I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, the
Another factor in baptism pertains to ongoing spiritual instruction and development after the actual baptism. While not limited to infant baptisms—since post-baptismal nurture is important for any person regardless of that person’s age at the time of baptism—this factor has particular significance in the case of infants who are baptized.
Though I didn’t understand at the time, out of reluctant obedience, I began to thank God instead of complaining. Each day, I determined to find something to be thankful for rather than complaining. I even started to thank God for the things I didn’t like in my life like the snow and cold! As I chose to give thanks regardless
Jesus does not divide the sacred from the secular. Instead, He takes the secular and redeems it, thus making it sacred. There is no divide as we understand it, because Jesus stands in the gap reaching with one nail-pierced hand to each side, uniting all of creation into one holy Kingdom.
Jesus did not come to give us answers. He came to give us himself. And Bonhoeffer says that that’s what it means to live in the penultimate as a Christian, to live in it the way Jesus did. It means that we are to join others in their suffering, to try and understand what other people have to put up
Recently, I’ve somewhat been on a purging binge (note that I love a good oxymoron) and going through the many boxes I have in storage labeled with the words, “Carrie’s Mementos.” I hate to admit that I was on a fast track to be featured on a cable show about people who collect a lot of stuff and I’m pretty sure
John of Damascus grounds the making of image in the incarnation (the “taking on flesh”) of Jesus Christ, who “married” heaven and earth through the union of God and man. If the God-Man Jesus is the “express image” of God, as Hebrews 1:3 says, then the artist is free to express himself creatively, using the material of the world to
In the midst of an extraordinary amount of stone-throwing and name-calling from across the political and theological spectrum, the Church in North America has shuddered and shaken from its timbered ceiling (or its artfully exposed industrial lighting) to its hallowed stone foundation (or tiled coffee house floor). (Astute readers perhaps will have noticed the use of the capitalized word “church”
The redeemed, the serene, the peaceful ones who are reconciled with God will find our God-aimed identity not in what we buy, accumulate, save, or consume, but in how we give.
Grace is not a one-time thing. God doesn’t just see our sins, forgive us one time, and then choose to be done with us forever. No, God constantly gives us grace. God gives us grace to forgive us, He gives us grace to empower us, He gives us grace to lead us. For us, and for the world, grace is
I have great respect for many colleagues in ministry who espouse a reformed or Calvinist view of the world. That said, it should be no surprise to those who read and listen to me regularly that I am enthusiastically and unapologetically Arminian. I am far too deeply committed to the notion of God’s pure love exercised in his gift of human free
Protestantism has hit a snag. Catholics have their challenges, but it’s a very different set. The Orthodox church in its various forms has its disputes but remains largely unchanged. North American Protestants have hit hard times, like an ecclesial version of the 2008 economic meltdown. We’ve printed Bible verses on magnets, screen printed t-shirts, run food pantries and epic VBS
Peace or division? Which is your mission, Jesus? Which is your kingdom about?
In 1 John 3: 11-24, we see two truths that are really, really hard to hold together. We will not always be liked. But we must always love. Listen to what we are told today: For this is the message you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We must not be like Cain who was
The danger of our silence is that if we ignore the subject of money, both the mission of the Kingdom of God and the spirituality of God’s people will ultimately be impoverished.
If we really believe that in Christ there is no male or female, it should trouble us deeply that so many men are missing from our midst.
Hypermobility. Transience. Individualism. Consumerism. Nationalism. Add to those descriptors the second half of the great commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself. And what do you get? Helicopter love. Helicopter Love* A helicopter love, or lifestyle, is one in which a person has a place to live (a safe haven), but they hop into a virtual helicopter to fly to the various
Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still. For they must needs be present, that love and live in that which is omnipresent. In this divine glass, they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure. This is the comfort of friends, that though they may
Advent reminds us that Christmas is not a sentimental, consumerist, family-friendly holiday, but is a season of radical political subversion, the downfall of the mighty, and an upturning of the hierarchies of the world. Seeing Christmas in fresh perspective begins with participating in the biblical narrative of God’s preferential option for the poor, forgotten, and imperfect.
The brilliance of the World Methodist Conference is still shifting through my mind, light through a suncatcher hanging on a window. The days in Houston were color, sound, faces, laughter, weeping, worship, intensity, frustration, revelation. I met people and forgot names. I met people and remembered names. I saw textiles woven with Methodist patterns, saris shimmering, archbishop caps velvety and
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