When one is driven to climb the ecclesiastical ladder it is easy to embrace a doctrinal position that removes half the competition — using the same Jesus-free method of selective extractions of scripture that justified slavery and other church-endorsed evils. Many...
It's not just hating war, despising war, sitting back and waiting for war to end. It's not just loving peace, wanting peace, sitting back and waiting for peace to come. Peace plans its strategy and encircles the enemy. Peace marshals its forces and storms the gates....
It is easy to bow heads around a tableful of food and family this week and voice words of gratitude. It is more faithful — as followers of Jesus — to do so with a renewed commitment to expressing ongoing gratitude through generosity. Gratitude-driven generosity...
The values, priorities, and character traits Jesus calls for in what's known as The Sermon on the Mount don't align well with much of what drives Americanized Christianity today. Merciful? Pure in heart? A thirst for righteousness? Hardly. Peacemakers? Willing to...
The Quaker writer Richard Foster was the first to alert me, I believe, to the important distinction between power and authority. Power is claimed; authority is earned. Power is based on being in charge and having the leverage to impose punishment on others who might...