Week 7 (Year 4, NL)

We each have to face mortality alone—but also together.

Who can sort out the ironies and challenges in these four texts? Where is the joy in this kind of salvation?

Like the surveillance state, the Christ Pantocrator icon asserts an omnipresent authority. But it also asserts divine mercy and love.

I love René Girard. I don’t love that J. D. Vance loves him, too.

While my thinking on this question has shifted, at the core of my being there is still a well-dressed girl from Queens.

For many, repent is a hurt-filled word. That’s a shame, because we need it more than ever.

There is no one who does not need God’s mercy and no one who may not have it.

It’s hard to see the way God sees.

God is moving on, but Samuel can’t.

On giving Eugene Peterson's The Message another chance

I preached a word of judgment. The stranger in the back row heard grace.

The lectionary readings for Ash Wednesday are the same each year. So it almost doesn’t feel like Ash Wednesday if I go through the day without hearing Psalm 51: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions.”

I believe God can make us completely over, but I also believe that this is not always necessary.

In my younger, decidedly anti-Christian days, I did not like the way Christians asked God for mercy. It reinforced my idea that “the Christian God” was cruel and punishing. After all, if God was a loving and compassionate God, one would not have to beg for mercy. And if God was cruel and punishing but at the same time righteous and just, then human beings were clearly bad and unworthy.

This whole system of thought—shameful people and cruel God—made me want to stay far, far away from Christianity and Christian churches.

I am intrigued by the emphasis on call in 1 Samuel 16. Because I am a theological educator, I am even more fascinated by the role each of us can play in nurturing someone’s sense of call.

Saul and David are the key “called” protagonists in the story. But it is Samuel who carries, clarifies, and extends God’s call.

Can someone be called and not know it?