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How many times I’ve heard folks explain their absence from worship with, “I’m just not good enough to go to church”!  Congregations are perceived, outside of our walls, as a collection of perfect people who’ve somehow cracked the code of ethical–or at least acceptable–behavior before a demanding and capricious Almighty…  These folks have convinced themselves that they’re just bad, that there’s no hope of godly acceptance.  Scripture for this weekend speaks hopeful words to those who’ve been cast away by their peer-groups and thus themselves.  Who SAYS we’re so bad??

Our opening story is that of Ruth, an outsider, one of those terrible people from Moab (3:1-5; 4:13-17).  Naomi, her mother-in-law and the real hero of the story, came up with a way to overcome the stigma of intermarriage so dear to Ezra & Nehemiah.  Boaz’ marriage proposal expanded the limits of the “People of God”:  now Ruth was embraced and acceptable.  Evidently God makes provision even for those–shudder!– Moabites.  (see Deuteronomy 23:3)    G. Malcolm Sinclair exclaims, “This is huge.  It shakes the powerful….It elevates the tender and dirt-real lives of the many.”  (FEASTING on the WORD, B 4:269)

In the Letter to the Hebrews 9:24-28 we re-visit the idea of Christ as High Priest.  The duties of that official included being advocate for the People, bad as they may have been.  Now, in Christ, we have a full-time advocate for our imperfections.  Does God need to be reminded of God’s parental love?  The community of believers to which the author wrote may have been endangered by “spiritual fatigue” and needed reassurance of their personal & corporate worth.  “The entire passage trumpets liberation to all bound by the burden of guilt arising from our failures to ‘measure up’ to God’s desires or even our own best intentions.” (Jane A. Fahey, op.cit.)  Our salvation has been established for good!

Mark’s remembrance (12:38-44) of the prideful “religious” and the poor widow who gave all she had should be seen as a contrast between the Ins & the Outs.  Jesus didn’t say that God loved one better than the rest; so neither should we.  It is noted, however, that the Establishment seemed to have lost its compassion en route to feathering its own nest on the backs of the poor!  Even knowing this, the widow gives everything she’s got to maintaining the tottering system.  So then does Jesus give everything he’s got to give eternal life to the dregs of humanity–present company included!

The widows in these stories came to abundance and acceptance even in their poverty.  Not only were they accepted by their neighbors, but especially by God, who gives a model for today.  Those who’ve separated themselves from worship with mis-placed guilt are reminded that a Holy Image has been implanted within them, an Image which is not to be cast aside.  Thanks to those who reflect God’s intent by accepting me and other sinners as recipients of holy love, despite our bad habits…

God Bless Us Every One                       Horace Brown King

My encounters with scripture passages assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

We have a choice, this weekend, between the readings for All Saints’ Day and those for the 24th Sunday after Pentecost.  I’ve arbitrarily chosen to look at the All Saints’ Day passages, primarily because I really LIKE the All Saints’ worship, and secondarily because it’s my 75th birthday!  So there.  As an Old Geezer, I’ve been pondering Immortality lots, lately; here is to be found more comfort than challenge, more hope than guilt.  As the seasons are beginning their retreat into winter solstice, our Biblical wanderings also mellow into the subdued light of seeking a Star…

Wisdom of Solomon is considered non-canonical (pseudo-pygrapha–I love the word) by many groups, but there’s a lot of God-speak here to be found.  This text (3:1-9) challenges the deception of appearances by inviting readers to “probe the truth and purpose of God in life and in death”. (Gary W. Charles, FEASTING on the WORD, B 4:220)  Souls have eternal life because they’re in God’s hands, thus we live with confidence in a hopeful resolution of our spirit journey.

After the first three chapters of the Revelation to John I go straight to the end (21:1-6a), avoiding all the gnostic seals & symbols.   After all the weird beasts ‘n’ battles, we end up in a fruitful garden, just as at the Genetic start of our encounter with God.  (Or is it God’s encounter with us?)  “The new heaven and the new earth” are representative of God’s renewing and restoration of that which has become scarred and cratered.  A New Jerusalem spills out of heaven, and God pitches a tent with humans to realize the ideal community.

The Story of the Raising of Lazarus, John 11:32-44, has been described by some as the dress rehearsal for Easter.  We need to allow Jesus to be more than a traveling miracle-man; he’s here as a grieving friend to both living and dead.  Desperate and hostile, we also look for a miracle at the graveside–or at least a reason for death’s sudden appearance which stops our clocks and agendas in mid-breath.  Yet here we read about Jesus the life-giver inviting believers to step boldly into death’s presence, affirming that even here God is at work!  “The miracle is just this:  that united in [Jesus’] death by his grace, you may wake from the death that is life without him and live unbound, now and eternally, to god’s glory.” (Cynthia A. Jarvis, ibid. page 240)

“And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long,                                                                      steals on the ear the distant triumph song,                                                                               and hearts are brave again, and arms are strong:                                                               Alleluia!  Alleluia!”

God Bless Us, Every One                                Horace Brown King

My encounters with Scripture passages assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

From my comfortable study, serenaded by Bach and blessed by my dozing cat, it’s silly for me to speak of suffering.  Most of those in our church pews this weekend have very little appreciation of suffering:  we have aches and pains, to be sure, but few of us (thankfully!) have experienced the gut-wrenching feeling of complete abandonment.  Are there silver linings for the clouds hovering over the helpless?  Is there any inkling of God, any grace among the ashes?

This will be our final involvement with Job, for now.  His story is extreme to us; yet Job himself kept his relationship with God alive, including God as both instigator and partner in his cry from the bottomless pit.  Job has discovered, on our behalf, that embracing God for better or worse requires a deeper way of speaking.  Our text, Job 42:1-6, 10-17, acknowledges that God IS God, and Job is not.  (“Someone” has put a Hollywood ending, vv.10-17, on this, which somehow waters down the story.  But not everything has a Happy Ending.)   The more useful Grace is NOT to conclude the tale, but to be summoned to a continually unfolding sense of divine presence in whatever circumstances we find ourselves.

I admit to having a poor understanding of the tradition of the High Priest as described in the Letter to the Hebrews (7:23-28).  Liturgically, the High Priest was one selected to go into the Holy of Holies bearing the sins of the People, thus receiving a national absolution for another year.  The Gospel writers presented a much more political role, that of keeping the Faithful complacent in order to not draw attention of the Romans.  At any rate, this author presents Jesus as the once-for-all “High Priest”, bearing the sin of All and thus extending Grace to All.  Just as our Old Testament hero Job discovered, this refined experience radically reorients our daily relationship with God.

We don’t know that Bartimaeus (Mark 10:46-52) was ragged and smelled bad–but the people around him treated him as if such were true.  “He’s blind!  He must have done something bad to deserve that!  Or else his parents did…!”  But he recognized the Source of Grace, the one who would turn the world upside down, when he came near.  The Righteous folk tried to suppress him, but he threw off his old way of life (his cloak)  and came for his healing and community restoration.  Dare we posit that “the Crowd” gained new sight as well?  Cynthia A. Jarvis reminds us that “Miracles are those events that bring people from darkness into light.  Miracles turn our attention to what really matters in life and in death.  Miracles claim no power, but reveal a Power who wills to be known.”  (FEASTING on the WORD, B 4:214)

Compared to Job & Bartimaeus, I’ve got it all!  These stories help remind me and other whiners that our life-cups do overflow indeed.  Will they also remind me to point out God’s Presence to hurting souls?  Will they nudge me to seek out those who’ve given up?  Rich and healthy as I am, may I find an urgency to carry Grace among the ashes??

God Bless Us, Every One                               Horace Brown King

My encounter with lectionary passages of Scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every  Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

As the story goes, the King wanted his official portrait painted to hang in the Great Hall with his ancestors.  He sent out heralds to announce a great competition:  the winning artist would receive many guilders.  Famous artists submitted samples of their work–but the King’s choice ultimately lay with an obscure artist who got the dimensions and the flesh-tones in the best light…  Lessons for this weekend can go many ways, but almost all will center on God’s invitation to the least of us to paint Creation.  There are several variations on this theme…

The reading from the Book of Job (38:1-7, 34-41) is God’s reminder to complaining Job that Job’s not God, an awful thing for contemporary hearers to admit.  This is NOT the world according to Job!  So, if God is God, then we must be fellow Creatures along with Leviathan & Behemoth, walrus & carpenter…  Our human importance is established as we note that the Voice of the Whirlwind spoke personally to one of us.  It could make worship interesting to have one lector sternly read this passage, followed by a contrasting voice reading the Psalter (Psalm 104:1-9, 24, 35c).  United Methodists are referred to page 826 of the hymnal.

The Epistle is the Letter to the Hebrews 5:1-10, which recalls the ancient tradition of the high priest, chosen to be a go-between ‘twixt God and the People.  The writer maintains that the Christ is our ultimate high priest, who was perfected by his obedience and thus became a source of eternal salvation for US.  We too have been chosen to paint Creation, to remind tourists and historians alike what Goodness looks like!  Works in process, we’re not yet perfect; yet we trust that in our relationship with Christ we’re GOING there…

The Gospel, Mark 10:35-45, is an uncomfortable reminder that we all have Zebedee DNA in our genes (Jana Childers).  Seems that his kids, James & John, looked for special consideration in the Kingdom of God, sitting at Jesus’ right & left hands.  So don’t we all?  Some of it may be insecurity about our future: we live in uncertain times.  But Jesus calls disciples old ‘n’ new to offer an alternative to the nations whose rulers milk them dry:  he sets us free from that system in order to color Creation with bold strokes.

Rich with imagery, these passages remind me to color my preaching and teaching with bold strokes.  There’s nothing drab about our faith or our life in community, and we have opportunity to add drama to the unfolding Creation Story.  To whom will you be a high priest today?

Thanks be to God!                                   Horace Brown King

My thoughts about scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this space on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

“Please, sir,” said Oliver, “may I have some more?”  “More” is a universal quest:  most of us want Something More, even though we can’t often define it.  People with good marriages, good homes and good vehicles will abandon all they have in order to find Something More.  “Well,” say I, “I deserve it!  I’m kinda moral (when I think about it), and ethical to a fault, especially about YOUR failings.”  The scriptural passages we consider on the weekend will chide us a bit about our materialism.

In the Hebrew scripture, we struggle along with Job, searching futilely for a court in which to meet God in order to present his bitter complaint about his mistreatment (Job 23:1-9, 16-17).  “There an upright person could reason with him, and I should be acquitted forever by my judge.”  He’s still convinced that Yahweh’s justice will find for him. In faith, Job speaks into the darkness.  There may be more than we know who’re hearing this passage and wrestling with the Person of God.  “Oh, that I knew where I might find him…”

Or does grace find US?  The passage from the Letter to the Hebrews, 4:12-16, continues the Quest by speaking of a High Priest (Jesus) who can empathize with our wrestling with God.  This connection with the Almighty is a sword  “to cut through the illusions we cling to:  trusting in economic and political security instead of God’s abiding presence, hoarding resources as if they were not gifts of God, believing in a cultural gospel that says what we have, whom we know, and how much knowledge, power, and prestige we possess determines who we are.”–Michael G. Hegeman, in FEASTING on the WORD, B 4:163.  It’s awesome enough to approach the throne of grace, without carrying a lot of Stuff with us!

The Gospel remembered by Mark (10:17-31) is the story of the well-meaning fellow who wanted eternal life, but couldn’t bring himself to shed his belongings.  According to the Law, he was quite perfect; but Jesus told him that he had one significant barrier–too much Stuff.  “How hard it will be  for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”  This is certainly counter-cultural, and most of us will squirm and say, “Yeah, but…”   The man’s captivity to his possessions has prevented him from joining in the full life of a Disciple.  How much risk can we tolerate?

These are timely lessons.  A lot of the people I hang out with are desperately searching for a route to God/Heaven.  They run from Church to Church, often joining temporarily with a feel-good group which baits them with promises of Nirvana.  Yet they proclaim entitlement to “the American Dream”–whatever that is–and cover their greed with best wishes for their children…  These readings from Holy Writ sock it to us; may those who have ears hear.

God Bless Us, Every One                        Horace Brown King

My struggles with Biblical passages assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

Well, sure.  All too many of us grew up with the injunction to “be good, God will reward you”.  The obverse to this is often unspoken, but it’s there:  “You must’ve done something wrong, or you wouldn’t have _______.”  This weekend’s readings take our simple theology deeper into the labyrinth of living.  As we plod along, are we getting any closer to the Center?

The Story of Job begins, “Once upon a time…” in a galaxy far, far away–or is it?  Job’s account describes our Cosmic Battle (1:1; 2:1-10)  with the vacuum of evil as it sucks even our attempts at Holiness into the Vortex of Nothingness.  Mark A. Thronveit, in FEASTING on the WORD (B 4:127) considers that “heaven is about to unleash a totally inexplicable assault on Job’s theologically proper existence by afflicting him with undeserved pain and suffering….What does one do when one’s theological doctrine, that the universe runs on the principle of reward and punishment, is manifestly at odds with one’s experience?”  Is there grace among the ashes?

We’ll be looking at the Letter to the Hebrews for the next several weeks.  An oddly- constructed piece, it consists of reminders of the Christ-role toward humanity and how we may respond.  One of my colleagues complained that the Letter’s organization was as if it were written on note-cards which then were scattered by the breeze from a fan, then recollected with but a few minutes to publication.  Our reading is 1:1-4 plus 2:5-12.  I especially like verse 3a: “[The Son] is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being.”  This image moves us past our daily attempts to please God into a timeless acceptance of salvation:  the key is Christ.

What in the world do we do with Mark 10:2-16, Jesus’ polemic against divorce?  This has unfortunately been used as a cudgel to guilt the abused, and ultimately to close the doors of the Church to many.  Is marriage a Sacrament from Heaven, or is it a human institution to procreate the tribe?  Did marriage in Jesus’ day include “romance”, or was this an arrangement by the parents?  If one of these arranged matches were dissolved, was that seen as a slap at the parents?  What rights were accorded the slighted spouse and children?  Whose big idea was it to include “for better or for worse”?  Does “worse” include verbal or emotional abuse??  How much integrity should a sad marriage claim?

We could, of course, revert to absolutism, as did the writer of Psalm 26 who boasted of his/her faithfulness.  But the sensitive approach to all of these lections will include the possibilty of Grace even when life isn’t all skittles ‘n’ beer.

God Bless Us, Every One                             Horace Brown King

My reaction to scripture passages assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

I often sing the song about Lizzie Borden, who allegedly hacked her parents to death with an axe.  “Now it wasn’t done for malice, and it wasn’t done for spite, and it wasn’t done because the lady wasn’t very bright…She had always done exactly what her Ma & Papa bid; they said, ‘Lizzie, cut it out!’–and that’s exactly what she did!”  Not surprising, then, that the scripture for the coming weekend addresses the need to excise the unGodly from our lives.  Ginger Gaines-Cirelli reminds us that “our inward posture centers on God and resists all that is NOT God, resists all that is counter to the ways of God revealed through Jesus.” (CIRCUIT RIDER, August/Sept. 2018)

The Book of Esther needs to be read all at once, or at least condensed to the narrative.  The prescribed lesson is 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22; it may be more useful to select other verses, since the story won’t appear again this year.  But the core of it addresses the unwitting  genocide of the Jews by King Ahasuerus, ruler in Persia a few centuries BC.  Righteousness eventually won, and the arrogant Haman got a taste of his own medicine.  This is a folk-story, not a God-story: it makes a nice morality for those who persevere in their cause–and in the end, the evil was excised “and they lived happily (?) ever after”.

The last verses of James’ letter (5:13-20) call the congregation to the centrality of God’s power.  The sick and the sinful will be restored to wholeness, and the family will be healed by those who bring home the lost sheep.  There are some specific remedies for brokenness:  pray for one another, sing holy songs, engage and accept the virtues of the elders, share faith and folly with others of like mind and situation who are also on this spiritual journey.  Can we cut out the self-serving wisdom of the world and allow community building to replace it?

Jesus’ words in Mark 9:38-50 are unnerving, calling us to cut away the offending body-part which may separate us from God’s fullness.  If Jesus isn’t speaking in hyperbole, I’m in real trouble, having few working parts left!  Modern medicine, though, has been doing this:  if a patient has cancer, gangrene, or certain diabetic conditions they experience a surgery which saves their body even while unhealthy segments are removed.  This goes well with a previous call to ego-denial, announcing that the righteousness of God must be taken seriously above other rewarding quests.

Such surgery is always painful.  Giving up something we treasure frightens us, yet the resulting health of the Whole Body increases our prosperity of the quality of life.  Pearl Maria Barros  gives the benediction:  “The good news is that grace is also a way of being in the world.  Grace comes to us every time we ‘cut off’ our problematic behaviors by acknowledging them and then replace them with those that lead us closer to God and to each other.” (SOJOURNERS, September/October 2018)             “Slam the door and lock and latch it:  here comes Lizzie with a brand-new hatchet!”

God Bless Us, Every One                                  Horace Brown King

My thoughts about readings for the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this space on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

I don’t like “Yield” signs.  They always remind me that some traffic is more important than my momentary errand.  They remind me that someone else has the right-of-way.  They don’t coddle my ego with false affirmations of my obvious worth, and they make me wait even though my present project is urgently changing and renewing the world.  Single-handedly.  I don’t Yield very well.  Two of this weekend’s scriptures lift up the virtues of Yielding while they smack down our grandiose persons who dote upon being Number One.  Owww!

Generations of power-people have misused Proverbs 31:10-31 to idolize “the perfect woman/wife” at the expense of those who don’t measure up.  Weird Al Yankovich has a song which says, “You’re not perfect, but you’re good enough for now”.  Then there’s the movie of THE STEPFORD WIVES, where robots replaced actual women.  The reading brings us  nice thoughts, of course, but these tend to both lionize the Ideal and put down real women with all their human complexities.  The final verse helps to save it:  “Give her a share in the fruit of her hands, and let her work praise her in the city gates.”  Can I and my fellow chauvinists yield our self-importance?

St. James speaks about bitter envy and selfish ambition:  “do not be boastful and false to the truth.”  (3:13-4:3)  These things are unspiritual and evil, leading to “disorder and wickedness of every kind”.  “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy.”  This indicates that such traits are God-given, and the Believer is exhorted to receive and imitate them.  Can I lock my Ego in a closet, along with my Evil Twin?   Or does that just deny my humanity?

Mark 9:30-37 recounts two instances where the Disciples didn’t know what to say!  The first verses tell of Jesus constant reminder of his betrayal, death & resurrection; but they didn’t understand, and were afraid to ask.  Later, at home, Jesus asked them what they were discussing on the road; but they were silent with shame, since they were arguing about which of them was “the greatest”.  From Ozymandius to Cassius Clay/Muhammed Ali to POTUS #45,  our tendency is to proclaim our greatness.  It makes us feel good.  But “whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.”  !!!   Can we learn to yield?

Seems as though those darned yellow triangles are all over!  Not only at busy intersections, they seem to pop up wherever my daily smugness carries me.  I guess I really need these reminders that my traffic is neither more important nor less so than that of those sharing my space.  (“MY” space??)  My spiritual practice du jour might be to yield my agenda to God–and those created in a Divine Image.  Lord, that’s hard!

God Bless Us, Every One                          Horace Brown King

My encounters with scriptural passages assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

Word, words, words.  From the talking heads on MSNBC to the empty inquiries about our friends’ health, we’re deluged by ’em!  Parents can’t wait for their offspring to talk–which they will do constantly until they’re teenagers who only communicate by texting.  Some people were born with a silver spoon in their mouths; I was evidently born with my FOOT in my mouth!  Scripture for the coming weekend reminds all of us to speak only with caution, because people can get hurt.

The Hebrew Scripture, Proverbs 1:20-33, brings us words of Holy Wisdom: “at the busiest corner she cries out…”  Wisdom laments that the “simple ones” haven’t absorbed her counsel; the resultant panic, calamity and distress will remain unpitied by One who said, “I told you so!”  What grace there is can be found in the final verse of the reading:  “but those who listen to me will be secure and will live at ease, without dread of disaster.”  I find it ironic that a word can be both painful and helpful.  Do we have choices of voices?

There’s no Christology as such in the Epistle of James 3:1-12.  “Right speech” is one of the three marks of true religion outlined earlier, along with the care of widows and orphans and keeping unstained by the world.  James marvels that so small a thing as a human tongue has so much power!   The undomesticated tongue is called “a restless evil, full of deadly poison”.  “With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God.  From the same mouth come blessing and cursing.”  The writer isn’t speaking of daily profanity–the words I say when I pinch my finger in a door–but the disrespect we offer others.  You know: jokes about another race or ethnicity; deflating the puffed-up; making allowances for the less-educated; impatience with the fat, the blind, the deaf.  This passage is inviting the Church to be counter-cultural in the way we perceive and talk about “Them”.

Today we explore again Jesus’ question, “Who do people say that I am?”  as remembered by Mark.  Peter, spokespersons for the Disciples and the rest of us, gives a good answer: “You are the Messiah”.  But shortly after, he goes all worldly on Jesus, “rebuking” him for claiming his death & resurrection–for which he himself is rebuked.  Again an oral encounter which shakes the universe!  Our tendency is to speak with a forked tongue…

Pearl Maria Barros asks, “In a world in which we are constantly bombarded with information–some of it beautiful and much of it terrifying–how do we witness to Christ?” (SOJOURNERS, September-October 2018)  Our words can add to or detract from the Kingdom of God…As the sign says, “O Lord, make my words soft and tender, for I may have to eat them tomorrow”.

God Bless Us, Every One                                 Horace Brown King

Come watch me wrestle with words and the Word of the Lord every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

When the Church speaks about HEALING, we need to be sure that what is meant is WHOLENESS of body, mind & spirit.  Often a specific condition or disease is overcome; but even where a “thorn in the flesh” remains, a healing sense of being whole in God’s love is instigated.   Some will say that Death is an ultimate healing.  My own understanding is that healing is sacramental:  that is, it’s a loving in-breaking of Grace to an alien system.  Readings for this weekend speak about Wholeness extended to all, whatever their situation in life.  (If you’re interested in knowing more about Sacramental Healing, the Order of St. Luke the Physician has many good resources; or my favorite golden-oldie,  Morton Kelsey’s HEALING AND CHRISTIANITY, Harper & Row, 1973.)

Selected snippets from Proverbs 2 (1-2, 8-9, 22-23) introduce a sense of God’s purpose for a whole society:  “The rich and the poor have this in common: the Lord is the maker of them all.”  These aphorisms go beyond personal morality to the maintenance of a sensitive community.  Susan T. Henry-Crowe reminds us of some current language which makes barriers:  “immigrants”, “aliens”, “rednecks”, “white trash”, and “losers” are but a few labels which destroy equality.  Where do these ancient moralisms help us to join together their theological claim with our current world?  If we do not advocate for the “others”, do we betray the family of God?

James letter introduces us to the parable of the prejudiced usher (2:1-17).  Two persons may enter a congregation, one ostensibly a Big Spender and the other noticeably ragged.  The fancy dresser gets the best seat in the house, while the street-person is lucky to sit on a footstool!  This is hardly a demonstration of Godly living, says James.  “If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs  what is the good of that?”  It does require a special effort by each established member to welcome a newby and weave them into the fabric of the congregation…

The Gospel, Mark 7:24-37, tells two healing stories, both of which happened outside Jewish territory to Gentiles.  Also, both involved third-parties making the connection to Jesus.  Many of us have torn apart the story of Jesus’ seeming unwillingness to heal the daughter of the woman of Tyre, and the happy ending of their conversation.  Since I’m deaf as a post myself, I resonate with the deaf man whose friends besought Jesus for healing.  Again, Grace is poured out on the outsiders irrespective of their beliefs or worthiness.

I’m always amazed at what I learn from the insight of everyday people.  IF I can tear myself away from my book-lined study to hob-nob with folks at the Village Diner or the waiting room of the walk-in clinic, I receive witness and blessing of life which is unfolding by Gods’ Grace all around!  Perhaps this sort of divine encounter will bring ME wholeness, as well?

God Bless Us, Every One                        Horace Brown King

My thoughts about Scripture readings assigned to the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this space on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com