You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you. — St. Augustine In the book, The Holy Longing, Ronald Rolheiser describes a Jewish legend about what happens to the soul just before it enters a body: …just before God puts a soul into the body, that soul […]
I desire mercy, not sacrifice. — Jesus (Matthew 9:13)
My life is but a weaving Between my Lord and me, I cannot choose the colors He worketh steadily. Oftimes he weaveth sorrow, And I in foolish pride Forget He sees the upper And I, the underside. Not till the loom is silent And the shuttles cease to fly Shall God unroll the canvas And […]
I learned the path to Heaven, Is full of sinners and believers. Learned that happiness on earth, Ain’t just for high achievers. I’ve learned, I come to know, There’s life at both ends, Of that red dirt road. Seems fitting with the Oklahoma red dirt
Our duty as Christians lies in making ventures for eternal life without the absolute certainty of success… This, indeed, is the very meaning of the word ‘venture’; for that is a strange venture which has nothing in it of fear, risk, danger, anxiety, uncertainty. Yes, so it certainly is; and in this consists the excellence […]
Ever have one those songs that you hear just a portion of it and it sticks in your head? This song called “Stumbling to Bethlehem” by Patti Scialfa was played at the end of the season finale of Joan of Arcadia back in May. I searched the Internet and could not find the lyrics anywhere […]
Read the whole Bible within a year on this flexible schedule.
I have this habit of occasionally teasing my kids, particularly my two older daughters, of not being graceful. (Sometimes in the appropriate moment, some of my students get it too.) When one of them trips or drops something or does something really klutzy, I will say with a smile something along the lines of: “Good […]
There is this one scene from the movie The Passion of the Christ that still comes to my mind just about everyday. It was the scene where Jesus washes his hands. There is a closeup of his hands as someone holds up a small wooden bowl. He dips his hands into the water, lifts his […]
The full soul loathes the honeycomb, but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet. — Proverbs 27:7
Are you a human do-ing, or a human be-ing?
Does God change? Did Jesus die on The Cross as atonement for God’s curse of death on humanity?
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference—living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardship as the pathway to peace, taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it, trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His will—that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever. Amen. — Reinhold Niebuhr
We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin. — C.S. Lewis
In the worst of times, the human spirit, with God’s help, does the best things. Karen Marie relays such one remarkable story of mercy and forgiveness called “With My Own Eyes” by Pastor Richard Wurmbrand. This is a must read.
Know that when you seek anything of your own, you will never find God, because you do not seek God purely. You are seeking something along with God, and you are acting just as if you were to make a candle out of God in order to look for something with it. Once one finds the things one is looking for, one throws the candle away. This is what you are doing. — Meister Eckhart
Eternal Wisdom, source of life and grace, bless all who are seeking the meaning of life. Endow them with courage to risk the unknown. Bless them with wonder to be still and rejoice. Anoint them with wisdom to understand the potential of their dreams. Blessed is your name, now and evermore. Amen. — Vienna Cobb Anderson
One day as a small opening appeared on a cocoon, a man sat for several hours watching the butterfly struggle to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further. So […]
You may have noticed the new “Quote” box at the top of the home page. My quote category was getting big with over 140 quotes so far, representing just over 30% of my total journal entries. I could see it becoming unwieldly in the future. Plus, I have noticed that I have slowly posted more […]
René Descartes walks into a bar and has a drink. The bartender asks him, “Would you like another?” Descartes pauses and says, “I think not,” and promptly disappears. The bartender is enlightened. I just knew it. Descartes had his famous saying backwards. 🙂(joke via Whiskey River)
Have you ever noticed how some statements tell us more about the person than what the words actually say? So with Roman Catholicism, which at this [current] point in its history, I no longer believe to be a true Christian church any more than a Buddhist monastery. — Alan (found in a post to the […]
Time and Space are not the ultimate reality. Let’s set the stage with a simple story. In a marvelous little book by Edwin Abbott called Flatland, the main character is a geometric figure called A. Square. He is a mathematician and inhabits a place called Flatland, a two-dimensional plane or flat surface not unlike the […]
Redemption, Reconciliation, Liberation ::: Love, Peace, Energy ::: Father, Son, Holy Spirit
I stumbled upon this weblog called Scattered Words (via mute Troubadour). The author is named Ben, and he is a 22-year old struggling with his sexual identity and his relationship with God (a double load to carry). Someone wrote him an email asking several questions about his struggle to turn toward God. His answer to […]
The new Texas quarter has been out in circulation for a while now. Oklahomans, not to be outdone, have minted their own quarter. (The U.S. Mint is not too happy about it either.) The idea was a pretty good one except for one problem—the new quarter kept jamming soft drink machines. (We call them “pop […]
Faith is daring of the soul to go farther than it can see. — William Newton Clarke See Part 1. To no fault of our own, humans are largely stuck with the idea that time is a linear sequence of events. Things happen one after the other. Yesterday was, today is, and tomorrow will be. […]
From a chapter on hell, C.S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain concludes: The doors of hell are locked on the inside. …They enjoy forever the horrible freedom they have demanded, and are therefore self-enslaved: just as the blessed, forever submitting to obedience, become through all eternity more and more free. In the long run […]
To him who overcomes I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it. (Revelation 2:17) From a chapter on heaven, C.S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain comments: I am considering not how, but why, [God] makes each soul unique. […]
The sky was overcast and gray all day, threatening to rain, but never following through except for an occasional drizzle. In the evening, the clouds broke near the western horizon. The golden setting sun peeked under the clouds, making all that part of the sky warm and glowing. The sun appeared to say, “I was […]
The spiritual life is a reaching out to our innermost self, to our fellow human and to our God. — Henri Nouwen, Reaching Out Something I read yesterday reminded me of a teachers’ inservice I attended last Fall. The guest speaker was Michael Carotta and he briefly described three dimensions of spirituality: Vertical — the […]
Part of a conversation between an Eastern Orthodox and a Pomergent: Karl: So if we want the truths…, we have to look for them in an “uncontaminated” system. robbymac: However, good luck finding an “uncontaminated” source other than the Bible! Mankind and our sinfulness gets in the way too easily—hence the need for discernment. Karl: […]
Sin is like a man jumping into a well. His act is eternal, leaving no hope of escape. Only Jesus, by His immense love through the redemptive Incarnation, can throw a rope down the well to save the man. The man must choose to take hold of this rope, that is, to repent and turn […]
Isn’t it strange that princes and kings, and clowns that caper in sawdust rings, and common folks like you and me are builders of eternity? …