Isaiah 65:17-25 Revelations 21: 22-26 I often hear people complain about the Old Testament. They say that it is full of nothing but violence and ugliness. I just want to point out this beautiful passage from Isaiah is part of the Old Testament. People, including me, also say that the book of Revelation is chock full of awful stuff. But then you have this exquisite passage from chapter 21. It is true, in the Old Testament and in Revelation, and perhaps even in the gospels, we wade through a lot of hard stuff, awful stuff – and then we get to this place of breathtaking beauty. Kind of like life, at times. There is a lot of awful and painful stuff in the world, stuff that is hard to look at. Yet, if we remain present, we may get to hope. These two passages we read today are preceded by […]
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Remembrance
Matthew 5:1-12 As we moved toward this day of remembrance, 2020, I did a little personal remembrance, looking back on this year. Where have we come from in 2020? About a year ago, in the last couple of months of 2019, I was feeling a sort of restlessness, a sense that something was burgeoning, getting ready to be born. As the world turned to a new calendar year, I felt there was light right around the corner. I remembered that way back in the beginning of this year I was very conscious of what 2020 means to us. 2020 is perfect vision. I began this year thinking about that and with the intention of making 2020 a year of seeing clearly. To me this meant a kind of spiritual clarity. I was drawn to the idea of seeing where and what God is calling us to. What is God drawing […]
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