GOSSIP, SLANDER, HATE SPEECH AND FORNICATION ARE ALL PERFECTLY LEGAL– AND IMMORAL If we begin with Jesus who is the object of our faith he then shapes our speech. If we begin with our politics our politics will shape our speech. If it is humorous for a politician to trash the liberals or the conservatives then it is “my right” …
“ON NOT BEING A PREDICTABLE WHITE GUY”
From the moment of Jesus’ conversation with a Samaritan woman right through the day Jesus died on a Cross, on through his Resurrection and Ascension and the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost, Jesus astonished us with his unpredictable goodness. As Christ’s disciples in 2015 we are now, in the world of domestic tensions and international terrorism, servants of the …
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE THE CHURCH IN A TIME OF TERROR?
We are all very upset about the fourteen dead in California, the murders in Colorado Springs and the nine African Americans killed in a Charleston church and on and on. Murders committed by proponents of the sacred, ISIS and an end-times obsessed Christian, and by Dylaan Roof, a young man for whom nothing is sacred. The public rants and sloganeering …
REFLECTIONS AND CONFESSIONS OF A REDEEMED TRASH TALKER!
Scripture says God was reconciling the world to himself through his Messiah. In Ephesians nine verbs tell us what Jesus has done and what is now real in the Church: Jesus is our peace (2:14), he made us one (vs. 14), he broke down the dividing wall of hostility (vs. 14), created one new humanity (vs. 15), made peace (vs. …
ARE WE GODLY ENOUGH TO HAVE AN ILLUMINATING, ARGUMENT ABOUT TERRORISM?
Scripture says, “Iron sharpens iron. And one person sharpens the wits of another.” But for iron to sharpen iron the swords, the blades, must conflict. Blades piercing flesh does not sharpen iron. It is the creative, redemptive friction of the two blades respectfully colliding that leads to more truth on the matter. According to the apostle Paul, nobody, self styled …
THE WORLD’S MOST FAMOUS IMMIGRANTS – JOSEPH, MARY AND JESUS
What if we started by contemplating that somebody took in Jesus, Joseph and Mary when they fled from Herod into Egypt. Joseph, Mary and Jesus may or may not have been illegal immigrants, but they did what millions of immigrants are doing now: they ran for their lives. We would not have the boy Jesus if someone had not saved …
TERRORISM AND THE GOD WHO WILL “SET ALL THINGS RIGHT”
Many today opt for a sentimental, non judgmental, loving, God, rejecting the biblical vision of a God who judges the world. But are we not reacting against the wildly speculative end times theologies that seem to savor the so-called coming blood bath when God slaughters the unbelievers in an Armageddon nightmare? What if the final judgment of God is fundamentally …
PARIS TERRORISM: “IF WE ARE NOT TERRORIZED IT DOESN’T REALLY WORK”
ISIL (the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) emerged out of the state collapse of civil strife that followed the 2003 Iraqi War and the 2011 Syrian conflict. It emerged at the outset to protect Sunni civilians who were not being protected in Syria and Iraq. ISIL has since proclaimed itself a caliphate, claiming exclusive political and theological authority …
KIM DAVIS, CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND JESUS
Kim Davis, a Christian clerk in a Kentucky courthouse, recently refused to issue a marriage license for a gay couple. She lawfully exercised her right to disobey the law on grounds that her conscience was violated. It was an act of civil disobedience. Her civil disobedience as a citizen of the United States is certainly her protected liberty. Her disobedience …
THE POLITICS OF GOD IN OUR TIMES
The Kingdom of God has come in Jesus Christ the Lord right in on top of the kingdoms of this world. We live in the tension of the “now and the not yet” of the Kingdom of God! This means the U. S. Constitution is not the Bible; the pledge of allegiance does not replace or even rival the confession …