Dear Angela, Happy New Year to you, your family and creative writers team. Attached is a 1971 article from the Vancouver Sun that my son dug up: “Pulse Beats for Youth: Group Shares Art, Religion as Commune.” It brought back memories. That entire project was funded by a federal arts grant. Some of the projects…
What is the hurry on the Human Sexuality Report? It took 300 years of conversation for the church to reach consensus on the Trinity. To this day, the church discusses whether God chooses you, or whether you choose God. It is such a central question, yet there is no human answer, the Bible holds both…
While party standings are largely unchanged in B.C., the Liberals won Richmond’s two seats from the Conservatives. That is most surprising and cause for concern. It appears pro-Beijing forces launched an aggressive smear-campaign on social media against the two Conservative incumbents for speaking out against Beijing’s human rights abuses. Chinese-Canadians dominate Richmond’s population. That community…
Each morning for weeks, we wake to a minor civil war just outside the bedroom. A fierce food fight at the hummingbird feeder. It lasts all day. Six or more are at it. No tolerance for the other’s existence. No matter that food is in abundance; no matter that each can have a private spigot;…
This profound moment is His story, as is all of history. Suddenly, every person on the planet is linked in deep vulnerability and co-dependency. What is God telling us? What is our testimony in this hour? Does citizenship in the Kingdom of heaven provide guideposts for life on earth? To re-build life on earth, there is no better blueprint than the Kingdom of heaven that Jesus said to seek first. First we need a grip on what the Kingdom is.
When I was ten, my grandfather died. Our family was still in Holland. I remember the open grave, lowering the casket and taking my turn pitching dirt into a deep black hole. Adults said Grandpa died in the assurance of faith and the hope of the resurrection. It comforted me; my Grandpa was a child of God. There was no talk of Grandpa happily reunited with Grandma in heaven.
This is a summer of record temperatures, wildfires and near-drought in the rain forest. Rising water temperature in the Fraser River kills sockeye. Global warming is here. Mid-August mornings bring a cool, new freshness, autumn approaches, a metaphor for life’s downward slope. We attend a memorial service for Bill, an engineer who upon retirement left the city for the coast to reflect with deepening appreciation on trees, birds and his Creator. Will the redeemed burn fossil fuels on the new earth? Should we?
Who will forget the force and authority of Billy Graham’s voice? Especially that signature declaration, “The Bible says!” His was a voice of clarity and eternal certainties, for the Bible tells me so! Some think we need voices like that, today, but how do we know what the Bible says?
When weary of waiting, remember what time it is. We live between the first and the second coming. Because of the First Coming we are citizens of the Kingdom. It is not only future. Jesus’ birth means God is with us. Jesus’ death means Satan’s clock is ticking. Jesus’ resurrection means that your death is a door, not a hole.
In 2016, Violet took up painting again as an expression of her devotion to God and gratitude for her salvation.
Last year, the value of our home increased half a million, tax free, in one year. Wonderful! No, it is not wonderful at all. More and more people cannot afford a roof over their head. So what can be done? While Christians help the homeless and some churches have built social housing by creatively redeveloping their land and buildings, demand rises faster than supply. It is not enough to treat the symptoms; we must strike at the cause.
Medical science has rendered obsolete the experience, tradition and language about our mortality and created a new difficulty: how to die. We need to re-learn when and how to accept that the battle is over. We wait till doctors tell us there is nothing more they can do. But rarely is there nothing more doctors can do.
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