Our unseen rhinoviral malefactor
Our hip broken at Bethel
Our rusted wealth
Form the composting boneyard of our accreted presents
By eternity tilled
The thorned seed to receive
So today we might have
Lamb and chocolate

Minneapolis tonight. SF Thursday -- then the redeye home Friday night.

Someone recently asked me a number of questions in an LJ community, so I thought I would share my answers here -- since they capture my perspective on certain issues that commonly concern those who appropach matters of faith somewhat thoughtfully.

Would you say that biblical interpretation, using these means, is an inexact science?I would push ( Read more... )

In his song "Imagine," John Lennon asks us to envision a world in which there are no countries and no religion.  Interesting that he does not also propose there being no money.  I wonder why that was?

Oh, wait.  Never mind.

“God is love.” -I John 4:8b

There is a God who is. While there is a tendency to gloss over such things in church, it may nonetheless be worthwhile to consider for a moment the fact that John’s simple assertion here contains within it the notion that there is a particular God who is. He is not making this statement about some generalized deity. In ( Read more... )

Just did a webinar with Bruce Powel Douglass of IBM on agile development for safety-critical systems. He was awesome. I loved when he needed an example of inadequate parameter constraints and chose a ventilation system that allowed 1000 ml of air to be pumped into a preemie's lungs.

This week, we had a teaching on Hebrews 10. There were three points:

We should monitor our tendency to isolate ourselves from our faith communities. The writer of this epistle would not have had to write what he did if the church folk of the time were all always 100% eager to congregate. It seems that there have always been issues that keep us ( Read more... )

Just completed 3000 words for Incredibly Big Megacorporate on expert integrated systems. This is when a martini would be in order -- if it weren't so out of order.

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At the beginning of each calendar year, I take some time to have hour-long sit-downs with the members of my congregation.  The purpose of this time is to check in on the state of their lives, get feedback about how they think things are going with the congregation, and make some plans for the upcoming year ( Read more... )