Part 3 of series: Thanksgiving: Not Just a Day, But a Season A Season of Thanksgiving: A Brief History of Thanksgiving For several years, it has been my history to put up a bit of Thanksgiving history a few days prior to the holiday. So, once again, here is a brief history of Thanksgiving. Several years ago I asked my six-year-old nephew, “On Thanksgiving, to whom do we say thank you?” He quickly responded, “To the Native Americans.” (No, I’m... Read more
Part 2 of series: Thanksgiving: Not Just a Day, But a Season A Season of Thanksgiving: Don’t Overlook the Heart of Thanksgiving In just over a week, Americans will celebrate Thanksgiving Day. Yet for many of us, the actual holiday is so full of activity that we have little time for intentional, extended giving of thanks to God. So, as has been my tradition for many years, I am putting up several posts in anticipation of Thanksgiving Day in order... Read more
According the a recent story in the New York Times, I may not be as funny as I think I am. No, no, the Times didn’t run a story on my personal comedy. That would be a very short and a very boring article. I am speaking here as a member of my gender, as a man. And I’m speaking as one who just read the story by Pamela Paul, “Seriously, Men Only Think They’re Funnier.” Paul’s article was based... Read more
Part 1 of series: Thanksgiving: Not Just a Day, But a Season A Time for Thanksgiving: Why Start Now? Today, I’m interrupting my blog series, What is a Church?, in order to spend the next few days focusing on Thanksgiving. That’s right, Thanksgiving. Yes, I know that the official American holiday falls on the fourth Thursday in November, not the third Monday. So, yes, I know that I’m a week early. But I’d like to begin to offer some thoughts... Read more
The Biblical Imperative We Love to Ignore Psalm 96:1-13 Sing a new song to the LORD! Let the whole earth sing to the LORD! Psalm 96:1 Psalm 96 begins with a simple imperative: “Sing a new song to the LORD!” If you look up all of the Hebrew words that underlie this command, you find that they really mean “Sing a new song to the LORD!” Fine. But here’s the problem: We don’t like to sing new songs to the... Read more
Last night I saw The Way. This movie, starring Martin Sheen, is one of the most beautiful and moving films I have seen in a long time. I highly recommend it. If you can catch it in a theater, so much the better because of it’s visual beauty. In The Way, Martin Sheen plays an ophtalmologist named Tom, who discovers that his adult son, one with whom he has had a difficult relationship, is dead. The son, Daniel, died in... Read more
One of my favorite writers, David Brooks, seeks to answer these questions in his fascinating and cage-rattling op-ed in the New York Times. Brooks begins “The Inequality Map” with a tongue-in-cheek situation: Foreign tourists are coming up to me on the streets and asking, “David, you have so many different kinds of inequality in your country. How can I tell which are socially acceptable and which are not?” This is an excellent question. I will provide you with a guide... Read more
Part 14 of series: What is a Church? A Church as a Body, Part 2 In my last post I began to explain why the Apostle Paul wrote to the Christians in Corinth, and why he used the image of the human body to help them understand who they were as God’s people together. The core problem was that of division in the Corinthian ekklesia, with members treating each other in an unloving manner and failing to value their connectedness... Read more
Recap: In this series, What is a Church?, I’m trying to discover what the Bible says about the local church. What is, or better yet, what should this odd collection of people we call a church be like? What is the nature of a Christian community, according to Scripture? So far I’ve examined in detail the meaning of the Greek word ekklesia, which is usually translated as “church” in our Bibles. In my last post, I noted that Paul’s letters... Read more
Mark D. Roberts
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No More Clink of the Coin in the Kettle . . . Salvation Army Ringers Go Digital
The New York Times reports that the Salvation Army is going digital. In more and more locations this year, those omnipresent bell ringers with the red kettles will be equipped so you can swipe your card in order to make a Christmas donation. According to a Salvation Army representative: “A lot of people just don’t carry cash any more,” said Maj. George Hood, the Salvation Army’s spokesman. “We’re basically trying to make sure we’re keeping up with our donors and... Read more