I can have all the right beliefs; I can do all the right things as dictated by my church, but if I don’t know what God is saying to me in this moment and the next, I am nowhere in my faith. If I don’t allow God in to teach me directly what He wants […]

The Holy Spirit calls us in many ways: through our thoughts to follow him, to address this issue or that, to allow him to heal us, through our dreams, a friend’s suggestion of a movie to see. An idea heard two or three times in as many days. An invitation to see or hear with […]

  “Lent leads us to the cross,” preached Rev. John Cleghorn at our church on the first Sunday in Lent. The question for us is this: is it the cross of Jesus or our own cross that Lent leads us to? Of course, the whole passion story leads us to Jesus’ death on the cross […]

If English had a better neutral pronoun, I would use it instead of “he” for God. As it is, neither pronoun, “he” or “it,” begins to describe who God is or what God is about. God the Father is such a common image that we have of God—it speaks to the relationship that God wants […]

Do you know how you think? Do you listen you to the negative tape in your head? Do you know the source of its injunctions, its fears? Are you comfortable with all that you are, warts and all? Or do you push away the thoughts? Will you do anything to drown them out? What is […]

The one reaction I have to contemporary Christianity over and over again is this: where is the closeness to God? Where are the people who have an intimate relationship with God like Jesus did? He called God, Abba or Daddy! He regularly spent time alone with God. God’s laws were written on his heart. He […]

“Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, honor those who mistreat you.” That quote is from Luke 6. Matthew 5 puts it this way: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” And he goes […]

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” [Gal 5:22-3] Fruit is the product of a plant or tree at the end of a long season of growth from spring to summer or fall. And so it is with the fruit of the Spirit—it is the […]

I was praying a month or so ago with my hands open, palms up—not my usual hand position– when this phrase came to mind, “Open-handed, open-hearted, open-minded.” I was going to add open-souled when I realized that the soul is the part of us that is always open to God. Then I found this passage […]

I am beginning to write a book about the Exodus story being our story, too. My thesis is that it is the template that God left us for how we get out of slavery to the world and into the kingdom of God. As I contemplate the passages in these five books of the Bible—Exodus, […]