So Much to Think About

---

…poetic words from Neale Donald Walsch 
Yearning for a new way will not produce it. Only ending the old way can do that. You cannot hold onto the old all the while declaring that you want something new. The old will defy the new; the old will deny the new; the old will decry the new. There is only one way to bring in the new. You must make room for it.

“When you can assume that your audience holds the same beliefs you do, you can relax and use more normal means of talking to it; when you have to assume that it does not, then you have to make your vision apparent by shock — to the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost-blind you draw large and startling figures.”
Flannery O’connor 

Biblical Interpretation
Hermeneutical Self-Awareness + Judgmental God = A Whole Lot of Anxiety

Biblical interpretation is so anxiety-inducing because it’s viewed as so high stakes. Your eternal destiny hangs in the balance, so you have to get it right. And yet, given the hermeneutical situation, you lack any firm guarantees you’ve made the right choice. The whole thing is a neurotic spiritual nightmare. In fact, it’s this nightmare that keeps many Christians from stepping into self-awareness to own and admit their own hermeneutics. It’s more comforting to remain oblivious and un-self-aware. 

So I told my students, You have to believe that God’s got your back, that, yes, you might make a mistake. But that mistake isn’t determinative or damning. Just be faithful and humble. You don’t have to have all the correct answers to be loved by your Father. Each of us will carry into heaven a raft of confusions, errors, and misinterpretations of Scripture. It’s unavoidable. We will not score 100% on the final exam. 
But don’t worry. Let your heart be at rest. God’s got your back.
Richard Beck

Freedom
Freedom is not the ability to do anything, to have no limits, but the ability to truly be who and what you are, which can only be known through the revelation of limits.
Fr Stephen Freeman 

Sabbath moments
The Sabbath moments of the soul are those brief glimpses we all have of unexpected wonder, unlooked for surprise, being ambushed by beauty. “Consider the lilies…” “Look at the birds of the air…” “He owns the cattle on a thousand hills…”

Even when life turns darker, and we know the deeper valleys where the sun is hard to see behind looming horizons, God is there, and blessing is to be found. Not the answers to all that we need or want; and not easy ways out of hard places. But those small signals of hope, those touches of goodness and unlooked for moments when kindness, comfort or laughter come as gifts.
JimGordon

The Gospel cure
Stating that “The Gospel” is the cure to any social ill is lazy and dishonest…it is the Gospel proclaimed and applied that transforms people and society…if we cannot agree on the application it is empty sloganeering to avoid dealing with the sin in question…
Phoenix Preacher

True and real
Somehow, myth is not just true, but real. The nature and character of the world cannot be described properly without reference to something more. That something more has a nature that gives shape to the stories labeled as myths. They are not just any story, a sub-genre of fiction. Indeed, even stories that would otherwise be labeled “true” and “real” (in the literal sense) have significance precisely in their mythic character.
Fr Stephen Freeman

What are we betting on for Christianity to succeed?
…it frustrates me that a fair number of my tribe — Christians who are theologically, morally, and politically conservative — are betting all their chips on the hope that the main fight is political, and can be won through politics. It’s just not true, and to say that does not mean that political engagement is useless. We have to stay engaged as long as we can. But it’s to say that the core problem is a loss of spiritual meaning — and that’s something that each of us has the ability, and indeed the duty, to address in our own lives.
Rod Dreher

One last thing I’m thinking about…

This report from Gallup has shaken the U.S. Christian community. It seems as though every church I have contact with is preaching on the church. This information maybe coincidental but it is relevant. Stimulated by my Covid experience, I have been rethinking church and intend to write a series of posts on the subject.

LISTEN OF THE WEEK

The sermon below is one of many but I found this one particularly helpful as I continue to rethink church.

CHURCH? WHY BOTHER?: WHY DO YOU BELIEVE IN THE LOCAL CHURCH?
Josh Graves 4/25/2021

Still on the Journey