Today’s feast is nothing less than our yearly, tangible reminder of who belongs in first place. In the blessing of the grapes we carry on the Old Testament commandment of God that whatever is first; first born child, first born animal, first fruits of harvest, these belong to God. As grapes were always the first…
I was getting an oil change for the church car last week and by the garage across the street I saw a sign ‘Free brake check, stop by if you can!’ It gave me a laugh and then gave me pause to reflect on a theme of all our readings of these past weeks. The…
Last weekend I attended my nephew’s high school graduation. He’s off to college, and understandably at his age, not sure what career he wants to pursue. One thing he says he knows for sure, is that his career will not involve mathematics. At one point he was into the sciences, but just didn’t like or…
‘Can I, can I, can I….’ If you are a parent or spent any time around kids, you have been through this phase with your children. It seems from our youngest days we are hardwired to seek and test the boundaries of what we can and can’t do; it’s how we learn and grow and…
We have a strong system of higher education in the United States, which also has significant problems in need of reform. The most obvious problem we all see about college is its price tag. ‘College is the opposite of kidnapping. They demand $100,000 from you or else they’ll send your kid back!’ College gets lots…
I think we all can identify on some level with Elijah; we all have good days and bad days. Some days there is hardly anyone in church, no one can serve on the altar and the toilet is broken. Other days the church is full, as is the altar, and the toilet is still broken. …
Second only to videos starring cats, the most popular genre of clips and videos these days is the ‘epic fail’. Go ahead, open youtube today after church and type in ‘epic fail.’ You’ll see dozens of videos, each with a million views, of a parent getting on their child’s kiddy toy, and destroying the toy…