Snow Decisions and the Worship of God

by | Dec 26, 2010 | Uncategorized

I made the decision to cancel our gathering for worship today at First Baptist Church of Asheville. As a safety decision, I am nearly certain it was the right thing to do. Getting to the church campus would be treacherous today, and I don’t want to put people at...

Christmas “Gifts”

by | Dec 23, 2010 | Uncategorized

There are so many things I like look forward to during the Christmas season: “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” especially that scrawny and scraggly Christmas tree Charilie Brown brings to decorate the set of the Christmas pageant, scrawny and scraggly but green, fragrant...

Lost in God and found by joy

by | Dec 16, 2010 | Uncategorized

When the angel Gabriel told Mary that God had invited her to become the mother of Jesus, the angel also gave her the news that her (much!) older cousin, Elizabeth, was pregnant. The news about Elizabeth was astonishing because Elizabeth was well into her Polident and...

Bad decision. . .

by | Dec 12, 2010 | Uncategorized

Bad decision. . . At 6:00 this morning, it looked to me like I needed, very reluctantly, to cancel services today. I was especially concerned about the impact anticipated falling temperatures and predicted further snow would have on people trying to get home,...

“Yes” to Love

by | Dec 10, 2010 | Uncategorized

On an otherwise unremarkable day, in the unremarkable backwoods town of Nazareth, God sent the angel Gabriel to interrupt young Mary’s life with some startling news. As far as we know, Mary had no advance warning and no special preparation for the surprise God sprung...

Prayers for Peace

by | Dec 6, 2010 | Uncategorized

This Advent season, my prayers are for peace. Peace in our world. God’s good world is divided by controversy, rent by conflict, and torn by warfare. A bittersweet memories of my teenage years is watching USO-sponsored “Bob Hope Specials” performed before American...

Time and the Advent Season

by | Nov 29, 2010 | Uncategorized

Christians have an odd way of keeping time. Most of the time most of us think of Sunday as the last day of the week and the cap of the weekend; it’s the day before the grind of work and school cranks back up on Monday morning. But, Christian faith invites us to think...

God is Great, God is Good

by | Nov 24, 2010 | Uncategorized

One day, when his daughter Karen was still a young girl, writer Chris de Vinck, popped an Enlgish muffin in the toaster and went out the kitchen to check on a couple of things. He left Karen in the kitchen. A few moments later, he heard her cry out in pain, and he...

Bring Back the Magic

by | Nov 18, 2010 | Uncategorized

I enjoy Jimmy Buffet’s music, even though I know he’s only an average musician, but one who has an above average ability to know what his audience wants and deliver it to them. I doubt there will be a symposium some day at which the works of Aaron Copland, Duke...

Joy instead of anxiety

by | Nov 13, 2010 | Uncategorized

Anxiety keeps us preoccupied with the future; it is the unsettled and unsatisfied feeling that comes from our worries and fears about tomorrow. At its root, of course, anxiety is our “dis-ease” over the fact that we will, one day, die; but most of the time it...