What a fun honor! Jonathan Pennington of Southern Seminary invited me to be a guest on his new YouTube show “Cars, Coffee, Theology.” What a treat! You won’t be surprised that we talked about suffering and grace.
Faith
41 posts
Whenever I hear the word priorities, I think of Ron Weasley (in the movie version, at least) saying that Hermione, who privileges learning above all else, “needs to get her priorities sorted.” The comment is a bit subversive, it is very amusing, but I have a more serious challenge today. American Christians: we need to get our priorities sorted. What is more important for a Christian, to be right or to be compassionate? What is […]
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I often flip that line when recruiting students for the honors college (“We are looking for people with not just the smarts, but the hearts as well.”). But as Chris Tilling points out, Christians (and not just Evangelicals) often go too far into the “hearts” side of faith and usually without understanding the biblical concept of “heart.” …the Greek word, καρδία (heart), doesn’t mean “muh-feels as opposed to suspicious mental work”. Rather, as the Exegetical Dictionary of the […]
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“YOU NEVER KNOW what may cause tears. The sight of the Atlantic Ocean can do it, or a piece of music, or a face you’ve never seen before. A pair of somebody’s old shoes can do it. Almost any movie made before the great sadness that came over the world after the Second World War, a horse cantering across a meadow, the high-school basketball team running out onto the gym floor at the start of […]
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Proper 7 (12) (June 24, 2018) Alternate First reading and Psalm Job 38:1-11 Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32 Second reading 2 Corinthians 6:1-13 Gospel Mark 4:35-41 4:39 He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. … 41 And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the […]
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A short homily for the Fourth Sunday of Easter (April 22, 2018) Acts 4:5-12 Psalm 23 1 John 3:16-24 John 10:11-18 Word and Speech; Truth and Action. What has been done “in the name of Jesus”? In Scripture, the blind are made to see and the lame to walk. Sins are forgiven in the name of Jesus. Indeed, Peter says that “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven […]
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This year I have been thinking a lot about the fact that the Church should be a place of healing. That means that, if a Christian community is doing their job right, there ought to be a lot of hurting people in it, needing healing, comfort, and love. If we are honest with ourselves, we are all represented in that community, at least at some point or another. So the question that occurs to me […]
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I don’t need Lent. I don’t need to be reminded of my mortality. I don’t need to be reminded of the sinful and wicked workings of this world. I don’t need to be reminded that I am a sinner. I don’t need to be reminded that I am ashes and to ashes I shall return. I know I will die. I know this world is full of wickedness and death, suffering and pain. I know […]
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After tragedy has occurred to us, fallen upon us, how do we walk on, lacing up those painful shoes I talked about in my poor analogy? How do we carry on, day after day? We must begin by being open to and accepting the grace that is offered to us. I consider what happed to the Man and the Woman after they had chosen to forge their own path, a path that led away from God […]
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In mid-February 2017 we had a funeral for a beloved member of the parish. He had lived a long, full life and his family surrounded him at his departing and gathered for the service. The first reading was this beautiful passage from The Book of Wisdom (in the Apocrypha). Wis. 3:1 But the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them. 2 In the eyes of the foolish they seemed […]
