Category: Reflection
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Becoming fully human
He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?” He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Once more Jesus put his hands on…
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Beauty and Justice
There is a great deal to lament as we look around the world, with conflicts all around: from the small places with in ourselves and the communities around us to the more tragic and dramatic unrest in the middle east and further to Sudan, the Congo and Zimbabwe. It can leave us feeling overwhelmed and…
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Door to sanctuary
For the life caught up with following Jesus, the inward journey and outward journey are linked and find energy and momentum from each other — like a pendulum swinging back and forth. Both motions orientated around the fulcrum of God, but one expressing that relationship outwardly in love and service to others and the other…
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Love mixed up
There is a presupposition that runs through theses posts which can be distilled to some thing like: the good life is a life caught up with the love of God and the love of neighbour.’ The last post touched a little on noting how the way we use love leads to the word being tainted…
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The Clod & the Pebble
The following is a wonderfully insightful poem by William Blake (1757-1827) The Clod & the Pebble ‘Love seeketh not Itself to please, ‘Nor for itself hath any care; ‘But for another gives its ease, ‘And builds a heaven in Hell’s despair.’ So sang a little Clod of Clay, Trodden with the cattle’s feet : But…
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Imagination and the role of the artist
This Image is a visual response to a collection of beautiful images created by my brother Paul. “Why is our world beautiful, and what are we as Christians to do about the fact that our world is beautiful? Why is our world ugly, and what are we as Christians to do about the fact that our…
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Celebration and Value
What we celebrate determines what we value and reflects what we believe. (I’m sure I’m quoting or paraphrasing someone here). We celebrate birthdays because we believe in life and value the existence of friends and relatives. We celebrate weddings because we value loving-committed relationships and believe in family. We celebrate the birth of a baby…
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Reality and Hope
It’s taken me a while to continue the series of post that have stopped off at points of pain, hope and the prophetic imagination. My eldest brother has wonderfully distilled Brueggemann’s thesis as follows: In his book The Prophetic Imagination, Walter Brueggemann identifies two modes of Old Testament prophets. The first is the message of future…
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Energizing Visions
I ended the last post with a couple of quotes from Henri Nouwen concerning eschatological dreams and visions of harmony. Here’s a quick reminder: These visions… offer us hope when we are close to despair, courage when we are tempted to give up on life, and trust when suspicion seems the more logical attitude. Without…
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Loving conversation
A few thoughts are coming together here, but need to be fleshed out more. I’m thinking about how we love one another in the way we speak and converse. First from my brothers blog ‘reimagining science’: “…we have a tendency to think that when we speak, we are just transferring information. However, it’s all a lot…