For most people, the idea of Advent is either primarily or exclusively an historical consideration if it is anything at all. The arrival of God in the world is certainly celebrated this time of the year, but very few people can reconcile a “Savior is Born” with the evening news. In this post and podcast I pose the question: What if the Advent of God is not limited to a history lesson, but is gazing at us each time we look in a mirror?
What makes a sin sinful? Is it societal law? Is it religious law? Or is it something else? In this post and podcast I compare the biological impulses of sex and food to show just how biased and inconsistent religion has been with regard to the sins of sexual immorality and gluttony. If you were taught like me that sin is that bad thing we do, then get ready for a real ride as I pose questions for which most pastors will not approve. What we will learn is a game changer in how we live our life and how we view morality.
Every win/lose paradigm ends the same way; smug winners and angry losers. Seeing the world through a binary lens is at the heart of what it means to be poor and the result is the suffering we see in every corner of the globe. In this post and podcast I provide an example of how two completely opposite truth claims can be resolved into something bigger than either claim. This has always been the path forward as this is the path to wisdom. Somewhere we bought into this idea that if one thing is right then the opposite must be wrong and we began erecting monuments and systems that support our team. The end result was the dehumanization of the other side or what I call poverty.
Wherever there are two or more people, we have politics. Politics is a by product of every organization, group, club, tribe or gathering. As organizations grow, something happens which causes the organization to gain power over larger numbers of people. In this post and podcast I reveal how every organization gains power and why so many people feel powerless in the process. The good news is that we are not without recourse, we can regain all that has been lost, and turn everything around. The question is whether we are willing to accept that the problem is not “those people”, but ourself.
There is always more to every story. Each moment is multidimensional. Nonphysical reality is constantly bearing in on our physical world. Inspiration births action, ideas become things. In this post we examine our ability to see these two dimensions and tie it to our sense of apathy toward seeing. Why do we prefer to live anesthetized to reality and insist on being disappointed? We examine an allegory that depicts the wisdom to get beyond our externals.
Even though we all know something about love, we are all still confused by it. In this post and podcast I try and expand our ideas about love. We must graduate from the notion that there are different kinds of love and embrace the scale of a singular love with many dimensions. As we do, we will also encounter a new paradigm for God. All this love in the world and all along we thought it was us.
We often think of our culture as a mile wide and an inch deep. How do we go deeper into love? What if our love has plateaued? What can we learn about how vertical love and horizontal love interact? In this podcast and post I share the only path I know of to go deeper into love, and that is the same pattern that God uses with us.
What does it mean when we are told that “God is Love?” No person on our planet will doubt the existence of love, but some doubt the existence of God. We’ve all been told that the love of God is something other than the love we have for each other and our things. In this post, I challenge that assertion and begin to lay the groundwork for how the love of God shows up in and as our very lives. This dramatically changes the picture of God that we’ve been given and introduces us to an obtainable belief that can be experienced and seen by all people.
Today this conclusion examines the parable of the wedding feast. This story alone could garner an entire series, but the focus today is the mirror message to the earlier parable of the workers in the vineyard. In this post I will show how anger and retribution are too small to be the operating framework of God. Anger exists, but it is reserved for that which is false, or in God’s view, “non-existent.” Love is the only power strong enough to displace our deeply entrenched affair with externals and self promotion. If we welcome generosity, we enter the state of heaven. We enter a kingdom where the present rules of getting even no longer apply.
I decided to put off the conclusion of this post one week so that I can provide for you the necessary framework to really gain the wider perspective I am providing in this series. We will never gain a solid theology without a solid anthropology. John Calvin said: “Without the knowledge of self, there is no knowledge of God.” For this reason, I am providing you the framework to discern our False self from our True self. Our ego, our pride, our false self promotion are not who we “truly” are, they are who we are in our falseness. In this post I unpack Merton’s words; “The false self is the self that God can know nothing about.” and why that is pivotal in grasping the other half of Jesus’ teaching about justice and distinctions.