Life on Planet Earth on Murder

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Murder is unique in that it abolishes the party it injures, so that society must take the place of the victim, and on his behalf demand atonement or grant forgiveness.

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Alice Sebold

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“Murderers are not monsters, they're men. And that's the most frightening thing about them.”

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One of my memories as a teenager was hearing about the murder of Katherine Susan Genovese at Kew Gardens in New York City. Early in the morning on March 13, 1964, she was attacked by an assailant on h...

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Forgiveness Among Americans, a Study

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Fetzer Institute

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Matthew 18:21-22, Matthew 6:14-15, Luke 17:3-4, Ephesians 4:32, Colossians 3:13

According to a study performed in 2010 by the Fetzer Institute: Sixty-seven percent of Americans agree that the US population is composed of generally forgiving people, but 58% also agree that ther...

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The Complexity of Our Tears

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Steven Garber

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John 11:null

One day I was teaching on Capitol Hill and at the end of the afternoon one of my colleagues asked me if I knew a particular woman. I said that I did and he told me that she had been found murdered in ...

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Confronting Evil

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Andrew Delbanco

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While the illustration is somewhat dated, it brings up some of the crucial issues related to a modern approach to the subject of evil: Several television specials have been broadcast [on the subject...

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A “Nice” Family

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Evelyn Sommers

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A woman and her six-year-old daughter were found dead in their neat, orange brick suburban home. The husband and father had murdered them and attempted to take his own life. He was found unconscious a...

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Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increa...

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Different Seasons, Different Challenges

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Ronald Rohlheiser

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Scripture

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, Ecclesiastes 3:11, Luke 15:11-32, Proverbs 20:29, Psalm 90:10-12

Someone once quipped that we spend the first half of our lives struggling with the sixth commandment ( Thou shalt not commit adultery ) and the second half of our lives struggling with the fifth comma...

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“Divorce? Never, But Murder, Often”

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Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

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Song of Solomon 8:6-7, Ephesians 4:2-3, Colossians 3:13-14, Proverbs 17:9, Ecclesiastes 4:9-10, 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

The British actress Sybil Thorndike was married to Sir Lewis Casson another prolific actor. Their marriage was rather tumultuous at times, and after his death, she was once asked, “Did you ever think ...

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Can You Forgive a Monster?

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The Pastor's Workshop

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Matthew 5:44, Proverbs 20:22, Mark 11:25, Colossians 3:13, Ephesians 4:31-32, Romans 12:19-21, Matthew 6:14-15

Revenge and forgiveness are major themes of Michael Christopher’s play, The Black Angel. In it, Herman Engel is Nazi general responsible for killing over 200 French Jews. Convicted of his crimes by th...

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C. S. Lewis

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Matthew 12:36, Ephesians 4:25, Proverbs 6:16-19, Galatians 6:7-8, Romans 6:23

It does not matter how small the sins are, provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into nothing. Murder is no better than lies if lying does the trick.

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Missing the Message

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The Pastor's Workshop

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What if you were sent a message, but you never received it? Or, put another way—what if the most important message of your life was sent to you, but it never reached you? It’s hard for us in the digit...

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Heavenly father, we confess to you that

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Jacob Traeger

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Heavenly father, we confess to you that we do not always think or act as the children which you made us to be. You tell us to honour our fathers and mothers, not to murder, commit adultery, steal or c...

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O Lord, We marvel that you would take

Author

Barbara Duguid

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Colossians 3:12-14, Romans 12:2, 1 John 1:9, Ephesians 2:14-16, Romans 5:8, 1 Peter 2:24

O Lord, We marvel that you would take on flesh and blood in order to be crucified, killed, and buried for us. You humbled yourself and submitted to the hatred of sinful men, accepting the thorns, the ...

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Adapted from Hosea 4

Author

Dustin Ray

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Scripture

Hosea 4:1-2

Pastor: “Hear the word of the LORD, O children of Israel, for the LORD has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the la...

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Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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The world says: "You have needs — satisfy them. You have as much right as the rich and the mighty. Don't hesitate to satisfy your needs; indeed, expand your needs and demand more." This ...

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Justin Martyr

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We ourselves were well conversant with war, murder and everything evil, but all of us throughout the whole wide earth have traded in our weapons of war. We have exchanged our swords for plowshares, ou...

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Stealing Indian Land

Author

George Yancey

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To illustrate how the racial oppression of previous generations has benefited European Americans, we can look at the fate of Native Americans. When Europeans arrived in North America, Indians owned al...

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On Changing your Mind

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

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Scripture

Proverbs 16:25, Isaiah 55:8-9, Proverbs 28:26, James 4:13-15, 1 Corinthians 8:2, Proverbs 14:12, Luke 7:30

Joseph Lister was a British surgeon and the founder of anti-septic medicine. That may sound incredibly boring, but the effects of his discovery were profound. Prior to Lister, surgeons had virtually n...

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The Cost of Confession and Repentance

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Charles Colson

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Genuine confession and repentance can be costly, as I have discovered in dealing with offenders. Take the case of the young man in the Washington area, deeply involved with his church and solidly conv...

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Attempted Shortcuts to Love

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John Starke

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1 John 3:1, John 4:1-26, Luke 19:1-10, Galatians 5:13-14, Romans 5:5-8, 1 John 4:16

“Most of their vices are attempted short cuts to love,” writes John Steinbeck in East of Eden, a book full of characters who crave the love of a father, a brother, a lover, a son. The experience of fu...

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A Matter of Life and Death

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A. J. Swoboda

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Ideas are a matter of life and death. Take slavery, for example, which deems some peoples as inferior to others and regards people as objects to be used. Eugenics similarly witnesses to a whole set of...

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What Created the Fears in Your Life?

Author

Susie Davis

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Lamentations 3:22-23, 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, John 16:33, Habakkuk 3:17-18, Romans 8:28, Isaiah 43:2, Psalm 34:18

In her beautifully written memoir Unafraid, Susie Davis reflects on fear after experiencing a school-shooting as a high-school student. It was after this that Davis began to experience regular bouts o...

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The Quasimodo Complex

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1 Samuel 16:7, James 2:1-4, 1 Peter 3:3-4, Proverbs 31:30, 1 Samuel 16:7, Psalm 139:13-14, Leviticus 19:14

Two decades after I worked with the airmen, I read a fascinating article, “The Quasimodo Complex,” in The British Journal of Plastic Surgery, Two physicians reported in 1967 on a landmark study of e...

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Justin Martyr

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We who formerly hated and murdered one another now live together and share the same table. We pray for our enemies and try to win those who hate us.

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Author

Handley Moule

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Ephesians 2:8-9, Romans 6:23, 1 John 1:8-9, Romans 5:8, James 2:10, Isaiah 64:6, Romans 3:23

The harlot, the liar, the murderer, are short of it [sc. God’s glory]; but so are you. Perhaps they stand at the bottom of a mine, and you on the crest of an Alp; but you are as little able to touch t...

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Confusion and Chaos go with Evil, Goodness comes from an Ordered Reality

Author

Dallas Willard

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Scripture

1 Corinthians 14:33

The man who prosecuted the infamous Manson family for their murders later wrote a book titled Helter Skelter. This phrase was taken from a song performed by a well-known rock music group. Manson...

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Rejecting Grace

Author

Brett McCracken

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Jonah 4:2, Luke 23:39-43, Matthew 20:1-16, Luke 15:11-32, Isaiah 55:8-9

There’s a gut–wrenching scene in the Korean film Secret Sunshine that captures the scandal of grace better than any film I’ve ever seen. The scene takes place in a prison, as protagonist Shin-ae (Jeon...

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Author

Glen Scrivener

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John 1:16-17, Romans 5:8, Ephesians 2:8-9, Acts 2:38, 2 Corinthians 12:9, Titus 3:5-6, Galatians 4:6

The piling on of grace upon grace is incredible. God had given us his Son. We killed him. In response God says, “I want to forgive you and offer another ‘family member,’ so to speak.” It was a case of...

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