someone i’m not …

When a guy’s invited once to spend the day in Chicago with U2, but turns down the offer because he has work to do, he’s … a lot different than me.

More specifically, he’s Eugene Peterson.  I hope I’m becoming more like him today.

evening scripture

You will keep in perfect peace 
     him whose mind is steadfast, 
     because he trusts in you.

—Isaiah 26

evening scripture

My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you. Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.

 If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

–Jesus’ brother, James

evening scripture

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

–Paul, Letter to the Romans

talk?

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love—a scholar’s parrot may talk Greek—
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking. For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

–C.S. Lewis, “As the Ruin Falls“

this is where i am right now

(It’s warm.)

in celebration of a girl’s best friend …

I’m packing for Florida this evening … and thinking about how totally “worth-it” it (inevitably) is to include the blow-dryer.  One of those multi-solution mechanisms God’s graced us with.  (Trusting I won’t have to take things this far.)

hard to believe …

My mom was 18 years old when Martin Luther King, Jr shared his dream-speech.  How beautiful that her daughter would live to celebrate a different day; may we press forward to know its fullness.

a many-splendored-thing?

We as Christians are called upon to love all men as neighbors, loving them as ourselves.  Second … we are to love all the Christian brothers in a way that the world may observe.  This means showing love to our brothers in the midst of our differences–great or small–loving our brothers when it costs us something, loving them even under times of tremendous emotional tension, loving them in a way the world can see.  In short, we are to practice and exhibit the holiness of God and the love of God, for without this we grieve the Holy Spirit.  Love–and the unity it attests to–is the mark Christ gave Christians to wear before the world.  Only with this mark may the world know that Christians are indeed Christians and Jesus was sent by the Father.

–Francis Schaeffer, The Mark of the Christian

a few reminders

Should not one dare then to talk about Abraham? I think one should. If I were to talk about him, I would first depict the pain of his trial. To that end I would like a leech suck all the dread and distress and torture out of a father’s sufferings, so that I might describe what Abraham suffered, whereas all the while he nevertheless believed. I would remind the audience that the journey lasted three days and a good part of the fourth, yea, that these three and a half days were infinitely longer than the few thousand years which separate me from Abraham. Then I would remind them that, in my opinion, every man dare still turn around ere he begins such an undertaking, and every instant he can repentantly turn back. If the hearer does this, I fear no danger, nor am I afraid of awakening in people an inclination to be tried like Abraham. But if one would dispose of a cheap edition of Abraham, and yet admonish everyone to do likewise, then it is ludicrous.

—Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling