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Posts from the ‘Eschatology’ Category

Sep 11

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The Banner

Every human society is, in the last resort, men banded together in the face of death. The power of religion depends, in the last resort, upon the credibility of the banners it puts in the hands of men as they stand before death, or more accurately, as they walk, inevitably, toward it.

Peter Berger, The Sacred Canopy

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I’ve written a lot of posts about death here over the years. Usually these are reflections upon the pain and the longing that accompany death, or about what the existence of death and our reaction to its inevitability might say about what it means to be human or about the nature of God and God’s promise. Or these posts represent a personal encounter with death—they are reflections about what it’s like to walk with people through death, or the experience of grief, or whatever. Read more

Jul 31

God’s Odd Way of Loving Us

One of the best parts of spending a bit of time in British Columbia each summer is the opportunity to reconnect with the many dear people whose lives we were once embedded in—at least in a more concrete way. It is so often a delight to discover the twists and turns people’s lives have taken, how their kids have grown, the new opportunities they are exploring, etc. It is a privilege to see how the goodness of God traces its way through the many stories we have been privileged to be a part of.

But, as always, there are other stories, too. Stories of relational breakdown, job difficulties, children who have gotten themselves into a bad place. And death. Always stories of death.  Read more

Jul 4

3 Comments

On the Waving of Flags

So, today is the Fourth of July and, given that many of the news sources and blogs that regularly track originate south of the border, I expect to be inundated with patriotic media today.  Or media criticizing, redescribing, and reimagining patriotism.  Or anti-American media.  Whatever.  I expect to see a lot that has to do with America. Read more

Jun 27

10 Comments

Why (I) Bother?

I have always been a lousy sleeper and I lay awake at night a lot. This proves to be fertile space for all manner of thoughts to flit in and out of my brain, some good and useful, many not so much. I think about my kids and their future. I think about philosophy. I think about soccer. I think about people who are suffering. I think about the meaning of life. I think about the many people who I have been blessed to know and who are a part of my life. I think how we end up in the places we do, doing the things we do and about what the point of it all is. Read more

Jun 5

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A Fine Mess

Back in my university days I took an undergraduate philosophy course on the problem of evil. We had been through most of the well-rehearsed responses to the question of how evil can co-exist with an all-powerful, all-good, and all-knowing God. Each had their problems, of course. “But what happens if we just say that God is limited?” our professor asked, with evident glee. What if God’s kinda just making it up as he goes along? What if God’s a bit of a selfish jerk who isn’t nearly as concerned with human misery as we are? Or, what if he’s a nice enough guy, but he just can’t do much about evil? What if he’s doing the best he can with what he has to work with? What if he’s learning as he goes, just like the rest of us? Read more

May 21

5 Comments

On Alien-Angels with Evil-Detectors… and Horses

As I’ve remarked on numerous occasions here, I have over the years found kids—my own and others’­—to be among the most reliable and thought-provoking sources of theological insight that God has seen fit to gift me with.  I love their questions, the way in which they process things, and, perhaps most important of all, the delightful irreverence and curiosity with which they approach many religious ideas that so many of us grown ups have spent years dutifully affirming. Read more

May 14

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What Must I Do to Inherit Eternal Life?

That may be true for you, but how can you say that it is true for everyone else when there are so many different understandings of truth out there 

This is, of course, among the most common questions out there in postmodern-dom and, more specifically, in the context of the religious/ethnic/cultural diversity that is becoming the new normal in Canada and the West in general. Christians are becoming increasingly aware that there is much that is good and true and beautiful in a wide variety of worldviews and practices. We are also alert to the painful reality that the Christian worldview has all too frequently been aligned with the interests of colonialism and other less overt modes of cultural imperialism. It can be a tricky thing, this business of expressing one’s convictions about the particularity of truth amidst all of diversity and historical error and the baggage that comes along with it. Read more

May 13

An “Embarrassing Kind of Love”

I continue to consider it a shame that I have only begun to get acquainted with Brennan Manning now that he has passed away. I am finding him to be a remarkable writer and thinker. Even though at times Manning’s spirituality seems quite different from my own and, on occasion, I even find myself disagreeing with how he puts this or that, he quite stubbornly holds the reality of grace before the reader in an extraordinary and compelling way. Here are a few memorable quotes containing plenty to ponder from my reading of The Ragamuffin Gospel this evening. Read more

Apr 5

The Light of Life

Jesus said, I have come that they may have life,
and have it abundantly. 
 
Whoever follows me
will never walk in darkness
but will have the light of life.
 

Every morning this week, these words from John’s gospel have framed the morning prayers in the prayer-book I use. They are good and hopeful words with which to greet a new day. They are appropriate post-Easter words. As is the case throughout John’s gospel, there is this wonderful contrast between the light and the life of Christ and the darkness and death we see all around us. Jesus’ words are true and good and full of strength and hope

And then I walk out the front door… Read more

Apr 1

If Christ Has Not Been Raised — Pity Us All

I spent the morning after the triumph of life over death reading about the triumph of death over life.

Well, that sounds a little more dramatic than it actually was. What I was in fact reading was a fairly ordinary little book by David Webster called Dispirited: How Contemporary Spirituality Makes Us Stupid, Selfish and Unhappy. It’s hard to imagine a book with a subtitle that catchy being almost a complete waste of time, but it was. I was really looking forward to reading Dispirited after hearing an interview with Webster on the radio (he made some intriguing comments about contemporary spirituality and how it perpetuates selfishness, individualism, consumerism, etc.), but the book turned out to be a rather poorly written, sloppily edited collection of loosely connected rants against the increasing prominence of the (admittedly irritating) “I’m spiritual but not religious” claim.  Read more

Mar 27

Thy Kingdom Come

Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven (Mat. 6:10).
   
Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, “The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed;  nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you” (Luke 17:20-21).

 

Some reflections on the Wednesday before the Friday and the Sunday that changed the world… Read more

Mar 14

3 Comments

The Cultivation of Regret

Do you ever wonder about what might have been? What if I had taken that job? What if I had moved to that city or stayed in that city? What if I had pursued that relationship? What if I had put my kids in that school? What if I had encouraged that friendship, chosen that church, made that crucial decision at that crucial moment? How would my life have been different? What painful pitfalls might have I avoided? What pleasures and surprises might I have missed out on? What doors may have closed never to open again? What have I missed out on by virtue of choosing what I have chosen when I have chosen it? Read more

Mar 12

1 Comment

An Odd Prescription

I have, over the last few months, had the privilege of regular interaction with a couple of young men who (independently) came to our church inquiring about baptism. In their own words, both know “next to nothing” about Christianity. They don’t know much about history or theology, the have read little more than a scant few verses in the Bible, they aren’t much interested in the latest controversial issues in the church, and (gasp!) don’t find my sermons terribly memorable. But they want to get baptized. They don’t know much about Jesus, but they want to come to him, to sign up to follow, even though they don’t have much of an idea what they are getting into.

(Come to think of it, how many of us really do?) Read more

Mar 7

6 Comments

Bleached Upon the Shore

One does not typically expect to encounter theological inspiration at a church finance meeting. Well, I suppose some might, but I do not number myself among such strange creatures. For most of this week’s church business meeting, things proceeded according to the script. There were facts and figures and updates and PowerPoint slides and motions and seconders to motions and questions and clarifications and dialogue and decisions and then we were done.

Read more

Mar 1

12 Comments

On Disappointment

There aren’t many good radio stations in the city I live in. Like, roughly zero. But for a few glorious moments this morning the heavens opened, the clouds parted, and a shaft of wondrous auditory light suffused my little Volkswagen Jetta as I flitted about, running errands on a windswept prairie day. U2’s “One” was playing on the radio. It’s probably my favourite song. Ever. I hadn’t heard it for months, maybe even a year. And here it was! On a crappy Lethbridge radio station that ordinarily dispenses a nauseating combination of top-40 pop trash and mid-eighties light rock (think Katy Perry and Chicago back to back)! Such rapture, such undeserved grace! It was almost more than I could bear. Read more

Feb 27

13 Comments

For Our Own Good

Should human beings have the right to eat, drink, and spend ourselves into oblivion without the state getting involved? Should the government be allowed to save us from our own toxic habits and risky, stupid, shortsighted behaviour in the interest of the public good? Will nothing short of legislative intervention save us from a future of morbidly obese, substance dependent video game addicts, mired in a mountain of unnavigable debt? Have we, the citizens of the brave, new twenty-first century world, come to the point where we require protection from ourselves? Read more

Feb 19

10 Comments

Who Sees Clearly?

The problem of evil is frequently cited as one of the most powerful arguments against religious faith. The existence of suffering, whether on the micro or macro level is seen as evidence against the existence of a benevolent and powerful deity. And yet, the empirical data around suffering and religious faith stubbornly refuses to fit into this view of how and why human beings believe what they believe about the world. Religious faith seems to be the highest in contexts where suffering is the greatest. Read more

Feb 13

Dust

Remember that you are dust and that to dust you shall return.

These words have been spoken in churches around the world this Ash Wednesday and will be spoken later today in our own church. These words are a call to ponder our mortality, to examine our souls and repent for our sins, to begin the slow march to the cross of Christ and to the new life of resurrection on the other side.  Read more

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