christian living on Hatred

Father God–You invite us to come as a child to his/her daddy. You invite us to open our souls to You. You invite us to lay our desires before You. You are fond of us, Your children–so we come to You h...

Gracious God–who opens Your arms wide to welcome us just as we are but who’s too loving leave us that way: in response to Your invitation we come humbly and boldly with our broken hearts and weak hand...

God of grace and truth, hope and power: in the midst of an ever-changing world, we delight that You are constant, joyous and loving, always the same, but never stagnant or boring. That’s why we’re so ...

What can we say, O Lord, to justify ourselves? You shower us with grace upon grace. Your mercies are new every morning. And we find it hard to forgive others. Sometimes we are petty and hold grudges f...

A Valentine’s Day Tradition What better way to say, “I love you,” than passing your beloved some sugar, corn syrup, dextrose, and glycerin wrapped in a chalkly Necco wafer heart? Maybe some of you re...

Much that we have interpreted as a defect of sanctification in church people is really an outgrowth of their loss of bearing with respect to justification. Christians who are no longer sure that God l...

Gracious God of love–Father, Son and Holy Spirit: We are grateful that You’ve revealed yourself to us, telling us that each of us are loved by You as children, each precious in Your sight, each a refl...

If you do not transform your pain, you will surely transmit it.

Kindness flows from you, Lord, pure and continual. You had cast us off, as was only just, but mercifully you forgave us; you hated us and you were reconciled to us, you cursed us and you blessed us; y...

When God wants to sort out the world, as the Beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount make clear, he doesn’t send in the tanks. He sends in the meek, the broken, the justice hungry, the peacemakers, the ...

Gratitude has a ripple effect, spreading warmth and positivity to those around us. It is nearly impossible to hold onto resentment or self-pity while maintaining a grateful heart. John Kavanaugh share...

If we acknowledge the God of the Bible, we are committed to struggle for justice in society. Justice means giving to each his due. Our problem, as seen in the light of the gospel, is that each of us o...

“[Zach] had gone from seeing beauty in the midst of suffering to creating it. He had taken this thing that could have suffocated him with despair and stripped it down until all that was left was hope....

This is in fact one of the many sharp edges of “the problem of evil.” Evil isn’t simply a philosophers’ puzzle but a reality which stalks our streets and damages people’s lives, homes and property. Th...

My tradition teaches that no heart is as whole as a broken heart, and I would say that no faith is as solid as a wounded faith.

How shall my heart be reconciled to its feast of losses?

If the too obvious, too straight branches of Truth and Good are crushed or amputated and cannot reach the light—yet perhaps the . . . unexpected branches of Beauty will make their way through and soar...

A wound that goes unacknowledged and unwept is a wound that cannot heal.

The great hope of Christianity is not that we get to escape all the suffering of the world, but that God is going to use us to be a part of his healing project…

Creator of all things, Alpha and Omega, Beginning and End, Father, Shepherd, Servant, Brother, Priest and King. Whose love poured out mends broken hearts. Whose wounded hands reach out to all. Whose S...

Think of an ancient icon of Christ. Imagine that a thousand-year-old Christ Pantocrator painted on a wooden panel is discovered in some forgotten monastery. The image of Christ is there, but it’s cove...

Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life…. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for pe...

Most powerful Holy Spirit, come down upon us and subdue us. From heaven, where the ordinary is made glorious, and glory seems but ordinary, bathe us with the brilliance of Your light like dew.

We ask you, Lord and master, to be our help and support. Save those in trouble; have mercy on the humble; raise the fallen; reveal yourself to the needy; heal the ungodly; return the wanderers of your...

If your salvation does not include living with God in beauty, truth, and goodness, it’s going to be a very dry haul. And so much of our difficulty today for Christians in this world, and for the world...

Goodness is beauty in the best estate.

What’s the worst good news you’ve ever received? Here are a few that come to mind for me. “Mr. Halter, this is Bill from the Ford service department. I’ve got some good news for you. All the smoke yo...

We ask you God, to help and defend us. Deliver the oppressed, comfort the poor, lift up the fallen, show yourself to the needy, heal the sick, bring back those of your people who have wandered, feed t...

O Lord, we are aware of how much we need you, and how much the world needs you. We yearn for your guidance and strength. We pray for your intervention and for your kingdom to come. Today we lift up t...

The dream so profoundly called for by Martin Luther King Jr. was not the American dream but a longing for the kingdom of God.