The ballad of love and hate

I’ve been reading and writing a lot about love lately.  In the midst of all that mental activity, this song by The Avett Brothers has become a favorite of mine.  It is deep and beautiful and moving – “The Ballad of Love and Hate.”  Enjoy:

Women and Ministry

I’ve not blogged for a long time.  Too long.  I enjoy writing and thinking and expressing what is going on in my mind.  Lately I’ve just not had much to say.
But today I became aware of a piece that President Jimmy Carter wrote and it struck a nerve,  I loved what he had to write [...]

Death

I saw this quote on Twitter today: “Death gives meaning to our lives. It gives importance and value to time. Time would become meaningless if there were too much of it.”
It immediately made me think about the tendency in our society to view Death as a “natural part of life” or even [...]

Capitalism Video

This video is funny.  Really really funny.  And the funniest thing about it is that it is all true.  It doesn’t really need much commentary.  Just listen.  And laugh.  And be struck by our own pettiness…

Surprised by Hope

I’m not in the mood to write much, but you should know know that I have recently read, without question, one of the best books about theological topics I have ever come across.  It is called Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church written by N.T. Wright (no surprise [...]

Scribal Error

This morning my youngest daughter was reading the back of a t-shirt Shar was wearing, one of those that came from a bunch of sponsors. The daughter asked, “what is ‘I he Garage Pub?’ I don’t understand.” It turns out that the ‘T’ was a little faded so what should have been ‘The’ [...]

Blog title; until then…

I subscribe to a daily email of a verse from the NLT (the New Living Translation – one of my very favorite translations). It has been good – a little scripture every day to ponder. Some of them have been quite timely, seeming to relate almost directly to things going on in my life. This one came [...]

More thoughts on Mercy and Boundin’

On Sunday I showed the animated short Boundin‘ (it is on The Incredibles DVD – it can also be seen on youtube or purchased for $1.99 on iTunes). What I failed to do was discuss (at any length) how that short had anything to do with our topic at hand: mercy.
First of [...]

Some thoughts on mercy

This is the upcoming “lesson” for our “church” this week:
This is what I want you to do: read what I have to write, then contemplate it, pray about it, allow it (and the related text from the scripture and from Mere Christianity) to read you. Record your thoughts on paper or post comments [...]

Silas Marner

I just finished reading Silas Marner. I had heard that it has been hailed as ‘one of the greatest books in the English language’ (or some such praise) so I was eager to read. At first it did not seem so great. The characters are described in some detail and the plot [...]