Feb 12
For those tracking the progress of my pre-Easter reading project, I do continue to pick away at N.T. Wright’s The Resurrection of the Son of God (my pace has slowed considerably over the last few weeks—that’s going to have to be addressed if I’m to finish in time). Right now, I’m in the middle of his discussion of various views of the resurrection in the Hebrew Bible and how these differed from the views of the ancient Greeks. Read more
Last Friday a pastor from the mainland phoned me up and asked if I would be willing to do a graveside ceremony for a family who was returning the body of their loved one to Nanaimo for burial. I still find it very strange to be entrusted, in however minimal a fashion, with these significant events in people’s lives, but I also find it very difficult to to say no to a friend. So, today I was off to say a few words at the burial of a stranger, hoping and praying that something I said would be of some comfort to those present. Read more
If you’re anything like me, you tend to accumulate books far beyond your capacity to read them. In my case, these books tend to migrate from the nice brown Chapters box (always so exciting to see these boxes arrive!) to the coffee table in our living room (where they are daily in plain view, crying out: “read me”) to a pile of books on another table in the living room (a pile in which they steadily descend to the bottom over a period of weeks), to my office where they sit on the side of my desk where my “really should have a look at this” file is located, to the top shelf of my desk (in order to make room for other things I really should have a look at), and finally to my bookshelf, their final resting place, where they sit side by side with any number of other books which have undertaken the same sad journey. It’s kind of pathetic. Read more
One of the more beautiful quotes I’ve come across in quite some time—from Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead:
I feel sometimes as if I were a child who opens its eyes on the world once and sees amazing things it will never know any names for and then has to close its eyes again. I know this is all mere apparition compared to what awaits us, but it is only lovelier for that. There is a human beauty in it. And I can’t believe that, when we have been changed and put on incorruptibility, we will forget our fantastic condition of mortality and impermanence, the great bright dream of procreating and perishing that meant the whole world to us. In eternity this world will be Troy, I believe, and all that has passed here will be the epic of the universe, the ballad they sing in the streets. Because I don’t imagine any reality putting this one in the shade entirely, and I think piety forbids me to try.
From the category of “interesting pastoral experiences” comes the following email I received last week:
Hi,
I am seeking a universalist belief church where people believe that Jesus came to earth to tell people about universal salvation, not eternal damnation? Is this such a church? I have gone to yours before, but never did understand what the belief system is at this church?
Thank you for your time—God bless,
———— Read more
Lent is a time of waiting—something we are all, in various ways and to varying degrees, familiar with. During Lent our waiting is oriented towards Good Friday and Easter Sunday, the high points of the Christian calendar. But “waiting” is a theme that extends far beyond the period of Lent. Read more
I recently had an interesting conversation about the relationship between history and truth with a group of UBC students with whom I’m going through Lesslie Newbigin’s The Gospel in a Pluralist Society. We arrived yesterday at what is, in my opinion, one of the most important chapters in the book—”The Logic of Election.” In this chapter, Newbigin challenges our assumptions about what election is for, arguing that God never chose a specific group of people—whether the nation of Israel or the church—to be the objects of eternal salvation but rather to be his instruments of extending his redemption to others. According to Newbigin, we do not encounter God as isolated individuals; he has always used other people—both now and across time—to communicate his purposes to us. Read more
 | inquisitivelypinkcd4… on Hagar |
| inquisitivelypinkcd4… on Haunted (Whispers in a Ruined… |
 | Ryan on Haunted (Whispers in a Ruined… |
| inquisitivelypinkcd4… on Haunted (Whispers in a Ruined… |
| inquisitivelypinkcd4… on Haunted (Whispers in a Ruined… |
Rumblings 