All is darkness. Was Jesus sentient at all on the Sabbath? It is a disquieting association –Sabbath rest with death, yet on this seventh day, Jesus rested. At what point did resurrection occur? We know when the followers experienced it, but when did it begin? When did the pneuma — […]
Life contains a series of liminal points, thresholds we cross that can never be uncrossed, actions taken that can never be untaken, transformative occurrences that change everything for all time. The inevitability of the cross increased in certainty from the moment Jesus was arrested in the Garden — everything in the ensuing […]
Can we truly imagine a death sentence, even of our own choosing? What goes through one’s heart and mind when the narrow path forward leads to pain, anguish, violence, humiliation and destruction? What sources provide the internal fortitude to face such an overwhelming crisis? When such a terrible fate awaits […]
Continuing my speculative reflection on what might have been going through Jesus’ mind the week of his crucifixion… Jesus crossed a crucial point-of-no-return by his actions in the temple. He became not just a nuisance, but an enemy of the Roman empire. It was just a matter of hours or […]
“Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,” (Philippians 2:5) is reverberating through my head as I approach this year’s Holy Week. Now, I realize that I am treading on thin ice here, but my reflections for this week are nothing but my limited attempts to […]
I know I am in the minority, but in a culture crazed for Christmas and Easter, my two favorite church holy-days are Pentecost and Maundy Thursday. I’ll get to Pentecost in about six weeks, but for now I want to think about what makes Maundy Thursday so significant for me. […]
Like many things in our modern culture, Holy Week has become a muddled grey paste of a religious experience. Lent, Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter all get jumbled up together in an atheological hodge-podge that leaves the veteran confused and the novitiate clueless. I have already sung, […]
I cannot read the gospel passages of Jesus’ last week on earth without wondering what must have been running through his mind. I realize that this is pure speculation — nothing more or less. But I feel like it must have been a time of great agitation and ambiguity. I […]
The shift from Palm Sunday to Good Friday has always fascinated me. Cheering masses turning to ugly mobs. Crowds assembling to catch a glimpse of the possible Messiah reconvene to scream for his blood. One might think Jesus supported healthcare reform and immigration, the way people turned nasty, threatening his […]
“It’s a damn impossibility. If Jesus came back, then Jesus never died in the first place!” “You are an idiot! Just because you have never seen it happen, it can’t be true!” “People don’t come back from the dead. Near-death experiences are just that, NEAR death.” “Jesus wasn’t “people.” Jesus […]
United Methodeviations 