Survival requires more than the basic biological necessities we readily acknowledge—oxygen, food, and water. It also demands something less tangible but equally vital: hope. When hope vanishes, the hu...
When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty...
With a graciousness and an understanding of human weakness that only God can exhibit, Jesus liberates us from alienation and self-condemnation and offers each of us a new possibility. He is the Savior...
Have you ever found yourself reading the Bible and you came across a scene that is horrific, filled with awful violence or scheming swindlers or ethical blunders, and you find yourself unsure what to ...
The one essential condition of human existence is that man should always be able to bow down before something infinitely great. If men are deprived of the infinitely great they will not go on living a...
Mark 4:35-41, Job 38:1-11, Psalm 107:, Jonah 1:, Genesis 1:, Matthew 8:23-27, Luke 8:22-25, Psalm 74:14, Psalm 104:26, Genesis 1:21
A Sopping Wet Week in the Lectionary Today’s readings are thoroughly wet. In Job, God is master of the sea, Psalm 107 concerns mariners in the storm, Paul is a little drier, but still gets shipwrecke...
Mark 4:35-41, Psalm 107:, Jonah 1:, Genesis 1:, Matthew 8:23-27, Luke 8:22-25, Psalm 74:14, Psalm 104:26, Genesis 1:21
Note: This was originally part of a guide for the Fifth Sunday after Pentecost (RCL Year B) , which includes Job 38:1-11 and Mark 4:35-11. I have adapted the discussion of each of these two...
Psalm 51:17, Romans 7:18, Matthew 5:3, Romans 3:10
Feel your sinfulness. Let it humble you. Let it sober you. Beware of so filling your life with talk shows and phone calls that you don’t regularly stop and consider the ruinous condition of your life ...
Isaiah 64:6, Romans 3:9-18, Hebrews 11:6, Matthew 19:25-26, Ephesians 2:5
Some skeptics today speak about “evolving” from a primitive condition, but the Bible (Romans 1:18-32) sadly portrays a descent rather than an ascent. The result has been given the theological term “...
I am abashed, solitary, helpless, surrounded by a beauty that can never belong to me. But this sadness generates within me an unspeakable reverence for the holiness of created things, for they are pur...
In 2010, an oil rig named “Deepwater Horizon” suffered a catastrophic failure. Due to improper installation of the cement seal, a malfunctioning blowout preventer, and cost-cutting decisions by corpor...
In this excerpt of a poem by William Wordsworth, the poet describes our yearning for life beyond this life. Our desire for something greater than ourselves: Whether we be young or old, Our desti...
[Speaking of crucifixion] It seems almost inevitable to me that Jesus should go through this kind of darkness. . . . If you think of Jesus as God disguised as a man, then this will have no meaning for...
Nearly everybody knows of at least one sin habit in their life that they wish to leave behind them. Yet, no matter what they do, it seems impossible for them to be free of this habit, character flaw, ...
Pastor: Oh God, in my foolishness, I have denied that you are my God, my Lord, and my Father. Because of my abominable deeds and corrupt nature, I can do no good without you. All: You dwell in Heave...
Charles Darwin, known for his theory of natural selection, noticed that his later life included a “loss of happiness.” While he never acknowledged that it might have been related to his changing world...
A large part of what it means to be human is to be one who longs after things. Sometimes, we have trouble putting into words the longings inside us. Take for example these words from Anne Frank, just ...
No person has ever walked our earth and been free from the pains of loneliness. Rich and poor, wise and ignorant, faith-filled and agnostic, healthy and unhealthy have all alike had to face and strugg...
An Irish church once had a humorous yet insightful motto that gets at the heart of the pain that often accompanies our relationships: “To dwell above with those we love will certainly be glory. But to...
In the desert outside of Tucson, scientists dreamed up an experiment to re-create the conditions of earth for space, when and if the earth could not be made great again. The biosphere was a little wor...
Almighty God, you created us good, but by our sin, we have corrupted that goodness. Through our sinful nature, our default way of life is rejection of you, living for self, and doing what’s easiest. W...
How great and glorious You are, O God. There is no one like You. You transform our weakness into strength. You forgive our stubbornness and arrogance, and fill us with Your generous wisdom. You turn o...
The meaning of creation remains unexplainable so long as the veil covers the eternal Image. This life would be nothing but destiny, this time only sorrow, all love but decay, if the pulse of Being did...
Many years ago a great Arctic explorer started on an expedition to the North Pole. After two long years in the lonely northland, he wrote a short message, tied it under the wing of a carrier pigeon, a...
If you see a thing whole—it seems that it’s always beautiful. Planets, lives… But up close a world’s all dirt and rocks. And day to day, life is a hard job, you get tired, you lose the pattern. You ne...