Props to This Church

I don't go to Gloryland Nazarne Church. I don't know anybody who goes there. I know almost nothing about the church.

But the little I do know, I like.

I drive by the church regularly, and the variety of musical events they host is terrific. Last Friday, the church hosted its semi-annual Christian rock night. The flyers I saw for the event listed 5 local bands, and bragged about how loud the music would be.

The sign in front of the church is currently advertising the upcoming "spaghetti dinner and old-time gospel sing."

Hard rock one week, and a traditional gospel sing the next? A church with that much musical range must be a good church.

Good for you, Gloryland Nazarene Church.

On assurance

J.D. Greear, from his book Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart
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"No matter how you feel at any given moment, how encouraged or discouraged you feel about your spiritual progress, how hot or cold your love for Jesus, what you should be doing is always the same -- resting in the gospel. Rest in His finished work. That's all you can do. It's all you need to do. It's all God has commanded you to do."

"kingdom community"

This quote is from Jean Vanier, founder of L'Arche, an organization dedicated to creating communities where the developmentally disabled and those who assist them share life together.

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"We are not a people who think we are better. We are not an elite. We are people who are poor, but who have been drawn together by God and put their trust in God. That is what a kingdom community is all about: a community that knows it has been called by God in all its poverty and weakness, and that God is love."

On the end of Job

From Lisa Velthouse's spiritual memoir Craving Grace:
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"Although for thirty-seven chapters Job's innocence and deservedness have been his party line, he doesn't tout either one now. Both seem to have become irrelevant to the discussion. Job plays no more bargaining chips, and he no longer implies that life is unfair. God's greatness has silenced and humbled him, and what he has to say is brief: 'Things I knew nothing about ... things far too wonderful for me ... but now I have seen.'"

The Wooziness of Grace

From Lisa Velthouse's Craving Grace:
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Theres a certain wooziness that accompanies grace. That much I know. It's the feeling of being bowled over by generosity and simultaneously being gut-certain you don't come close to deserving it. It's the kind of feeling that can leave one awed and overjoyed in an instant, that can throw legitimate doubts and fears out the window.

On Lent

From the editors of "Bread and Wine," a book containing readings for Lent and Easter:
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"Whatever else it may be, Lent should never be morose -- an annual ordeal during which we begrudgingly forgo a handful of pleasures. Instead, we ought to approach Lent as an opportunity, not a requirement. After all, it is meant to be the church's springtime, a time when, out of the darkness of sin's winter, a repentant, empowered people emerges."

Book Review

This review appeared originally at Alan's Eyes & Ears.

Full of Grace: Encountering Mary in Faith, Art, and Life, by Judith DuPre. Hardcover.

Every Christmas, I pick up a specifically seasonal book, and the last few years, that reading has focused on the Virgin Mary. This is another of those books, and a beautiful one at that.

The book contains dozens of striking photos, mostly of Marian works of art, although other photos are included that speak to particular themes. There are famous works of art, and obscure works of art. There is painting, photography, sculpture, and architecture. In addition to brief discussions of the artistic works, the book talks about a range of discussions related to Mary and related themes. Some of these are historical, some are devotional, and some come from the author's experience.

DuPre is taking a clearly modern view on Mary, and sometimes moves a tad too far into the non-traditional for my personal comfort level. But I take those passages as thought-provoking, as challenging, and DuPre usually moves back inside the guardrails of my comfort zone in due course.

Dante on the Trinity

In the deep and bright
essencs of that exalted Light, three circles
appeared to me; they had three different colors,
but all of them were of the same dimension;
one circle seemed reflected by the second,
as rainbow is by rainbow, and the third
seemed fire breathed equally by those two circles.

Steve Nicholson on Simplicity

Proper attitudes toward simplicity:
1. Receive what you have, what comes to you, as a gift from God.
2. It is God's business, not yours, to care for what you need and what you have.
3. Have your goods available to others.

Steps to take in developing a lifestyle of simplicity:
 1. Buy things for their usefullness, rather than their status.
 2. Reject anything that is producing an addiction in you.
 3. Develop a habit of giving things away.
 4. Refuse to be propagandized by advertising and the cult of the latest gadgetry.
 5. Learn to enjoy things without owning them.
 6. Look with a healthy skepticism on "buy now, pay later" schemes.
 7. Obey Jesus' instrictions about plain, honest speech.
 8. Reject anything that leads to the oppression of other people.
 9. Stress quality of life over quantity, and being over having.
10. Take time to see if God will provide a need without having to buy it.

2013 priorities

In deciding what to prioritize for my spiritual life in 2013, I have decided to retain my 2012 priorities, which I accomplished to various degrees in 2012. In looking at the "new monastic" and "urban monastic" movements, and I will continue to try to integrate these 5 priorities into my life.

S olitude
S tillness
S ilence
S implicity
S ervice

I have not worked out how each of these will be integrated into my life, but I have confidence that I'll figure it out. I have a destination.