Author: Jonny N
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Naked – a spiritual journey… and ‘Blankets’
I’m really enjoying reading Brian McLaren’s recent book Naked Spirituality at the moment. The structure of the book and “seasons” metaphor is proving helpful in describing my spiritual journey, and allowing me to see it with grace, as well as offer direction. Amusingly, even writing this seems to place me, at this time, neatly in…
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Let down and leaving town
The following is a reflection on Luke 24:13-36 often know as the story ‘on the road to Emmaus’ – Here is a story for anyone who feels let down by Jesus. We follow him, we learn from him, we think we’ve got him sussed out. He will fulfil our wildest dreams, and then… then… suffering,…
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Sacramental
I’m praying with eyes open today, as Peterson recommends (see ‘The Contemplative Pastor’). As I do so, I’m mulling over the psalmists concern to: “behold the beauty of the Lord and seek him in his temple.” Sacramental Made of meat, flesh on bone, dust gathering on soles of feet. Dust and stone my kith and…
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The right interpretation
“The right interpretation of the law is the one that produces love.” Augustine (Matthew 22:37-40)
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This is the day
Awake my soul The many shades of sky, crystalline white, pale mauve, a green, soft, light rests in to the blue, aqua tones found nowhere else in nature, except on the back of rare, warm water creatures. Yet here I sit staring out on a winters sky at the mid point between the equator and…
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The value of 'Consider'
Mako Fujimura as written a compelling reasoning for engaging in the arts. I particularly liked this bit: If we proclaim the gospel without “considering the lilies,” our preaching and teaching will have an activist’s urgency and edge, but it will be filled with fear. We will have the right information, but we’ll be devoid of…
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Do you not know that we are planning a wedding feast?
This is wonderful, the (brilliant) painter Makoto Fujimura writes an open letter to north-american-churches (although I think that this also has resonances for all churches in the western world). Makoto writes about the how and why art and artists got pushed to the margins and in many cases outside the church. Of course there are…
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In the beginning
Canvas print and related video piece. A visual meditation on the first words in St John’s account of the incarnation.
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The Wasp
The wasp on my window, Knowing the sky is there, Though seen, not experienced. Small sharp stabs of flight. He could settle for this, Call this reality, climbing Up and down the pane, A two dimensional life. Near the top, a two inch bar Of PVC between him And the great wide open spaces of…