ache came a story. Not a sermon, but a parable…

When Christians Misunderstand the Gospel: Why “God Reigns” Is More Radical Than We Think he gospel is not a private escape plan but a royal announcement: God reigns. From the first garden to the new creation, Scripture tells the story of heaven and earth uniting under His care. The Kin…

scribblingtheology.blog/2025/10/16/w...

My Burden 8Jesus said,my yoke is easy, my burden is light.I want to believe him,but most daysthe burden feels like stone. The burden of anxiety,the burden of belief,the burden of trying to be humanwhen I am tired,so tired. If this is light,what does heavy feel like? And yet,he keeps whispering, "Come, walk with me,

My Burden

8Jesus said,my yoke is easy, my burden is light.I want to believe him,but most daysthe burden feels like stone. The burden of anxiety,the burden of belief,the burden of trying to be humanwhen I am tired,so tired. If this is light,what does heavy feel like? And yet,he keeps whispering,…

@brianzahnd.bsky.social

So excited for your new book in may to come out (way too far btw), already pre ordered!

A Theology of The Elder Scrolls: Part I Every Elder Scrolls player knows the lore contradicts itself — Altmer, Nords, Khajiit, Dunmer, Imperials all tell creation differently. But what if those contradictions aren’t flaws, but the heart of Tamriel’s theology? Part I explores myth, paradox, and truth.

A Theology of The Elder Scrolls: Part I

Every Elder Scrolls player knows the lore contradicts itself — Altmer, Nords, Khajiit, Dunmer, Imperials all tell creation differently. But what if those contradictions aren’t flaws, but the heart of Tamriel’s theology? Part I explores myth, paradox, and…

The Image of God Revisited: From Eden to New Creation The image of God runs like a golden thread from Genesis to Revelation. Humanity was created as living icons in God’s cosmic temple, called to serve as royal priests who reflect his presence into creation. Though the image was fractured by sin and distorted by idolatry, it is restored in Christ, the true image of God, and fulfilled in the new creation where God dwells with his people and humanity reigns with him forever.

The Image of God Revisited: From Eden to New Creation

The image of God runs like a golden thread from Genesis to Revelation. Humanity was created as living icons in God’s cosmic temple, called to serve as royal priests who reflect his presence into creation. Though the image was fractured by sin…

Faith and Mental Health, Part Two: The Tenderness of Hope Faith does not erase suffering. Part II explores how hope lingers even in silence, how scars can bear witness to healing, and how new creation breaks in slowly, tenderly, like dawn after a long night.

May you know your sorrow is not failure. May silence hold you, not undo you. May hope come like a slow dawn, not rushing, just faithful. And may the scarred Christ carry you toward the promise that all shall be made new.

The Contemplative Gospel Part I: Creation, Fall, and Our Lost Communion with God The gospel does not begin with sin but with wonder. Creation was spoken into being within God’s presence, every breath sustained by Him. The fall fractured our communion, yet God’s presence remains. A contemplative gospel invites us to see creation as sacrament and to awaken to the breath of God still holding us.

The Contemplative Gospel Part I: Creation, Fall, and Our Lost Communion with God

The gospel does not begin with sin but with wonder. Creation was spoken into being within God’s presence, every breath sustained by Him. The fall fractured our communion, yet God’s presence remains. A contemplative…

The Language of Life Words are more than sound. They can corrode or create, curse or bless. Ephesians 4:29 calls us to speak life, to echo the God who spoke creation into being. Every word is seed, doorway, prayer.

Words are never just noise. They carry life or decay, creation or ruin. To bless is to echo the God who spoke light into being. To curse is to deny his image. May our words become breath that lifts, until our speech itself is a prayer.

The Ache of Beginnings: Reading Genesis 1–11 with Open Hands Genesis 1 to 11 is more than a story of beginnings. It is a mirror of our own ache, our exile east of Eden, and God’s relentless pursuit. These seed-stories speak of hiding and blame, yet also of covering and promise. At the heart of it all stands the God who was there in the beginning, the ground of all being, still whispering us toward new creation.

Genesis 1–11 is not just about the past but about us. To be human is to live east of Eden, longing for home. Yet the God who was there in the beginning still walks among us, asking “Where are you?” and whispering us toward new creation.

Running Between Worlds: A Poetic Retelling of Hebrews 11–12:2 Faith is not loud or obvious. It is the quiet pulse beneath the skin, the unseen thread that carried those before us into deserts, storms, and promises not yet fulfilled. Their stories still breathe around us, urging us to run with our eyes fixed on Jesus.

Faith is the quiet pulse that carried those before us into deserts and promises unseen. Their stories surround us still, urging us to run with eyes fixed on Jesus, who began our faith and will bring it to completion.

Faith and Mental Health, Part One: The Ache of Faith Faith and mental health do not meet in quick fixes. They meet in the ache, in the silence, and in the long nights when prayer feels impossible. And you are allowed to bring all of it to God

New blog: Faith & Mental Health (Part I) — on depression, anxiety, silence, and the weight of faith when prayer feels impossible. Honest, theological, human.

God Who Walks in Twilight Faith is the quiet pulse that carries us forward, unseen yet certain. Surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, we run with endurance, eyes fixed on Jesus the one who begins and completes our faith.

God Who Walks in Twilight

Faith is the quiet pulse that carries us forward, unseen yet certain. Surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses, we run with endurance, eyes fixed on Jesus the one who begins and completes our faith.

Hard to Pray The prayer I can’t quite pray yet I keep meaning to say something to you, God.Or maybe not to you.Maybe at you.But then I stop.It catches somewhere in my chest. It is not that I do not believe.I do.Probably too much.It just hurts in ways I do not know what to do with.

Hard to Pray

The prayer I can’t quite pray yet I keep meaning to say something to you, God.Or maybe not to you.Maybe at you.But then I stop.It catches somewhere in my chest. It is not that I do not believe.I do.Probably too much.It just hurts in ways I do not know what to do with.

The God Who Refuses to Behave: Wrestling with God at Peniel A poetic and mystical reflection on wrestling with God at Peniel. Exploring dangerous faith, holy mystery, and the untameable God who refuses to be caged.

The God Who Refuses to Behave: Wrestling with God at Peniel

A poetic and mystical reflection on wrestling with God at Peniel. Exploring dangerous faith, holy mystery, and the untameable God who refuses to be caged.

The kingdom does not come by ballot or blade, but by the broken body and the breath of God.

Written in Heaven You will suffer this was never hidden. But your name is written in heaven, in light no shadow can touch. This is the shape of Christian hope: not escape, but belonging.

scribblingtheology.blog/2025/07/05/w...

Before light, there was the deep.

God did not fix the chaos
He brooded over it.

Not as an architect,
but as an artist
who shapes the void by presence.

And calls us
to do the same.

We are of the earth
but not only.
Something moved through us
before we had words for longing.

A wind
not seen
pressed into clay
and it remembered.

And though we walk in forgetting
the silence still knows our shape.

God is nearer than breath,
hidden not in distance but in depth. Found not by grasping, but by letting go.

#MysticalTheology

#ApophaticFaith

#UnionWithGod

#ContemplativeChristianity

#HiddenPresence

#TheologyOfSilence

"God is not the answer that fills the void,
but the presence that remains when all else falls away."
— cf. Psalm 46:10

#PoeticTheology

#MysticalFaith

#ApophaticTheology

#ContemplativeChristianity

#ChristianMysticism

God moves through the silence beneath your thoughts, not after the healing, but within the wound. Even your unraveling is held in holy hands.

#poetry #mentalhealth