For as many times as we’ve heard the Easter story, the whole event still feels, well, kind of farfetched. Perhaps in your head you hold as fact that the lifeless body of Jesus rose from the grave, but during those dark nights of the soul, your heart nonetheless wonders: Can you trust resurrection? That’s whyContinue reading “Alive, Unbound, and Loosed”
Tag Archives: healing
A Christmas Heart
Pastor Grant M. VanderVelden shared this message during the Christmas Eve candlelight service at First Presbyterian Church in Waukon, Iowa, USA. It is part of his Advent and Christmas series “Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room.” The children’s story, The Christmas Heart, is written by Pam McDonald and illustrated by Kim Hanzo. The book isContinue reading “A Christmas Heart”
Suffering Well
The sinister scene embraces the clickbait ingredients of a viral TikTok video. When the Wise Men from the East innocently ask him about the newborn King of the Jews, Herod’s blood pressure undoubtedly spikes. His Grinch-ly face starts turning beet red, and thick veins commence to popping in his neck. Then, as last Sunday’s ScriptureContinue reading “Suffering Well”
Bitter-Sweet
Complaining, grumbling, and doubting are among the human emotions fueling the plot of our Advent Scripture lessons from the Old Testament book of Exodus, the epic story of the Lord God freeing his people from slavery in Egypt. Their journey to freedom through the Red Sea has been grueling, demanding, and exhausting, and folks areContinue reading “Bitter-Sweet”
He Said What?
In the lead-up to this morning’s Scripture lesson, the Gospel of John records Jesus likening himself to bread and telling people to eat his flesh and drink his blood. The Lord’s graphic language is turning some people off. Anything that smacks of cannibalism tends to do that. We’ll shortly learn that some of the Lord’sContinue reading “He Said What?”
Enough Already
Words matter, so you need to say it, believe it, and receive it: You are enough. YOU are enough. You ARE enough. You are ENOUGH. If you’re at all like me, you’ve experienced moments, times – or maybe even whole seasons – when you felt as though you weren’t enough. So, just in case youContinue reading “Enough Already”
Trusting God with Our National Sin
As go the lyrics, the songs we love to sing have freedom’s theme. Hence we red-blooded, God-blessed Americans love to croon of freedom and liberty, with words both sacred and secular, when national holidays afford opportunities to “let music swell the breeze and ring from all the trees.” But candidly I’m having a harder andContinue reading “Trusting God with Our National Sin”
God’s Naughty Child
Ouch! My month-long sabbatical didn’t exactly go as planned. Just a handful of days into my much-needed break from the demands of daily life and responsibilities of ministry, I took a tumble down a short set of concrete steps, as I set out for a hike on an otherwise-sunny spring day in northeast Wisconsin, theContinue reading “God’s Naughty Child”
You Don’t Know Jack
Thanks to the likes of Mother Goose, everyone knows the nursery rhyme by heart: Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water.Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after. But wait, there’s more! Up Jack got and home did trot as fast as he could caper;AndContinue reading “You Don’t Know Jack”
By the Lord’s Arithmetic
It’s the kind of banner headline that catches my attention and stops me cold: “How to Save a Sad, Lonely, Angry and Mean Society.” It tops a compelling essay by the conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks. Long one of my favorites, he well argues that consuming culture bathes the human mind with emotionalContinue reading “By the Lord’s Arithmetic”