Reflect, Resonate, Reevaluate, Respond

The way of Jesus cannot be imposed or mapped—it requires an active participation in following Jesus as he leads us through sometimes strange and unfamiliar territory, in circumstances that become clear only in the hesitations and questionings, in the pauses and reflections where we engage in prayerful conversation with one another and with him.
~ Eugene Peterson, 1932-2018, Pastor/Teacher

~~~~~ Psalm 125 ~~~~~

I wanted a perfect ending. I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity.
~ Gilda Radner, 1946-’89

We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!
~ Douglas Adams, 1952-2001

The fear of uncertainty is rooted in this belief: God won’t meet me in the way I am desperate for him to show up. And our greatest certitude is this: God is already in the room.
~ Shelly Miller, Spiritual coach

Insistence on security is incompatible with the way of the cross. What daring adventures the incarnation and the atonement were! What a breach of convention and decorum that Almighty God should renounce his privileges in order to take human flesh and bear human sin! Jesus had no security except in his Father. So to follow Jesus is always to accept at least a measure of uncertainty, danger and rejection for his sake.
~ John Stott, 1921-2011, Anglican Minister, The Cross of Christ

It helps, now and then, to step back and take the long view. The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is beyond our vision. We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work. Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us. […] We lay foundations that will need further development. We cannot do everything and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders. We are prophets of a future not our own.
~ Ken Untener, 1937-2004, Bishop of Saginaw

Reflect, Resonate, Reevaluate, Respond

Tragically, we use contempt daily without being aware of what we are doing. How does contempt spread its poison in our everyday encounters? […] Ignoring our emotions is turning our back on reality; listening to our emotions ushers us into reality. And reality is where we meet God.
~ Dan Allender, 1952-, Psychologist and Author/Speaker

~~~~~~~~~~ Psalms 123-124 ~~~~~~~~~~

Jesus covers us through the cross and his blood, but never without pointing out and exposing the depths of what our hearts are truly like. Our covering is not about hiding. Jesus has the integrity to name every wound you have suffered and every wound you have caused. [A]nd our covering is not hiding.
~ Dan Allender

My devotion to niceness has won me a lot of acceptance and praise, but it has also inhibited my courage, fed my self-righteousness, encouraged my inauthenticity, and produced in me a flimsy sweetness that easily gives way to disdain.
~ Sharon Hodde Miller, Pastor, Author, Teacher

Attention is the beginning of devotion.
~ Mary Oliver, 1935-2019, Poet

Self-contempt intertwines itself masterfully with the data of our story. I see this time and again with clients. I help them name harm they have known from a parent and they begin to experience deep grief. And yet within seconds, their posture tightens and their tears dry up in a flash. Almost without fail, memories of their own failures as a parent or a friend, sibling or spouse have immediately come to their mind. The initial experience of rest and relief vanishes before our eyes, stolen away before it has a chance to settle in. The inherent message seems to be that it is hypocritical to name other’s failure when you too have failed; that this was a fool’s pathway to begin with and nothing lasting will come of those self-indulgent tears. The work of contempt is swift and brutal.
~ Andrew Ide, Fellow, Allender Center

Self-righteousness exclaims, “I will not be saved in God’s way; I will make a new road to heaven; I will not bow before God’s grace; I will not accept the atonement which God has wrought out in the person of Jesus; I will be my own redeemer.”
~ Charles Spurgeon, Sermon 502: A Jealous God, 1863