Postmodern Renaissance Culture Revolutionary

Then his wife said to him,  "Do you still hold fast your integrity?  Curse God and die!"  (Job 2:9 NAU) The book of Job is not a fun book. There is a lot of really challenging material to read. There are multiple voices to follow to know who is saying what. And it deals with being human in a fallen, broken world. I believe Job may be one of the most human books of the Bible. I love Job. The book is part of the Wisdom literature, or Writings, of the old covenant or old testament. There is some evidence that it may be one of the oldest surviving pieces of literature in the material of the Bible. One thing it isn't: it isn't easy to want to live out. Lately, I have begun to see my life through the lens of Job. I know that there are a lot of people who FEEL like Job at times. And maybe that is part of my identity - it is what I feel. But bear with me as I draw out how, spiritually, I am living a Job life in this chapter of living. When God allows the ...

I really hope that enough people have stopped following that this is really just a declaration into the winds of a few hearts. I have been silent because my life is in an ebb and flow of chaos. Professionally, I am reaching my end as a local church pastor. I have lost any desire to lead people who have no desire to go anywhere. Relationally, I am losing my connection to all of the people closest to me: family, friends, mentors. I am sitting here, writing this in despair and broken. I have nothing left to lose, so I want to tell you about my real self. This is me. The person I see in my mind when I envision my true self. I'm not drop dead gorgeous, but I'm beautiful.  I'm not graceful and elegant, but I'm gentle and fragile. I'm not going to steal anyone's heart, but my heart has been broken and needs to heal. I don't want to be seen as a freak, but I realize I live in a culture that can't handle what it doesn't understand. I want to be loved...

I have a confession. I was not a fan of Mister Rogers Neighborhood. As a kid, I enjoyed the land of Make-Believe. I especially liked the puppets. There were times when Mister Rogers would do teaching or build something, and that would fascinate me. I always preferred Sesame Street and Captain Kangaroo. When my kids began to watch television, they didn’t seem to be drawn to the Neighborhood, so I didn’t have to change my opinion. When Fred Rogers died, there began a process that many are calling secular canonization. Mister Rogers became larger than his television persona and viewership. People began to extol the wonders of what he meant to them. The last decade has seen the popular attraction to Mister Rogers grow to a level greater than public television gave him access to. Two movies have been released in just over a year’s time span that highlight the quality and character of Fred Rogers. The first was the biographical film Won’t You Be My Neighbor. This year sees the release of a ...

I am currently working through a philosophical exercise with theological implications. I was reading the book Boundaries by Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend. If you are not familiar, the book is about relational boundaries between people to create healthy relationships. Chapter 13 of that book is called Boundaries and God . A few pages into that chapter, I read this idea: ...God does not want us to be passive in our relationship with him {sic} either. Sometimes, through dialogue, he changes his mind. We can influence him because ours is a real relationship of the kind Abraham had with God (Gen. 18:16-33). God said that he would destroy Sodom, yet Abraham talked him out of it if he could find ten righteous people. Foregoing the example of  Abraham, I was intrigued by the idea that in the relationship God offers, we can influence God's decision-making process. Changing the mind of God sounds like it may be too good to be true. But could it be possible, I wondered. I decid...

How Free Are We Galatians 5:1,13-15 Chomping mad Something really stuck with me in this verse as I was beginning to prepare for this week’s sermon There is a lot to chew on in this section I had to really choke down some tough ideas I really got my teeth into something that seems important, though Verse 15 says, “If you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another” This phrase has seemed challenging to me in the past, but it never really caught my attention In the 61 “one another” passages of the NT, it is the most graphically negative It also seems very difficult to grasp the imagery in the surrounding context Paul is talking about freedom through Christ Specifically, he addresses freedom from being slaves to the tradition of circumcision In a broader sense, he is talking about the liberty we have to live within the relationship with have with Christ But Paul points out that we should not use our liberty fro...

Pigs, Demons, and Tombs, Oh My Luke 8:26-39 The out of context kingdom Jesus felt compelled to leave his comfort zone to bring the kingdom to people who didn’t receive it Jesus began his mission with “the kingdom of God is near” He then began to take this message from one end of the Jewish countryside to the other One day, he decides to go across the Lake of Gennesaret and lands in the region of the Gadarenes For us, this story doesn’t really spark much interest in quickly reading through - Jesus does his thing by casting out some demons On a closer examination, there are some clear signs that Jesus left his comfort zone here First - the Gedarenes were Gentiles - they raised pigs Second - the first place Jesus enters is a cemetery of Gentiles Third - in the cemetery, there is a person who is running around threatening people while naked Jesus casts a multitude of demons out of the man We know that the demons flock into the pigs and the pigs jump off into the water and die The man is re...