Paul’s pivotal life experience is referred to as the Calling of Paul or the Damascus Road Experience–the day Jesus confronted Paul. Luke recorded the original incident in Acts 9: “Saul, Saul, why are you out to get me?” [Paul] said, “Who are you, Master?” “I am Jesus, the One you’re hunting down.” (verses 4-5) (more…) Read more
The next prayer we’ll investigate is straightforward enough, but the action the apostles took seems curious to us. Shortly after Jesus “was taken up and disappeared in a cloud” (Acts 1:9, technically called the Ascension), and some time before Pentecost, Peter persuaded the other disciples to replace Judas Iscariot, to return their number to twelve. Peter quoted Psalm 109:8: “Give him a short life, and give his job to somebody else.” He went on to explain that the replacement needed... Read more
Probably the biggest religion story of the past couple weeks has been the saga of Daniel Hauser, the 13-year-old boy from northern Minnesota who is dying of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Yes, he’s dying, unless he gets chemo. With chemo, there’s a 90% survival rate. Without chemo, less than 10%. After one round of chemo this Spring, Hauser refused to go back. At some point he and his mother — and possibly other members of his family — “converted” to Nemenhah, an... Read more
I can hardly imagine a person praying during his torture and execution. I find it even more difficult to imagine that person praying for his executors. But Jesus was no ordinary person. He loved people to the end, and he prayed that his Father would forgive the people who killed him. What an extraordinary accomplishment! (more…) Read more
In The New Christians, I wrote a section chastising liberals for censoring the Bible in the Revised Common Lectionary. Although liberals often criticize conservatives for cherrypicking Bible verses, liberals do just the same thing when they leave verses out of what they preach on Sunday (a practice that one doesn’t find with evangelicals). I wrote, …A beautiful and provocative Psalm, to be sure, and a reading that’s slated for one of the most important days in the church calendar, Pentecost,... Read more
Near the beginning of Solomon’s reign, he does what we hope any ruler would do. In 1 Kings 3, he asks God for wisdom. After Solomon marries his queen, he travels to Gibeon to worship at the shrine (before the temple in Jerusalem was finished). There, he and God have a dialogue. This one is different from the prayers we’ve looked at previously for two reasons: (1) the communication is initiated by God, and (2) it takes place in a... Read more
Some years after Moses led the people of Israel out of Egypt and after Joshua took them into the land that God had promised Abram, Israel was led by a series of judges. Moses picked the first judges, people who feared God and were known to be trustworthy and uncorrupt. After Joshua died, but before the people of Israel demanded a king, the Israelites attempted to settle in the Promised Land. It was a time of great turbulence. The judges,... Read more
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Last week, I ran some excerpts of a book I’ve written on the ancient practice of lectio divina. This week, I’ll be posting excerpts from another book called Ask Seek Knock, in which I wrote about how we can use the prayers in the Bible for our own personal devotion. That is, we can prayer the prayers that people in the Bible prayed. Today, a working definition of prayer. The rest of the week, some of those prayers. Probably, when... Read more
Praying the Bible Intro – lectio divina – reading – meditating – praying – contemplating Writing about contemplation is strange. It’s weird because the fourth step of lectio divina is so unlike our everyday activities. The first three steps of lectio divina aren’t that difficult to describe, because we read, think, and pray every day. Those are activities we’re accustomed to. Contemplatio, on the other hand, is an inactivity. The move from oratio to contemplatio is mostly an act of... Read more
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