“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings
About 4 years ago I was introduced to a theology of God that in all my years of pastoral ministry I had never considered from a source that I had never heard of. In “3 Mile an Hour God” the Japanese theologian Kosuke Koyama wrote “Love has its speed. It is a spiritual speed. It is a different kind of speed from the technological speed to which we are accustomed. It goes on in the depth of our life, whether we notice or not, at three miles an hour. It is the speed we walk and therefore the speed the love of God walks.”
What resonated with me was not simply the concept. The echo through my soul was the recognition that my wife and I had been inadvertently living this reality for most of these past 20 years. We have lived as place-makers, as place-keepers, and as characters in the neighborhoods we have called home. Our professions exist, our influence exists, and our relationships exist all because of a life lived at 3 miles an hour … continually on foot, pacing and praying for our place. In a culture where bigger is better and “if you’re not first, you’re last”, we have come to understand that ours is an alternative lifestyle. The space we dedicate here through these writings is a celebration and acknowledgment of all that we’ve learned and continue to learn about life and love and grace at the exhilarating pace of 3 miles an hour.