The church is, above all, a place to receive grace: it brings forgiven people together with the aim of equipping us to dispense grace to others. from Vanishing Grace: What Ever Happened to the Good News?
02278 – The Church & Grace
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01670 – Religion Can Narrow Our Relationships
In every culture there are persons who fill the position of community elders. These are men and women whose wisdom, generosity of spirit, wide concern, and inclusive love equip them to care for people beyond their kith and kin. Their goal is not just the well-being of...
01274 – Jesus Modeled Flexibility
Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be broken. This beatitude cannot be found in Matthew 5's listing, but it certainly has clear biblical principle behind it. Dr. David Schroeder, in his study on discipleship, asserts that discipleship is not so much about...
00388 – Doing Community
Community is not built through sitting in the same building and singing the same songs. It is forged in the fires of life. When we know each other deeply—the good, the bad, and the ugly—community is experienced. Roots grow deep when we know we are loved by others and...
00221 – Gifts and Challenges
Gratitude keeps us clear that not only do our gifts and our challenges come from God, but that our gifts and challenges are essentially one and the same… Without gratitude, our enjoyment of the world shrinks into cramped self-indulgence and the unscratchable itch of...
00206 – Fleeting Temples of Holy?
I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you” when someone sneezes, a leftover from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying. And sometimes, when you spill...
00072 – Letting Pain Transform Us
There is no such thing as redemptive violence. Violence doesn’t save; it only destroys—in both short and long term. Jesus replaced the myth of redemptive violence with the truth of redemptive suffering. He showed us on the cross how to hold the pain and let it...
00062 – Beware!
Jesus was not killed by atheism and anarchy. He was brought down by law and order allied with religion—which is always a deadly mix. Beware those who claim to know the will of God and are prepared to use force, if necessary, to make others conform. Beware those who...
00007 – Choral Music and Transcendence
To sing like this, in the company of other souls, and to make those consonants slip out so easily and in unison, and to make those chords so rich that they bring tears to your eyes. This is transcendence. This is the power that choral singing has that other music can...