He adamantly told me what his “biblical” doctrine on the matter was. And then I showed him three other passages that flatly disagreed with his idea on the passage he showed me.
From that point, it was amazing to watch him not care about the facts, and yet find a way to keep pretending he does.
Perhaps it is the case
That life here
Is meant to be a tougher adventure
Than you assume it must be—
And that you could and should
Learn more than seems convenient—
And overcome more challenges than
It seems one should have to overcome.
What good is that amazing brain you have—
Created and loaned by the
Greatest Thinker Ever Himself—
When it is under the charge of a tired spirit
Who has grown so weary in this world
As no longer to care about learning
And discovering and verifying,
And who doesn’t care if it
Learns the truth of a matter or not?
You are duller than you think you are.
We Christians regularly talk about “the kingdom”, but in my observation, we’re not often very precise about what we mean, and I think this causes us trouble from time to time.
When we say “the kingdom”, we could possibly mean anything between the full domain over which God is king, or that tightest circle of God’s fellowship. And I think we might do ourselves a favor—even if it causes us cognitive work we’d rather not put out—to see if we can be more diligent in saying exactly what we mean. And there’s probably no context where this might make a more useful difference in our lives than in our discussion of whatever it is that our various camps mean when we say “the church”. I observe that for a great many, it seems to be the strong belief that church=kingdom. But my question to that is this:
Continue readingWe have plenty of:
Yet, not everybody has adequate food or shelter or clothing.
So, then, what do we need that we don’t have?
Our son—
This wonder to us
With a mind of his own
That sees and hears the world
And reports back to us his own findings
In this sweet fellowship into which we have grown
In these nineteen years—
Not many ever fully surrender
To letting the truth be the truth.
No, the masses find such promise
In pretending parts of it
To be something other
Than what they are.
We want to know about ghosts,
But maybe not entirely,
Because maybe it’s somehow
More satisfying if we don’t
Find out for sure.
There’s a lot that needs doing in this world—and not enough doers doing it. But one thing that’s sorely in need is for someone to keep the encouragers encouraged, because if they stop doing what they do, it all gets far worse fast.
Please think of who you know that makes people better, and be sure to let them know they’re making a difference.
While this world does have its wicked
With their violence and schemes,
And we watch them pour their darkness
On a thousand righteous dreams,
