My stories are sometimes closer to poems or meditations, but often there is at least a little narrative in them.
Christians are not perfect, by any means, but they can be people made fully alive.
The rubber hits the road when we try to show grace to a person most unlike us, even someone morally offensive.
We in the church have humility and contrition to offer the world, not a formula for success. Almost alone in our success-oriented society, we admit that we have failed, are failing, and always will fail.
Eugene Peterson points out that "the root meaning in Hebrew of salvation is to be broad, to become spacious, to enlarge. It carries the sense of deliverance from an existence that has become compressed, confined and cramped. " God wants to set free, to make it possible for us to live open and loving lives with God and our neighbors. "I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free," wrote the psalmist.
We tend to think, 'Life should be fair because God is fair. ' But God is not life. And if I confuse God with the physical reality of life- by expecting constant good health for example- then I set myself up for crashing disappointment.
The world says you gain your life by getting more and more and more and more, but Jesus says, 'No, that leads to death. You get it back by giving it away and when you give it away you get it back. '
I like flowers, I also like children, but I do not chop their heads off and keep them in bowls of water around the house.
Man's mind is his basic tool of survival. Life is given to him, survival is not. His body is given to him, its sustenance is not. His mind is given to him, its content is not. To remain alive, he must act, and before he can act he must know the nature and purpose of his action. He cannot obtain his food without a knowledge of food and of the way to obtain it. He cannot dig a ditch-or build a cyclotron-without a knowledge of his aim and of the means to achieve it. To remain alive, he must think
Sunrise paints the sky with pinks and the sunset with peaches. Cool to warm. So is the progression from childhood to old age.
I was raised Jewish. I didn't know anything about Christianity.