NT Wright in Surprised by Hope, pp. 152-154 This is the point at which we modern Westerners are called to make a huge leap of the imagination. We have been buying our mental furniture for so long from Plato’s factory that we have come to take for granted a basic ontological contrast between “spirit“ in […]
Esau McCaulley, On Hope, Hate and the Most Radical Claim of the Easter SeasonApril 8, 2023 Easter has never been my favorite church service. Shouting “Alleluia, Christ is risen!” requires an emotional crescendo my melancholy temperament can’t easily manage.I’m much more comfortable on Maundy Thursday, the beginning of the Triduum, the holiest three days in […]
The poet Christian Wiman, who returned to his faith after having wandered from it, wrote in My Bright Abyss: Meditation of a Modern Believer that “Christ is always being remade in the image of man, which means that his reality is always being deformed to fit human needs, or what humans perceive to be their […]
Re. The Ten Commandments The first table of the law is summarized by the first great commandment, “You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart, mind, soul and strength,” whereas the last six commandments constitute the scope of the second great commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” All of […]
“Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35) His Birth in History Jesus Christ was born into this world, not from it. He did not evolve out of history; He came into history from the outside. Jesus Christ is not the best human […]
Martin Luther Ah, dearest Jesus, holy Child, Make thee a bed, soft, undefiled, Within my heart, that it may be A quiet chamber kept for Thee. My heart for very joy doth leap, My lips no more can silence keep, I too must sing, with joyful tongue, That sweetest ancient cradle song, Glory to God […]
John the Baptist’s mission was to prepare the way for Jesus. Painting is Preparation After I finished college, but before I attended seminary I spent a year working as a painter. I learned that painters do not spend most of their time painting. Most of the time is spent in preparation, especially if the surface […]
edftwinry So my brother and I were best friends growing up. He was hilarious and we got into all kinds of trouble. I still can’t believe some of the shit we got away with. Anyway I guess he had a nervous breakdown one day and accidentally killed a guy. I saw what happened and it […]
The Jesus Prayer Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, (inhale slowly) Have mercy on me, a sinner. (exhale slowly) “Breath is directly connected to both the autonomous nervous system and the voluntary nervous system. In other words, we can control our breathing, and it goes on automatically when we are not aware of it—unconscious, asleep, […]
God Shook My World at an EDM Concert I was rolling on Ecstasy when the scales suddenly fell from my eyes. Jonathan Tjarks| September 20, 2018 “At some point, I realized that it doesn’t make sense for Scripture to correspond with 21st-century science. Was Moses supposed to come down from Mount Sinai with the theory […]