General Christian The Compass of the Beatitudes Eight Beatitudes are found in the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 5:3-12 at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount and summarized into five in the Gospel of Luke 6:20b-23, in what has become known as the Sermon on the Plain. These sermons tell his followers what it means to follow Him. Markarios, the Greek […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 16, 2020September 16, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian The Narrative of the Gospel Versus the Narrative of the World In this season, we’ve experienced many hard things, things that testify to the brokenness of this world and the narrative it operates under. On Sunday, August 23, a police officer in Kenosha, Wisconsin, fired seven shots at Jacob Blake while he was trying to get into a car during an attempted arrest. The officer put […] Written by intervarsity September 15, 2020September 15, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian When Hope is Poisoned by Despair One of the supreme gifts of youth is the seemingly unlimited amount of hope. The young have not yet spent years pushing against immobile walls of oppression, repression, and suppression. They still believe that “good” is something that can be talked into a person. They believe in their yet unchallenged selves and their hope drives […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 15, 2020September 15, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian Jesus Isn’t on the Ballot. That Doesn’t Mean Christians Can Opt Out. It started in 2004 as a little Bible study looking at the political implications of Jesus’ teaching and the social dimensions of the gospel. Four years later, during the 2008 presidential election, I published a book with Chris Haw called “Jesus for President” and took the movement out on a national tour, traveling through nearly […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 14, 2020September 14, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian What Do You See When You Look at Protestors? “Smile!” I said as they both squeezed into each other, my older son, swinging his arm around his younger brother. They had the same bright eyes, and indulged me with one too many first day of school photos. Smiling at them I felt my heart ache. Two bright smiles, brothers to the end and the […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 14, 2020September 14, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian Lead us Not Into Temptation Genesis 2:4b-7, 15-17; 3:1-8, Matthew 4:1-11 A pastor was late for a memorial service which he was leading at a church other than his own in the city. After driving around and around searching for a parking place, he finally parked his car in a tow-away zone […] Written by Barbara Barkley September 13, 2020September 13, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian Lunchtime Grace: Lessons from the Meal Line On one of the hottest, most sultry days of August, as only can be in New York City, the Tuesday lunch-time line for rough sleepers was huge. It went down the church steps across the street, along west 80th street, and onto Broadway. I wasn’t sure we could feed everyone, and people were getting restless. […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 11, 2020September 11, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian Confidentiality, Anonymity, Privacy and Healthy Communication This last Sunday our lectionary passage was the one in which Jesus talks about how you are to talk to people directly when you are upset with them. We are not to talk ABOUT people, but TO people, one on one, when we are upset. If that doesn’t work, we […] Written by Barbara Barkley September 10, 2020September 11, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian 2020 is the Year of Religious Women Voters We’re just 8 Sundays away from the 2020 election. Between now and then, a moral reckoning among women of faith will determine the future of this nation and, I dare say, the planet. I believe we can rise to the moment by bringing to the fore our shared values of family, dignity, and justice. As […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 10, 2020September 11, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
General Christian Truth Telling (I apologize that the spacing, etc is so weird. Blogger has changed things and I can’t seem to edit some of the hidden codes in this to fix it). James 1:19-27, Matthew 18:15-22, Luke 11:2-4 Today’s passage from Matthew is a familiar one. It comes around every three years through the […] Written by Barbara Barkley September 9, 2020September 11, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Fire in the Sky: On Divisions and Forgiveness “I’ve seen it raining fire in the sky.”- John Denver, Rocky Mountain High Every August, for as long as I can remember, we’ve invited friends to join us in watching the Perseids Meteor Shower. Living high in Rockies, far from city lights, we enjoy amazingly dark skies. Sometimes clouds block the view; sometimes the moon […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Did Adam Smith Get “The Wealth of Nations” from the Bible? I am teaching through Isaiah in my adult Sunday school class. History nerd that I am, I perked up in chapters 60 and 61 when the English Standard Version (and other modern translations) repeatedly uses the phrase “the wealth of the nations.” I immediately guessed that this phrase was the origin of Adam Smith’s classic […] Written by Evangelical History September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Fire in the Sky: On Divisions and Forgiveness “I’ve seen it raining fire in the sky.”- John Denver, Rocky Mountain High Every August, for as long as I can remember, we’ve invited friends to join us in watching the Perseids Meteor Shower. Living high in Rockies, far from city lights, we enjoy amazingly dark skies. Sometimes clouds block the view; sometimes the moon […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Did Adam Smith Get “The Wealth of Nations” from the Bible? I am teaching through Isaiah in my adult Sunday school class. History nerd that I am, I perked up in chapters 60 and 61 when the English Standard Version (and other modern translations) repeatedly uses the phrase “the wealth of the nations.” I immediately guessed that this phrase was the origin of Adam Smith’s classic […] Written by Evangelical History September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Fair Genesis 15:1-6, Luke 3:8, Matthew 20:1-16 You know the story. The owner hires different workers at different times. That means the workers work different amounts. Yet, at the end of the day, each worker is paid the same amount. And the laborers are upset about this. They feel this is unjust. They feel that those […] Written by Barbara Barkley September 20, 2020September 20, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
On Gender Equality: We Have Made Great Strides & We Are Not There Yet To have this conversation with everyone and anyone makes no sense. If you cannot accept that women are equally created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), or that women are called and sent to share the Gospel (as the women at the tomb were on the first Easter) then please stop reading, for this […] Written by Red Letter Christians September 22, 2020September 22, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Dispassion – Options From a practical perspective, the key to ending suffering is to experience all things directly, with dispassion, free of labels, free of the intervention of the ego-mind. The key word is “dispassion.” Why is that key? Because if we don’t view things with dispassion, with equanimity, that means that our emotions are engaged and that […] Written by Ronald Hirsch September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Biblical Principles for Grandparenting a Child with a Disability Have you seen the bumper sticker that says, “We’re spending our children’s inheritance”? Parents committed to Scripture should change that slogan to: “Our children are our inheritance” (see Psalm 127:3 KJV). This applies equally to grandparenting. We receive grandchildren from the Lord as an inheritance, and we give them back to our family, church, and […] Written by Paul Tautges September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
Comfort My experience of God has been, consistently, that God shows up most fully during our hardest times. For me, God’s presence was tangible during our horrible family crises that started ten years ago and really became more manageable for most of us five years ago. During those first few years, […] Written by Barbara Barkley September 21, 2020September 21, 2020 Saving Bookmark this article Bookmarked
