“Go and find out what this means: ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice'” (Matthew 9:13). There is not an exhortation in the whole of scripture that needs more desperately to be pondered by Christians today than this sentence that Jesus says to the Pharisees after they criticize him for associating with sinners. Jesus is quoting Hosea 6:6, which he does again in Matthew 12:7 when the Pharisees criticize him for letting his disciples pluck grain on the Sabbath. No other Old... Read more
Change the world. It’s such an undifferentiated, macroscopic goal — the main theme of every high school valedictorian’s speech. But how do you do it? We get the impression from our news cycles and history books that the way to change the world is to get famous and important so that you can make big decisions or give inspiring speeches that cause people to give millions of dollars. Changing the world in our time has become synonymous with becoming a... Read more
1) She woke me up every morning until I left for college by yanking the sheets off my bed . If I wasn’t roused, she would tickle my toes. One time she even poured water on my head. I never had an alarm clock. 2) On my 18th birthday, she smashed the cake she baked for me into my face like they do in Mexican restaurants. 3) Every day she hit the reset button on our relationship, even when she... Read more
I was surprised to see President Obama take a public stand supporting gay marriage this week immediately after the North Carolina landslide referendum against it. I don’t question Obama’s sincerity, but politicians never make public pronouncements without a cost/benefit analysis, which leads me to wonder whether Obama’s campaign is taking a calculated risk to bait the culture warriors into unleashing an unprecedented fury that will alienate the independent voters they have already terrified by gobbling up Obama’s bait in the... Read more
Between 1910 and 1915, the Bible Institute of Los Angeles published a twelve volume series of essays entitled The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth, which would become the basis for the fundamentalist Christian movement. These essays were published in a polemical context in which Christians battled the scientism and historical critical Bible scholarship that seemed to threaten the very existence of our faith. Today’s polemical context is different. Today’s Christianity has turned into a triumphalist political voting bloc that... Read more
“The wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere” (James 3:17). We read this verse at the retreat I took with my fellow Virginia Conference provisional elders. What really struck me is how the characteristics of this heavenly wisdom are so much the opposite of the imperious knowledge that so many Christian pursue with the goal of winning arguments with other people. In our maniacally... Read more
Sixty percent is a supermajority, who took time out of their busy schedules, who needed to make a statement, who wanted to leave a legacy, who knew exactly how and where the lines should be drawn. (more…) Read more
Two weekends ago, our church’s men’s retreat examined and discussed one of my favorite scripture passages, 1 Peter 3:15-16: “Always be prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you to give a reason for the hope that you have; yet do so with gentleness and respect.” This verse summarizes for me what evangelism is supposed to look like. Our men covenanted to live so that people in our lives would have a reason to ask us about Jesus... Read more
In 2 Samuel 12, when Bathsheba’s first son was dying, David fasted and clamored with the Lord. After he died, David washed himself, ate a meal, and tried his best to move forward. That’s the position that many of us in the United Methodist Church face after several decisions made by this year’s General Conference. I feel like I made the best case I could on several issues (and I probably lost my credibility with some people I care about... Read more
“We stand united in declaring our faith that God’s grace is available to all –– that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.” Yesterday, the United Methodist Church General Conference added this statement to the preamble of our social principles by a vote of 532 to 414. The blogosphere lit up with incredulity that 414 GC delegates had apparently rejected our Wesleyan doctrine of prevenient grace. But the tweets that came out during that vote... Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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