Ruminations
-
Going to Jerusalem
Sometimes a slight shift in perspective is all it takes to see something familiar in a totally new light. Rearrange things in your home – pictures, furniture, seating arrangements – and you might see them again as if for the first time. Look at a loved one after a long absence or an especially difficult Continue reading
-
When night becomes day
Here’s a game that might make your Lent a little more interesting. It’s called “Purgatory,” named for the waiting room where, some Christians believe, your sins are purged and your soul is purified before entering heaven. The way the game’s inventor imagined it, people with contradictory views of life would be paired with each other Continue reading
-
Remember who you are
“How often I have desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing” (Luke 13:34)! Traditionally during Lent, we share vicariously in Jesus’ forty days of being tested in the wilderness to see what he was made of and who he would be. But Continue reading
-
On the other side of despair
“Sometime it’s purty hard to do the right thing,” an old philosopher once said. “You don’t always know what’s gonna come of it.” Bits of folk wisdom like that, from cartoonist J.P. Alley, used to appear most days alongside the news in the Memphis Commercial Appeal. From 1914 to 1968 they provided a humanizing balance Continue reading
-
Blessed abandonment
Many Christians rank the Beatitudes among their favorite scriptures, even if they don’t talk about them, or know them all, or appreciate what they mean, or accept them as true. It doesn’t help that we have two versions of them: Luke’s shorter, more original version (Luke 6:20-26), and Matthew’s longer, more edited one (Matt. 5:3-12). Continue reading
-
Sent
The question seemed simple enough, but simple questions can quickly turn out to be not so simple. “Whom shall I send,” God asked, “and who will go for us?” The question that came to Isaiah in the temple was his call to carry God’s message to his people. I wonder what he might have felt Continue reading
1 Corinthians 13, bible, call of the disciples, calling of Simon, christianity, faith, God is love, Here am I, How beautiful upon the mountains, Isaiah’s call, Martin Luther, Oscar Romero, questions of faith, reformation, send me, simple questions, speaking truth to power, the love chapter, Whom shall I send? -
The gospel and Mr. Trump
For some, the work of Christmas ended when they put the tree on the curb and the decorations back in their boxes and finished their gift returns. But for those who take the gospel of Jesus Christ seriously, for those who take the name of the Lord – Christian – not in vain but authentically Continue reading
-
We walk in Gift today
When she was a child, writer Annie Dillard would occasionally hide one of her precious pennies for someone else to find. She would cradle it in the roots of a tree or in a crack in the sidewalk, and with a piece of chalk draw huge arrows leading up to the penny from both directions. Continue reading
-
A Brand-New You
For the Christian, being baptized is not like beginning a new year or a new calendar. It’s not about turning over a new leaf in life. It’s about starting a new life entirely, a life in which everything old has passed away and everything becomes an entirely new creation (2 Cor. 5:17)! Here’s a baptismal Continue reading
The Sauntering Pilgrim 