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What could possibly be chaotic about a beautiful Summer Day?  Picnics and family reunions beckon, baseball games on the IPad go unwatched as we snooze on the terrace…  And yet there’s no joy in Mudville:  snappy bosses, malicious divorces, illnesses of various kinds insert their claws into our serendipity–and we begin to question God.  “Where’ve you BEEN?!  Can’t you see that we’re dyin’ here??”  Today’s lessons will speak to far too many; will they help the present malaise?

The one who reads the passage from Job (38:1-11) needs to give a brief synopsis:  Job is a good guy, a “righteous man”, yet his family/property/fortune has been destroyed by a devilish plague of bad happenings.  “But I’ve been GOOD!  Why do bad things happen to good people?”  Why, indeed?  It takes a while for Job to look beyond his cultural legalism to see the cosmic elements of Creation.  When he begins to open himself to omnipotence, he can finally hear the majestic poetry of the text.  God has limited the chaos-monster:  “Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped.”

The Epistle, II Corinthians 6:1-13, is characteristically oblique.  What’s more, there’s little take-home wisdom.  Yet there is a feeling of urgency–“now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation!”  And there’s an exhortation to open their hearts wide.  In between, Paul tells of the chaos he’s survived, with the implication that God has rescued him, so why not YOU?  There really are limits to the rages of the sea.

Mark describes Jesus’ missionary journeys around the Sea of Galilee in 4:35-41.  He wants to go to The Other Side, the land of the Gentiles.  (Isn’t there always Another Side?)  On the way, the capricious weather of Galilee threatens to swamp their boat –and Jesus is asleep!  Seasoned sailors though they were, they angrily woke Jesus:  “Don’t you care that we’re drowning here??”  Still unsure about Lordly power, they figured they had nothing to lose.  And they probably needed the catharthis of angry shouting to clean out their senses for a word from God!  (So did Job.)  So once again God limited the waves and tamed the chaos-monster…

Job, Paul & the Disciples all faced the daily threats and the immensity of the Creator’s power which once made order out of chaos.  Leanne Pearce Reed concludes (FEASTING on the WORD, B 3:151),  “The chaos is still there, but so is God.  And that is enough.”

God Bless Us, Every  One                            Horace Brown King

My ritual drowning in the scriptural passages for the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this space on Facebook; or at horacebrownking. com

Some years ago, my doctor told me that I should shed a few pounds.  How?  “Go find a gym or fitness center that you like, and join it.”   At my next visit, she said, “You haven’t lost any weight; you’ve actually gained!  Did you join a gym?”  “Oh, yes.”  “Well, how often do you go there?”  “What?  You’ve got to GO there?!”  So this weekend’s scripture lessons are for those of us (most) who’d like to try some heavenly gardening–maybe tomorrow…

For some of us, the announced reading from the Hebrew Bible is a passage from Ezekiel’s oracles, 17:22-24.  The Lord God is planting a twig from a well-developed cedar tree (the fabled Tree of Life?), “in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit…”  Winged creatures of every kind will find refuge and security in this new tree.  The prophet, as a child of the Babylonian Exile, reminds his hearers that God is still growing a holy tree in Israel:  not only shall the House of David be restored, but Yahweh’s power over all things will reforest the barren hills of the desert.  This is good to hear for the Church of today, seemingly the remnant of decency and justice in a profane and selfish society.

The beginning and the end of the Epistle carry the meat of Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthian Church (5:6-17).  “So we are always confident; even though we know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord–for we walk by faith, not by sight….So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”  A gardener must “walk by faith”, because that which is planted is not fully realized ’til the end of the season.  And such gardening re-creates the pristine possibility of useful growth.  So is a garden a friendly apocalypse??

Is it audacious to talk about seeds in the Age of the Microchip?  Mark’s Gospel does (4:26-34) through two parables of Jesus:  the Patient Farmer, who plants his field and waits for God’s good harvest; and the famous Mustard Seed, smallest of all but growing into a majestic and useful shrub.  There’s a built-in plan or system to growth, which happens anyway in spite of our tweaking it.  (Paul later said that “Paul planted and Appollos watered, but God gave the growth.”)  My mother and most of the mothers of my friends had earrings with a single mustard-seed embedded in crystal:  to remind us that even a speck of faith would turn into something spectacular, when given the chance.

Gardening of any sort entails tremendous risk.  What if the clipping didn’t root?  What if the seed found the soil too rocky?  It’s really easier to keep and use what seed we have than to risk next year’s crop-failure.  If you keep your minute seed as jewelry, you’ll always have it…’course, it won’t grow into anything.  Happy digging in the dirt: till–we meet again…

God Bless Us, Every One                            Horace Brown King

My walk through the jungle of Scripture can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

These many Sundays after Pentecost track and affirm the growing conviction of holy strength among those who follow Jesus.  We read again the challenges and comforts which the Holy Spirit blows into our sails:  no longer in the harbor of anticipation, we move into the injustice and selfishness of a material world.  Scriptures for this weekend address the immanent Presence of Divinity, which has (again) broken into the once-familiar world with new visions of what yet may be…

The Book of Beginnings takes us to our progenitors’ realization of their own humanity:  Genesis 3:8-15 describes the Lord God’s disappointment that Creation’s brief moment of perfection has been tarnished.  Adam & Eve acknowledged their nakedness, and God realized that wisdom has been shared as humanity tries to become divine.  Along with Wisdom goes Blame:  “SHE said it was OK!”  “The SNAKE said it was OK!”  The Snake/Dragon continues to terrify humans, personifying Evil and as a scapegoat for our own limited vision.

What is worthy, says Paul to the Corinthian church (II 4:16-18), is that which we see only in the eyes of our soul.  Our stories and dreams, our wishes and our songs, our commitment to another through marriage & procreation–all are not “factual”, but become powerful signs of what we dare imagine.  “So we do not lose heart.  Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.”  A caution, here–Paul is known for his rejection of the physical in favor of the spiritual.  I’d rather read these verses with a holistic sense of God’s Presence in both the seen and the unseen.

Mark’s Gospel account (3:20-35) is evidently inserted here to accent the humanity of Jesus AND his family.  Busy with healing and casting out demons, Jesus is assailed as being possessed himself.  His rebuttal is strictly human; no mention of God is made in this passage.  But how can an unclean spirit cast out another person’s unclean spirit?  Obviously the scribes and even Jesus’ family were seeing only the immediate, whereas Jesus was attempting to point out a Greater Vision of a Perfect Creation.

Each of these readings is an attempt to call the worshiper beyond the moment into a land of greater possibilities.  These are probably not escape-clauses, because reality and all its poignancy is rightly acknowledged.  Yet in the midst of our daily scrabbling in the dust, there’s something refreshing about going on a holy trip where Godly visions become our security and our bliss…

God Bless Us, Every One                             Horace Brown King

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

Even with your golden tongue and silky vocabulary, dear Reader, it’s impossible to speak of the Mystery of the Trinity.  Some of our holy encounters defy human words to clarify:  all we can attempt are a few similes and lame metaphors.  Of these, I’m most comfortable with St. Patrick’s display of a shamrock, with three equal petals attached to one stem.  Readings for Trinity Sunday are quite able to stand alone, and it’s the wise teacher who doesn’t pick them to death…

Nevertheless…the Old Testament lesson is the famous call of Isaiah (6:1-8), in which the prophet envisions  the throne room of Yahweh.  Realizing his humanity, he laments his “unclean lips”–but a seraph flies to him with a coal from the altar and cauterizes his profane nature.  Only then can Isaiah respond affirmatively to God’s question, “Whom shall we send?  And who will go for us?”  Until the brokenness is acknowledged, the believer’s horizons are limited.   There are those who present this text as a precognition of the Trinity:  “Holy, holy, holy Lord…”  I can’t say that this is entirely true to the Hebrew scripture OR belief…

We also continue to read from the important 8th chapter of the letter to the Romans, vv. 12-17.  Paul speaks often of the tension of living “in the flesh” but yet longing for the Spirit of God.   He avows that only this Holy Spirit can put to death the “deeds of the body” and lead us to be children of God.  In a nutshell, God is God; and we’re not!   Our actions and wills are insufficient unless sustained by the Spirit, God’s sacramental inbreaking.

Many of us have memorized some sections of the Gospel, John 3:1-17.  The whole is presented as a late-night conversation with Nicodemus, a friendly Pharisee.  One of the memorable nuggets is Jesus comment, “What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.” (v.6)  Jesus isn’t disregarding “the flesh”–as Paul is often criticized of doing–but  opens new horizons with a concept of receiving spiritual birth.  This is truly Grace, unshaped by human hands yet blowing from above as a heavenly wind.

Each of these encounters bears witness to a Spirit external to our own insulated lives:  Isaiah thought himself doomed until the angel entered his limited horizons to cleanse his speech.  Paul sees a two-floored universe where the spiritual must find footing within our humanity or we’ll perish.  And Jesus presents Nicodemus with an outside birth of the Spirit which inserts him/herself into our sweaty endeavors with the cool refreshment of a sudden wind.  Can we use a butterfly net to catch the Spirit and add to our menagerie?  Or shall we raise our sails in expectation of a breath of God to take us to amazing places?

God Bless Us, Every One

My musings WON’T be seen here next Tuesday, May 29th.  I’ll return for the following week.

Sunday will be the Day of Pentecost, the “Birthday of the Church” marked by the entry of the Holy Spirit into the lives of Disciples.  Readings for the weekend will feature this Divine Visitation, and will remind the hearer of the constant gracious presence of this Spirit.  From the Greek, we read “paraclete”.  Ready with the bad puns?  (“I once had a paraclete, but he wouldn’t talk and his feathers fell out.  So I ate him…”)  This is different: no feathers, but speaks constantly!

Acts 2:1-21 tells the story–the disciples were all together, maybe in the Upper Room.  “And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind…a tongue [of fire] rested on each of them.”  And then they began to tell Jesus’ story in languages of every known nation!  More than ecstasy, these were actual languages, and the point of the exercise is to make known the universality of God beyond polite boundaries.  This flowing of the Spirit verifies the “allness” of the Incarnation.  Peter, rising to the occasion, emphasized that “EVERYONE who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

The 8th Chapter of Paul’s Letter to the Christians at Rome is LOADED with nuggets of Godly wisdom:  best to concentrate of vv.26 & 27 today.  Unsophisticated in our prayers as we are, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us “with sighs too deep for words”.  Even when the headlines discourage us, nevertheless in our despair this Spirit revives us with a holy breath, “unceasingly attentive to our pleading, even to the point of bringing our prayers home to God when we are unable to articulate them for ourselves.”  (Clayton J. Schmit, FEASTING on the WORD, B 3:19)   “Such things are promises worth reiterating on the day we celebrate the birth of the Church.”

The Gospel continues Jesus’ farewell discourse to his immediate friends at the Last Supper.  “It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate/Paraclete will not come to you…” (John 16:7)  Jesus portrays the coming of the Holy Spirit as a natural succession to his earthly presence, with all of its teaching and healing.  Although Jesus has ascended, an important face of God comes to make a home within us for guidance, training and often nudging us to Live the Life.  Today’s believers are connected thusly to a Holy Wind which fills our sails to take us wherever God wants us to go…  “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth…”

Judith M. McDaniel sums this up  better than I:  “Jesus is not with us now; but while he is with the Father, he has left with us his presence in the person of the Paraclete, the Spirit of truth.  It is the Spirit of truth who guides each generation along that way to uncover the grace and beauty in life.  It is the Spirit of truth who teaches us to find God in the midst of life, to see life as Jesus taught us to see.  It is the Spirit of truth who speaks in our hearts the presence of Jesus.” (FEASTING… B 3:25)

God Bless Us, Every One                                 Horace Brown King

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

So now what’re we gonna do?  He’s gone….into the clouds somewhere.  The Teacher was always telling us How & Why; do we just hang out until further notice?  The implications of Jesus’ Ascension are all too important to pass off on a small Thursday crowd, so I’ve chosen to think about such mystery more than the “regular” readings for the Seventh (and Last) Sunday of Easter.  Preaching and teaching this could be a head-game of antiquity–or it could address current perplexities of expected ethic and behavior while the Lord is “invisible”.

Just for today, we’ll turn things around a bit and look at the Gospel first.  Read from the very ending of Luke’s story of Jesus, 24:44-53, it speaks of the ultimate instructions of Jesus to this followers gathered in Jerusalem:  “repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem….so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”  Then, at Bethany, “while he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven.”  Popular legend says that you can still see his footprints on the rock upon which he stood!

So it follows that Luke begins his second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, by recounting this experience.  And, something new, two “men in white robes” asked, “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?”  Was this a re-phrasing of the question in the garden on Easter morning, “Why do you seek the living among the dead?”  Jesus rarely remains where we last saw him!  Barbara K. Lundblad remarks that “in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus’ footprints are all over the pages of the text.”  (FEEDING on the WORD, B 2:507)  We may help folks to see where the Lord’s footprints can be seen in our present time.

Which brings us to the passage from Ephesians, 1:15-23:  readers are encouraged to receive “a spirit of wisdom and revelation” as they grow to perfection.  This is done by God when he Raised Christ from the dead “and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places…”  Can our hearers report “uplifting” experiences, even in the face of bewildering circumstances?  Do we celebrate those often-ecstatic moment when we’re lifted above the daily scrabbles in the dust?  Is this the “resurrection of the body” in our creed?

Ascension Sunday gives opportunity to savor the mystery, perhaps to join God in a bit of playfulness.  It’s an occasion to look beyond the expectable, to gaze into heaven.  The Ascension of Christ calls the Believers to seek out and cherish the Lord’s footprints, for they are many.  Here may reside the realization of the astronaut’s statement, “One small step for man, a giant leap for mankind”.

God Bless Us, Every One                    Horace Brown King

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

“The Holy Spirit can be disruptive,” Rosemary Radford Ruether claims, as conveyed by Barbara K. Lundblad (FEASTING on the WORD, B 2:481)   “The church must be organized to do two things:   To pass on the tradition from one generation to another; and to be open to the winds of the Holy Spirit by which the tradition comes alive in each generation.”  Lessons assigned to this weekend address this dynamic in the narration of two very different encounters, hopefully tied with a passage of present and prevenient grace.

The first of these spiritual encounters is really the tag to a greater story, which should be told as a preface to the reading itself, Acts 10:44-48.  Here’s Peter’s dilemma: while praying and fasting on a rooftop, God presented him with a “sheet” on which there were all manners of creatures, some kosher, some not.  “I’ll not eat what’s profane, Lord!”  “Where do you get off calling some of my Creation profane?”  This happened three times for emphasis, and the doorbell rang.  Friends of Cornelius, a–gasp!–GENTILE army guy wanted Peter to come to Caesarea to share the gospel with them!  Peter begins to get it, unlawful as it is to visit goyim if you’re Jewish.  “The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the GENTILES…!”  Something new was afoot!

The reading from First John 5:1-6 has its usual difficulties.  The core verse for me (today) is #4:  “whatever is born of God conquers the world.”  Without undue exegesis,  this helps legitimize the universal Good of Creation and may impress upon us that there are no ranks and preferences within the holy hierarchy.

The Gospel, John 15:9-17, is really a continuance of what we read last weekend, a part of Jesus’ final discourse to his closest guys.  In effect, he’s saying “here’s what I want you to do–that you love one another”.  This encounter is wholly different in mood and setting from Peter’s meeting with Cornelius:  the Upper Room is probably dim and intimate, and the principals have known each other for several years.  Still it’s another venue for the Holy Spirit to work it’s life-changing fire.  (Do I celebrate those thin spots in my life where God has poked through my self-importance?)   Please don’t omit the 16th verse, “You did not choose me but I chose you.”  21st-Century humans want to be masters, choosers–and it doesn’t work that way.

These passages help me to remember who’s in charge, that God is God–and I’m not!  Perhaps the greatest hindrance to the Christian movement in current times is our unwillingness to give ourselves over to God’s leadings.  Church leaders continue to call for extended hours of discernment:  a time to deny our own ego and agenda, a time to wait for the ever-present Spirit.

God Bless Us, Every One               Horace Brown King

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

“Abide” is kinda an old-fashioned word; we don’t use it much.  It makes me think of “abode”, a safe place to live for quite a while, as opposed to transience.  Its Greek root in the Bible is similar to that for “endurance”, or staying the course.  Something that endures is reliable, a value which doesn’t fade over the course of time.  Readings for this Fifth Weekend of Easter serve to reassure the hearers that God’s Steadfast Love (hesed) is very present, and is involved with forming community with God and others.

The story of Phillip and the Ethiopian (Acts 8:26-40) could be a head-trip into Old Testament prophecy about the Messiah–or could be presented as a grand adventure about a post-Easter Christian trying to find out what his discipleship looked like.  I’ll take the latter, please.  What I especially like is that Phillip was in contact with the Spirit/angel of God, and allowed that Presence to instruct him and to “abide” with him.  The Ethiopian started a new life in Christ–God shows no partiality–and the Church grew!   Note that this fella had no previous gospel encounters, that we know of.  Luke wrote Acts to a Gentile audience, in order that they and we would feel included in this enduring love.

The author of the First Letter of John affirms, “By this we know that we [endure] in him and he in us, because [God] has given us of [the] Spirit.” (4:13)  And this is followed by lots of mutual abidings:  those who endure in love are in God, and God endures within them.  This could be important news to the disgruntled pew-sitter who’s convinced that NOTHING lasts forever.  Each cynical generation can take heart with this counter-cultural alternative to roaring Change…

The Gospel is the final “I Am” saying of Jesus, held back until the drama of the Last Supper (John 15:1-8).  “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower.”  The temptation is to say, “WE’re the fruitful vines, and YOU’re the barren ones (nanny- nanny-na-na).  Don’t go near that one, for the Vinegrower will prune any of us at any time for the good of the Kingdom!  Instead, use this as a healing image:  Wholeness rises from the Ground of our Being through the Son and flows out into every leaf-bud, every scrap of bark…  Endure in Christ as Christ endures in you!  “Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides [endures] in the vine, neither can you unless you abide [endure] in me.”

Ray Cosimano grows grapes in his backyard, just as his ancestors did for generations.  He’s the guy who knows about pruning!  Last summer, Marie finally got a grapevine to succeed, since we have no Church Sexton to mow it down.  There were LOTS of branches, and a handful of grape clusters.  Our friend Ray told us which to prune (almost all of ’em!)  in order that this year’s crop might prosper.  The main stem still abides in its trellis in the sun, and we’ll see in a few weeks what of the plant will grow and endure.  Barbara J. Essex reminds us, “When God is doing the maintenance, we are assured that new life and new growth will result….  (FEEDING on the WORD, B 2:475-477)  The community’s challenge is to stay connected to the vine.”

God Bless Us, Every One                              Horace Brown King

My exploration of the assigned Scripture passages for the upcoming weekend can be found every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com

Why did the chicken cross the road half-way?  She wanted to lay it on the line!  Scripture readings for this coming weekend are all written to specific audiences, having the common thread of the person/name of Jesus, who cared enough that he laid his own life on the line for his people.  They remind our own communities of God’s involvement with our own needs.  They remind each hearer that God cares enough to go though death to emphasize this Steadfast Love.

Before Acts 4:5-12 is read, some sort of prologue is necessary:   Peter & John are in jail for healing a lame man “in the name of Jesus”.  This has annoyed the Sadducees and other Temple leaders, who want Jesus to be not only dead, but forgotten.  The text finds Peter & John on trial, which gives Peter opportunity:  “let it be known to all of you, and to all the people of Israel, that this man is standing before you in good health by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead.”  (Remember that the Sadducees don’t believe in life after death. )  The authorities brought death, but God has trumped them by bringing life!  Peter, John and our present saints are enjoined to announce this life-giving involvement.

Study-leaders should be advised that there’s little context in the three letters attributed to John; and that the many pearls therein may easily stand alone, a few verses at a time.  In the First Letter, 3:16-18, we little children are urged to respond to God’s munificence by laying down our own lives for each other.  “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?”  As God in Jesus has risked, so Believers are called to imitate God by putting our own worldly wealth on the line.

Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd.  The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” (John 10:11)  And then in vv. 15, 17 &18 he reiterates this, concluding, “No one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.  I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again.”  Exegetes should remember that this was recorded early in the recently-formed Church experience, when the concept of  dying/living “Christ” was still wet behind the ears.  Current Believers need to know by this passage that Jesus the Christ is standing up for them even when the wolf comes!

The question always remains:  how do we move from these fairly metaphysical statements to an actual hard-copy?  What of my well-endowed life shall I put on the line?  Shall I vette each charity that sends appeals daily, or the unkept drifter in the PriceChopper parking lot?  Besieged as we are with worthy causes, will I give in to mercy-fatigue and withdraw from all sharing?  “I’ve been poor, and I’ve been rich–and I like rich better!”  Besides, I don’t like pain…  My LIFE, on the line??

God Bless Us, Every One               Horace Brown King

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

There’s probably a Greek word for it; and if not, there should be.  I mean that humans have a tendency to live in a creative tension between rational solution and the inexplicable.  That is, scientific knowledge balances with a dreamland of visions and events for which we have no words.  Carl Sagan, spokesperson for the measurable and the knowable, nevertheless conceded that we humans are “bathed in mystery”.  The entirety of the Easter event calls the Believer to put aside rationality and to embrace the concept that God’s greatest works are those which are beyond our daily reason.

Acts 3:12-19 needs a synopsis:  Peter & John have been accosted by a cripple looking for alms.  But instead of money, they give him a knowledge of Jesus which makes his legs and feet dance again!  Those standing around were dumbstruck, asking how this happened.  Which introduces our assigned text, “When Peter saw it, he addressed the people, ‘You Israelites, why do you wonder at this…?'”  Why indeed have otherwise devout persons through the centuries tried to rationalize healing and similar sacraments of God’s breaking into our measurable comforts?  That God’s People of Old are astonished at this healing is incredible to Peter.  How can they have failed to recognize the One for whom they’ve prepared for so long?

I find that I have to cherry-pick for nuggets of wisdom in the Letters attributed to John.  In today’s reading (I 3:1-7) we again view the Holy Mystery:  “Beloved, we are God’s children NOW; what we WILL BE has not yet been revealed.”  As a good Wesleyan, I’m delighted that this writer is also Going On to Perfection!  The controversy, both then and now, is over Christology:  is Jesus a man with vital signs and other recordable dimensions–or is there More, a heavenly being from the Beginning?   Evidently those who’re having trouble accepting this Mystery are finding less to value in their Church-community.

Luke’s agenda is to present Jesus to the non-Jews, the “Greeks”.  The Hellenic tradition prided itself on rationality and facts; so this account (Luke 24:36b-48) is pretty radical.  Here we see Jesus appearing to the wide-eyed Disciples–a spirit?–AND eating/retaining some broiled fish–nope, a real guy!  Those affected by the Age of Reason are still trying to figure this one out.  Yet the incident does serve to remind them and us that God’s work is joyfully beyond the explainable powers of the cosmos!

As years go by, we learn more ‘n’ more about our physical surroundings, which is a good thing.  And yet there’s a worldly temptation to ignore those burning bushes which we can’t explain, shuffling our sheep on past to the comfort of a water-hole where we can see the bottom.  Don’t!  Or you may miss the growing awareness of the towers of God’s Kingdom, there in the mist…

God Bless Us Every One                       Horace BrownKing

My explorations of readings assigned for the upcoming weekend can be found ever Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com