I’ve just finished an enjoyable novel called The Art of Racing in the Rain. It is written from the perspective of a loyal and faithful dog named Enzo, which makes the book incredibly endearing. (I love dogs!) But the unusual vantage point also gives a remarkable insight into our human lives as well. Enzo, I [...]
Backwards Heart
Cut down tragically by lupus just before her fortieth year, Flannery O’Connor nonetheless was well-known from the success of her fiction. However, a friend of mine recently pointed out that O’Connor first made the headlines at the age of six, when a newsreel crew came all the way from Great Britain to her home in [...]
The Shack, Part 8: Spiritual and Religious
In The Shack, God is described in the same way that theologian Paul Tillich termed the “ground of all being” – a God who is in all, through all, and uniquely real. Papa, Jesus, and Sarayu take great pains to teach Mack that religion must include love. Religion that is based on hierarchy and rules [...]
Sam’s Baptismal Gown
As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. Galatians 3:27 Last Sunday, my son wore the same gown that I wore over thirty years ago when baptized in a Moravian church in Canada. My Southern Baptist grandmother, whom I call Gran, fashioned this article of clothing for me way back [...]
The Mourner’s Bill of Rights
Recently our community suffered a tragic loss of a young boy. With Mother’s Day coming up, I am reminded that churches can be insensitive to those who are grieving. We often mean well; yet it is important to recognize the wide spectrum of emotions and experiences in life. Along those lines, my friend and colleague, [...]
The Shack, Part 7 – Spiritual but not Religious?
There is a by Eric Weiner about his study of religion called Man Seeks God: My Flirtations with the Divine. His title about one person “seeking” God captures a refrain that I have heard countless times: when someone finds out that I am a pastor, he or she will often say, “Oh, I’m spiritual, but not [...]
A Table Blessing
As part of our liturgy for Holy Communion, we extend an invitation for everyone to share in the sacrament. Here is the version used on May 5th, adapted from a poem by the brilliant Native American poet, Joy Harjo, “Perhaps the World Ends Here.” Not only are her words beautiful, but they resonant with the [...]
The Shack, Part 6 – Heaven for everyone?
Do all people go to heaven? Perhaps another way to ask this, does God want all people to go to heaven? A further question: is there a way that humans can prevent God for getting what God wants? Very good questions to consider . . . In the fifteenth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, [...]
The Shack, Part 5 – Heaven is For “Real”
Rob Bell has a fascinating and provocative statement in his book, Love Wins: “Heaven, for Jesus, wasn’t less real, but more real.” By real, Bell is largely rejecting those dominant cultural assumptions of heaven as floaty, dreamy, hazy–people in white robes with perfect hair and singing in perfect pitch. He suggests that one way to [...]