'giving up certainty' Tagged Posts
Good Friday
Tonight we will gather for a time of prayer and solemn remembrance of the crucifixion of Jesus. We will begin at 7 in the Sanctuary at 5265 H Street. There is childcare for children 10 and under. All are welcome. The sky peels back to purple and thunder slaps the thighs of heaven, and all the tears of those who grieve fly up to clouds and are released and drench the earth. The ones who see and hear know that…
Trust in the face of uncertainty
Some Pharisees came and said to him, “Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you.” He said to them, “Go and tell that fox for me, Listen, I am casting out demons and performing cures today and tomorrow, and on the third day I finish my work.” —Luke 13.31-32 Jesus looks at the forces of death, geared up for the raid, the jaded dealers of oppression and fear with their swords and…
After the Storm
The parable of The Prodigal Son http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSLsUS29UiM The son: And after the storm, I run and run as the rains come And I look up, I look up, on my knees and out of luck, I look up. Night has always pushed up day You must know life to see decay But I won’t rot, I won’t rot Not this mind and not this heart, I won’t rot. God: And I took you by the hand And we stood tall,…
We’re all in this together.
Elie Wiesel is known to have said: “The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.” In our efforts to resist being actively self-righteous like the Pharisee, may we also pay attention to the self-righteousness of our blindness to others. Remember — we’re all in this together.
Toward Sunday
The parables of Jesus take everyday experiences from the time of Jesus and turn them upside down. By showing us ordinary elements and experiences, parables provide a transparency to see the whole of our live and the holy in our lives in a new way (from John Indermark, Parables and Passion, Jesus’ stories for the days of Lent, page 11). This week our worship will be rooted in Luke 18.9-14 Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. It is hard…
Laborers in the Vineyard
“Matthew’s perspective calls for Christians to understand themselves as belonging to a community, so that no decision is purely personal and individual. Matthew’s perspective calls for Christians to understand their lives as being lived in the light of the present and coming kingdom of God, which represents a reversal of cultural values rather than their confirmation. Thus the individual teachings of Matthew’s Gospel cannot be understood on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis, unless and until one is converted to the Gospel’s ecclesial…
Parables
“Maybe Jesus is saying: … Throw yourself into what you love or simply what you do. Let God sort out the rest. It’s not your problem, and that’s a gift unto itself. And if you should happen to find yourself on the wanting end of what’s deserved, God’s loving hand extended is gift indeed. But even more radical than this message of God’s generosity, perhaps, is a quiet, secondary message of these parables, as understated as their responsible characters. Namely,…
Parables
“…Jesus’ parables of judgment…are about an action going somewhere to happen. They are not about a system of static recurrences in which time goes on forever-where there is always, by the rules of the system, time for a second chance at everything. They do not allow you the luxury of a historical perspective in which a step taken too soon or a move made too late can always be remedied the next time around. Rather, they are about a world…
Toward Sunday
We are inviting our community to Give Up Certainty for Lent as we root ourselves in the parables of Jesus. We move into our third week and the Parable of The Wise & Foolish Bridesmaids. What is a parable? Exact definitions vary from “stories of life with religious or spiritual lessons” to “metaphors or similes that take narrative form.” We will be operating on an understanding of parables as “thin places” where the usual boundaries between heaven and earth, holy and…
Weeds
How does one live in a world where weeds do infest the ground, and evil does rear its head in powerful ways that defy certainty and simple answers? The Parable of the Weeds. Matthew 13.24-30