The Pace of the Day

Pulling up to a traffic light, I was easing into the pace of the day. It seemed clear at that moment that each day possesses its own pace, and it is our responsibility to find it and flow with it. Taken further, it’s not so much the pace of the day as the pace of … Continue reading →

Conversation Determines Destiny

Psalm 50 verse 23 declares, “Whoever orders his conduct (conversation) aright I will show the salvation of God.” When we consider that the word “conversation” is also used in the Bible to signify conduct or behavior, this is a good reminder for us of how powerful an indicator our everyday conversation is to the quality … Continue reading →

The Great Delusion

One of the greatest tragedies about the fall of humankind in the garden of delight was that the tempter actually conned the unsuspecting couple into reaching out illicitly for what they already had: the likeness to their Creator and the knowledge of good and evil or right and wrong. They were like their Creator already … Continue reading →

The Altar of Depression

As I read again Psalms 42 and 43, which are actually one continuous psalm, I saw something different. The psalmist was asking his own soul, “Why are you cast down within me?” But the verb “cast down” can also be translated “Bowed down” or “prostrate” within me, which implies that the psalmist came upon his … Continue reading →

Losing One’s Life

There was a writer who represented Judas, the apostle who betrayed Jesus, as rejoicing when he heard that puzzling commandment from Jesus, that we must hate our loved ones and even our own lives if we are truly to be His disciples. (See Luke 14 v.26) He was suggesting that there was an impulse in … Continue reading →

Most Liberated

At the community center we were enjoying an impromptu gospel concert when one of our number, a young lady with Down Syndrome, leaped out of her chair and began to dance in ecstasy. The rest of the room roared in appreciative laughter. It occurred to me that the rest of us in the room wanted … Continue reading →

The Remorse of a Prankster

Once I was listening to a beautiful piece of live music by Tchaikovsky, his Symphony No.6, known as “Pathetique.” I got the “cute” mischievious idea to approach the violinist afterward and to say to her, “That was pathetic!” (Get it?) My intention was to have fun with a pun, hoping she would be amused. She … Continue reading →

Befriending One’s Self

There is a proverb in the Bible at the end of the 18th Chapter that states that in order to have many friends one must show oneself friendly, and that there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother. I believe I’m beginning to see another level of meaning in this proverb. It isn’t … Continue reading →

Hume and Rousseau

I learned recently the Scottish philosopher and historian David Hume of the 18th Century befriended Jean Jacques Rousseau the French philosopher whose ideas helped to fuel the French Revolution. Hume was home-schooled by the way, and came, through his belief in skepticism, to even doubt that there was such an entity as a self, much … Continue reading →

The Wells of Two Nations

The woman at the well in John chapter 4 remarks to Jesus that the well is deep and that Jacob himself and his sons and livestock had drunk from that very well thousands of years before. She, the Samaritan woman, was concerned that Jesus had no bucket. As we established in the “Drawing Well Water” … Continue reading →