Grace-period

“Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD rises upon you. See, darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, but the LORD rises upon you and his glory appears over you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn. Isaiah 60:1-3 You don't have to look too hard to find darkness.  A fellow blogger who wrote about her family following Jesus to love the least of these by adopting a child with HIV lost her army husband in a helicopter crash this past week.  A family, a couple towns over, lost their twin sons and a daughter in a car accident.  The week before, a high school lost 5 teenagers in a different car crash.  A friend struggles with paying the bills or buying her children Christmas gifts.  One of my friend's relationship struggles with the destructive forces of drug addiction.  A dear friend miscarries yet another baby.   Frankly, I don't want this w...

a snarky Christian. Yeah, I wish it weren't this way.  I wish I could jump on the band wagons to boycott stores that don't express appropriate holiday cheer or threaten advertisers during TV shows that don't match my agenda.  I wish I could claim that the founding fathers of this country actually shared my belief system with a straight face.  Unfortunately, I find no joy in pointing a finger at you.  It neither elevates me nor creates space for discussion between us.  Instead, I feel superior and you know that I am a jerk.  Yippee. While many people can say that society is falling apart, I would counter with a request that they assess their age and the opinion of their parents at that same age.  If you have a Christian point of view, it is hopefully no surprise to you that this world is broken.  However, I would also hope that you know where you can place your faith. (And frankly, I find plenty of places where God is at work thru Hi...

I went to see The Help a while back with a couple of friends. On our way out of the theater, one of them asked what prejudice we might have in our modern society that 50 years later will be unfathomable. Thinking that there was a time in American history when persons of a darker skin tone were not considered human was unfathomable for me. I was still a bit speechless from the journey of the characters through the movie and found myself searching my own heart: Who are the marginalized today that will make us look foolish? With Advent season here, I have been thinking about this question again. I have some specific answers, for me, that are not attractive, but here goes. I am very uncomfortable with nursing homes that smell like stale urine and bland food, where it seems that we store old people who have outlived their usefulness, where residents might wander up to you and kiss you or scratch you without knowing who you are (or who they are). I also don't do well with...