life lessons

An Anabaptist Prophet Looks at the Iowa Caucuses

What's with making the results tonight so significant?

Before speaking to that question, I’ll tell you a bit more about this post by promising to answer three other questions as well:

  • Who sounds most genuinely friendly to the Christian faith: Clinton, Cruz, Rubio, Sanders, or Trump?
  • Who are the Christian candidates in the race?
  • What should be my role in the process?

Yesterday I thought again of the bizarre nature of national Presidential politics in the United States. The towering gullibility of the collective American mind is demonstrably bizarre.

Consider the two-ring caucus presently launching the opening act of Let’s Elect a President 2016.

The hawk-eyed Iowans will gather tonight to chatter and vote their hearts or minds in an effort to select a party standard bearer in each major political party. What comes out of Iowa tonight is supposed to be Really Significant.

Look. I don’t want to be unkind or sarcastic, but I have to be blunt. Iowa is only one of fifty states. What’s with making the results tonight so significant? Weird. Read it all

Why Flavor Their Day So Poorly?

When your attitude and speech could give such good flavors!

We can flavor another’s day
By how we act and what we say.
So skip the sour and add some honey;
Embrace the Spirit of Christ to make the day Sonshiny.

picture reminding of the power of pleasant words
Pleasant words are sweet and health.
“Pleasant words are as an honeycomb,
sweet to the soul,
and health to the bones.”
Proverbs 16:21

Accept no substitutes!

Why leave others with a bad taste? It will go with you as well. Read it all

A Rebel Heart for God

Only if it's broken, repentant, and surrendered

I thought of this again several times this month already:

“For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft,
And stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.”

That piece of 1 Samuel 15:23 just ain’t complicated at all: God won’t fit in a rebel heart.

Doing church things, saying church words, dressing church clothes, thinking church thoughts — none of them make room for God in a rebel heart.

But broken repentance does. Read it all

Can’t We All Just Pull Together?

Well, sure. We could. But...

I shuffled along through the dirt, water can subtly shifting my weight, water shower generously dampifying the vegetable plants. (Were they corn, beans, beets, or squash? I don’t remember and you don’t care.)

“Which is more important?” The weight of the question shifted my mind this way and that. “Pulling together. Standing for truth. Pulling together. Standing for tru…”

I concluded that if I must choose one over the other, I will choose truth.

Actually, though, I vote for standing together on truth so we can truly pull together. If we don’t stand on truth, we will slip and slide while trying to pull together. You just can’t pull well when you aren’t on solid footing. I would even argue that you can’t pull safely in such a circumstance. Read it all

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Above all, love God!