Mark 1:27-28
They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching—with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.
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Today, we would say “….and then the news about Jesus went viral.” Andy Warhol’s quote “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes” has become more in the realm of possibility. Fame today is spoken of in terms of a disease, a virus. It lasts for a short period or else it will threaten to kill the host. The shortness of our attention spans serves us as antibiotic against anything that would infect us and subsequently influence us for more than 15 minutes. Long before there were cell phones to capture the moment on video and post to Youtube, Jesus padded around on the dusty roads of Judea teaching a new way to live and sending demons packing. Eons of doubt and distraction has not changed that story or made it fade away from sight. Laura Winter, author of a new book “Still,” said, “Yet in those same moments of strained belief, of not knowing where or if God is, it has also seemed that the Christian story keeps explaining who and where I am, better than any other story I know.” This Jesus didn’t take his 15 minutes of fame and fade away. This Jesus is grace gone viral and it won’t stop.
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You kill me, Lord and I am still alive to talk about it. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 26
ELOGOS
Jan 25
I Corinthians 8:1-3
Now concerning food sacrificed to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Anyone who claims to know something does not yet have the necessary knowledge; but anyone who loves God is known by him.
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I continue to be thoroughly amazed and thrilled to be a witness and a participant of the Information Age. The encyclopedia(a word that Jiminy Cricket taught me how to spell) was the only hands-on, readily available source of information in my growing-up house with the exception of my father who seemed to be a walking encyclopedia of all manner of knowledge. The Information Age presents new challenges of how to discern the truth from the garbage and how to manage the information responsibly. Knowledge without love becomes a weapon of power and submission. Love with knowledge can change the world.
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Holy God, know me and grant me the grace to share your love with others. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 24
Psalm 111:10
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all those who practice it have a good understanding. His praise endures forever.
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Wisdom has been on my mind. I have not necessarily in possession of it but I think about the idea of it alot! I have been helping our teenagers to discover the Wisdom literature of the Proverbs and I recently bought a book by Katie Couric called The Best Advice I Ever Got- Lessons from Extraordinary Lives. I continue to find myself guided daily by bits of wisdom that has been passed down to me. Collecting them feels like my childhood marble collection….some small, some large, some complex, some simple, some totally unique and all in a velvet bag. I am that velvet bag full of marbles. Doesn’t sound too profound. No matter the situation in which I find myself, I have learned that facing it humbling in the presence of the Lord is always a good start.
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Holy God, thank you for all the people in my life that have pointed me in your direction. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 23
Deuteronomy 18:19-20
Anyone who does not heed the words that the prophet shall speak in my name, I myself will hold accountable. But any prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, or who presumes to speak in my name a word that I have not commanded the prophet to speak—that prophet shall die.”
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It is all in the right tools. Anyone who has ever built, fixed or crafted anything with their hands will tell you that great truth. Whether it be putting up a curtain rod, carving wood, changing a tire, sewing a quilt or building a patio. Anyone who understands computers will tell you the same thing – the right tools – adequate hardware, good connections, the right software make all the difference. As Christians, we continue to live in a time when we have to discern the voices which claim to speak in God’s name. We have been given an invaluable tool – God’s Spirit in us. It is Job One of the Holy Spirit to help us recognize the truth when we hear it. God will reckon with those who dare to speak their own words and not God’s. God gives us what we need to discern the foolish from the wise.
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Use, O Lord, the words that are mine and thine and forgive the words that are mine alone. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 20
Psalm 101:1-3
I will sing of loyalty and of justice; to you, O LORD, I will sing.
I will study the way that is blameless. When shall I attain it?
I will not set before my eyes anything that is base.
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I had a drama professor who once illustrated to the class the power of imagination and suggestion by saying “I forbid you from picturing a polar bear.” Of course, none of us had the ability to stop a polar bear from rampaging through our thoughts if only for a moment. There is a war happening for our attention and imagination. Visually we are bombarded with images that reek more havoc than good. We have few effective weapons or defenses. Trying to be perfect just invites in the virus we seek to avoid. To consider the character of our God is to invite a champion into our hearts and minds.
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You are, Lord, my best thought by day or by night. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 19
Mark 1:18-20
And immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.
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I have known a bunch of fishermen in my life – both the kind who fish for sport and who fish for a living. Neither would take too kindly to having their boys (doesn’t matter that they were grown men) leaving them in the boat to go follow some stranger. One of Mark’s agenda in writing his Gospel is helping readers who have never met Jesus get a good solid look at his authority. Mark’s Gospel stands on a soapbox in the city square and through cupped hands yells at the top of its lungs saying, “This is Jesus. Pay attention!” Zebedee was well within his rights to say something but according to Mark, what was important was that when Jesus said, “Follow” -Zebedee’s boys did….and Zebedee didn’t stop them. It is good to remember that this Jesus is worth following.
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Okay, Lord, I’m with you just don’t walk quite so fast. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 18
1 Corinthians 7:29, 31
I mean, brothers and sisters, the appointed time has grown short; from now on, let even those who…deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the present form of this world is passing away.
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There are these annoying little questions that nip at my heels every day. What have I done today? What have I accomplished? Have I been productive? Where did the time go? Everything left undone piles up and festers. The guilt of undoneness and the guilt of not doing everything people need to have done in the way in which they want it presses down like boulders crushing in slow-motion. Wordsworth was right, the world is too much with us….for this, for everything, we are out of tune. It is at times such as these that I pray silently so that I can hear the music of a new heaven and a new earth.
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God, sing that song again, you know the one. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 17
Psalm 62
For God alone my soul waits in silence; from him comes my salvation.
He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall never be shaken.
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Every generation dangles its toes on the edge of atheism. They move to that edge for a variety of reasons. The stink of hypocrisy. The suffocation of rules. The audaciousness of the Bible. The cruelty of Christians. The cold-handed slap of brokenness. The power of evil. Some very, very brilliant people have slough off the final rags of faith and danced to the noise of their own solitary heartbeat. As for me, I would rather wait in silence. I would rather endure the slings and arrows of skeptical noise. I have known noise and I have made noise. It is in the silence, however, when I most discover God waiting in silence for me.
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Sorry, Lord, I didn’t hear you. I was talking too much. Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 16
Jonah 3:1-3
The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, saying, “Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.” So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord.
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A second time. Those were words of grace. The first time Jonah was told to go to Ninevah, it became the tale of a whale. The first time, the people of Ninevah kept doing the rotten things they were doing to each other. The first time was a bust. Nothing changed. Nothing got better. Relationships did not grow stronger. The second time, Jonah got in the face of the people and told them to stop sinning. Some did. Their relationship with God got better. Jonah would later get mad at God for not destroying the people of Ninevah as he had he would the first time. Jonah had already forgotten that God had not given up on him. It is no wonder we have turned this into a children’s story. Adults have trouble with grace.
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How long, O Lord, before we get a clue? Amen.
ELOGOS
Jan 12
John 1:43-45
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.” Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.” Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.”
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I absolutely love this passage. When was it in your life when someone that you knew and trusted looked you in the eye and said, “This Jesus, he is the real deal. I’ve seen him. I want you to see him too.” Through the din of these days which leave even the most sure-footed among us scrambling for solid ground, there is this Jesus. The longer I live, the more struggles I have witnessed being endured, I continue to discover the faith welling inside to believe in this fantastic tale of the divine reaching into human history and leading us through the wreckage of our choices and actions toward a yet more glorious day and an incredible life that is filled with compassion. What makes it glorious and incredible is how sincerely we turn to those around us – both friend and stranger – wanting the absolute best for them and choosing to say, “This Jesus, he is the real deal…you come too”
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Holy God, may we learn again that the best thing we can do for those we love is to put them in the best hands. Amen.
