What Happens Today

But the one who boasts should boast in this: that he understands and knows me — that I am the Lord, showing faithful love, justice, and righteousness on the earth, for I delight in these things. This is the Lord’s declaration. ‭‭ Jeremiah‬ ‭9:24‬  ‭ Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained from the world. ‭‭ James‬ ‭1:27‬  Therefore, you should pray like this: Our Father in heaven, your name be honored as holy. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭6:9-10‬ Your name be honored as holy. We honor His name as holy when we walk in a manner that reflects who he is. If we bear the name of Christ, then our lives must bear his ways and our living his character. How else can his kingdom come and his will be done? We are views, portals into the eternal, into his kingdom. We must live in a way that displays his faithful love, justice, and righ...

When They Leave My wife and go to my eye appointments together. That's what we do. We've always done things together. I think we actually enjoy spending time together. So, we go to my eye appointment together in Boston and then head to Charles street after that to catch a good Italian dinner. Call it a medical date night. Is this what people start to do at our age? Is this getting older? Well, it's not as painful as I thought it would be when I was a younger man. As we were checking out of the doctor's office in Boston, bantering between ourselves and the receptionist, the receptionist made a comment that made me think for a few days. In fact, it made me think enough to take the time to write this blog about it. She said, You guys seem like you have a good time together. That's not something you can fake. Miserable couples, or couples going through it, can't give the impression that they have fun together.  My wife and I have children. They've been a j...

Sometimes we forget.  We develop an amnesia of the spirit - who God has been in our lives; what he has said, what he has done. And when we forget, we make poor decisions - foolish choices. We take paths that lead us to soul ache. Amnesia is the loss of memory, the forgetting of facts, information, and experiences. One symptom of amnesia is memory loss, but it can also make it difficult to learn new information. There are many things that can cause the damage that causes amnesia such as stroke, disease, and the one often portrayed in movies - blunt force head injury. But amnesia can also be caused by shock or trauma. This is called "dissociative amnesia" and can cause a loss of self identity. You forget who you are. Blows to the head.  Shock and trauma.  Life can come at us like this.  Maybe you've felt the blow of the loss of a loved one, a job, or a relationship. Maybe you've experienced the criticisms and judgments of a church. What about disappoi...

Sometimes God asks us to do something that doesn't make sense. Like praying for our enemies or praying for those that have hurt us. His ways are far above our ways. But to our natural minds, praying for God to help someone who has hurt us or those we love can challenge the very core of our thinking. Our enemies can be our literal enemies; or we can find ourselves at odds with those we call brother, sister, or family. Praying for those close to us who have hurt us can pose an even greater challenge than praying for the enemy we barely know.  God will dispense justice. That is his right, his job so to speak; not ours. And so God calls us to a higher place, to pray for our offenders, to pray for those who do wrong. But what do we pray. Dare we lift up our enemies and ask God to strengthen them? Do we go so far as to ask the Lord of righteousness and justice to refresh the spirit of the one who has hurt us? Do we call down encouragement from heaven on the one who has hurt our hea...

I once saw a cartoon of a man sitting alone in a large meeting hall. He was attending a conference for families without dysfunction. This cartoon struck me funny because every family has its dysfunction, even if we are unwilling to admit it! And if dysfunction exists in our families, it certainly exists in our churches. But we sure are good at covering up our dysfunctions, aren't we? Jesus stands against the art of the cover-up. The truth speaks for itself and is more powerful than a good sell or a carefully woven story. It is not in our nature to be transparent. Our original parents certainly showed this in the story of the garden. We've been taught to cover our issues up, white-wash them, speak a multitude of positive words, and then try to appear as we should appear.  In one of Paul's letters to the Corinthians, he used the human body as an analogy of the church. Our bodies function well at times, and at times they ache, they slow and they fail. As I grow older, the ...

All of us have a longing to belong; to be a part of something. Rejection can be one of the most painful experiences that we face. No man is an island. We were all made for community. On the opposite side of the cry for belonging is the assertion that we don't need anyone. How many lovers' paradises have ended with the words, "I don't need you! I don't need anyone!" Rejection and independence. When God set up His church, His body, He eradicated those words. He created an organism, not an organization; a living, interconnected being. At the head of this body, this church, is Jesus Christ, the One who said that He would reject no one that came to Him and who voiced His need for His friends in the hour of His darkness at the garden of desperation.  We need one another and we belong to one another - as the church. Paul gave instruction to the Corinthian church, a church with many traits similar to the church of today in the United States. Strong thinkers who ...

Lord, give me the heart of a child. Jesus thanked God for those that were children at heart, "I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children" There is something lacking in the wisdom that years of living bring. I'm not speaking to godly wisdom formed in the gray-haired, I'm referring to the wisdom who's origin is earthly. As children, we come out of the gate with trust in our hearts; we don't really have a choice, do we? We need to trust those who care for us and raise us. We can't achieve that on our own. As children we are trained to trust, and that trust lingers. For some, the untainted, it may linger for many years, even into the teens. For others, the broken and disillusioned, it fades early on. We learn love by what life hands us; imperfect people dishing out hurt, falling short of what should be. We've all fallen prey to it, and we've a...