Our Creative God

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Infinite God, from eternity past, creating, with the Cross in sight, entering into time. The Timeless one creating time – imagining the idea, making it so, then sustaining it with his own will and thought, carrying forward all of history to its great and glorious end: the real beginning.

I am a believer. That’s not to say that I believe in anything – quite the opposite. In most ways, I am a skeptic – an atheist, even. That’s just to say, there are a great many gods that I don’t believe in, and I do not like to be made a fool. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Creativity, Shannon, Theology Tagged With: , , , , , ,

KINGDOM: the Gospel of the Kingdom – it’s not about Heaven

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JustWrite copyI talk about the Kingdom of God a lot. I’m there so often because I’m still unpacking it for myself, but also because it is often a missing – and central – component to Jesus’ message of Good News. When we forget that the Gospel is also the Gospel of the Kingdom, what we’re left with is what we’ve all heard a thousand times: you’re a sinner; Jesus died on the cross for your sins, & rose again from the dead, & if you only pray to receive Him into your heart – voila – you’ll go to Heaven when you die! Sounds almost trite, once you hear it often enough – “pie in the sky, by & by”. Is that the whole Good News? Simply that someday, when you die, you won’t go to Hell? What about till then? What about NOW? [Read more…]

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Waging War on our Poison Tongues

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PoisonTongue
I once had an acquaintance state an observation they’d made about me that seemed out of the ordinary (they could take their pick, I suppose – “ordinary” is NOT something I’m often called). They said, “You are almost completely without sarcasm, and that’s refreshing.”

Oh how the mighty have fallen. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Character, Encouragement, marriage, Shannon, Theology Tagged With: , , , , , ,

You are NOT Ordinary

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ExcuseLike many young boys I knew, I grew up wishing I were a superhero. Unlike those other boys, my imagination was far more detailed and all-consuming.

My penchant for daydreaming earned me the nickname of “Martian” in elementary school – even the teachers called me that – because I was “always in outer space.”  My fantasy of choice was that a huge storm was bearing down on our school. I would imagine the teacher in front of me, but in my mind – as she was attempting to teach – waters rose up around her ankles, her waist, her shoulder – somehow unaware of the danger that was overtaking her.  I – in my minds eye – would then begin swimming each of the students in my class to safety, one-by-one, until the teacher – in real life – would call on me, and I would be at an absolute loss as to what she had been talking about.  “In outer-space again, Martian?”, and the whole class would giggle.  Even to this day, my favorite movies are Captain America, the Avengers, & Lord of the Rings – give me a hero with special abilities and an incredible call on his or her life and I am IN!

However, life feels so normal – so average – so day-to-day, pushing against the crowd, trying to make something happen.  Is there anything special about that? [Read more…]

Filed Under: Kingdom of God, Shannon, Theology Tagged With: , , , ,

God with Skin On (Christmas is REAL)

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ChristmasBlogHow do you cope with the end of your world, & the beginning of another? As strange – & devastating – as that may sounds, that’s what Christmas is, and some of us even feel it.

God with skin on – the creator of the universe, putting on frailty. It’s like packaging an earthquake in a test-tube, or pouring all the world’s oceans into a coke can. It’s something profound – almost absurd – and if true, it changes – quite literally – EVERYTHING.  [Read more…]

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