While wise, foreign magi rejoice with great joy at the arrival of Jesus—who they clearly identify as a divinely destined king—others who have benefited from the preexisting power structures quickly respond to the newborn threat. The gospel narrative attributed to Matthew wastes no time in letting us know what forces Jesus will be up against. […]
Tag: Evil
On Satan
While writing my last blog post, I realized that it was the first time on here I discussed Satan and I struggled with the concept of writing about our Adversary. (I even wondered if I should capitalize the word Satan or not. Was he worthy of such font treatment?) Of course, as is natural for […]
On Strangers and Enemies
Strangers are not always our enemies and our enemies are not always strangers, but we often treat strangers like our enemies and our enemies like strangers. And that’s because strangers and enemies are both often simply the result of human-made barriers and conflict. Some barriers are so systemically ingrained in our world that we forget […]
On Money
A key frustration of Martin Luther was how the church glorified and used money. He saw that the church in his day distorted the good news of Christ by offering salvation in exchange for money. And when the church became focused on money it ceased being the church. It stopped serving God. I wonder if […]
On Temptation and Evil
Earliest manuscripts of the Lord’s Prayer end with “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” (In fact, Luke ends with just “and lead us not into temptation”.) When I recite this portion of the prayer, my mind often goes straight towards thinking about temptations and evil, often forgetting to meditate on the underlying inquiry. That […]
Relevant Reformation 