OK, this is confusing. John says, “if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,” and then he proclaims that “no one who abides in him sins.” Um, John, did you forget what you just said on the previous page?
For much of the disciples’ lives, Jesus, who is right there with them, is apparently hidden from them. But to those who love him he promises to reveal himself.
The bible, the New Testament, the gospels are full of embarrassing promises, but nowhere are they as thick and heavy as in Jesus’ last discourse to the disciples in John 14–16.
Maybe you aren’t such a big fan of the mountains. The ‘beauty’ out there really doesn’t do that much for you, and the strain and pain of the hike are such a drain. After all, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right?
Read Acts 2:1-21 and 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13. And then keep going into chapter 13. A rushing wind. Tongues of fire. Tongues of other peoples. I’ve always had a fascination with spiritual gifts such as healing or prophecy or speaking in tongues. Paul names nine such gifts and seems to imply Read more…
And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I will remove its hedge, and it shall be devoured; I will break down its wall, and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste; it shall not be pruned or hoed, and it Read more…
Read John 13:31-35. I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. (John 13:34) What is the substance of this new glory with which Jesus was glorified? The difference now, the change, the new glory, is Read more…
The thirteenth-century beguine Hadewijch was a lyric poet from the Antwerp region. She adapted the form of courtly love poetry to her love for Minne, Love. In the original middle Dutch you can get a sense of the meter, rhyme, consonance, assonance, and word play, but what really stands out Read more…