Living in the lowlands

Posted on April 13, 2015 by jwfisch

“Here’s to fragility and recognizing the treasure that can be found living in the lowlands in the place where faith and doubt, courage and fear, surrender and struggle, bravery and timidity and belief and unbelief happily intermingle and coexist quite nicely without needing to cancel one or the other out totally.”

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The quote above came from Robin Frost who was empathizing with me after one of last week’s Catches. Robin is one of our regular readers who sends me comments from time to time and I always think when I glance at the name that I am getting an email from a great American dead poet. But that’s Robert. However, Robin waxed poetic in this comment that I think captures the reality of where we all live all the time. Continue reading →

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The dark and lonely closet of regret

Posted on April 10, 2015 by jwfisch

No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God. Luke 9:32

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When you begin to step out into your dynamic future (see yesterday’s Catch), regret becomes something tied to your static past that no longer serves a purpose. Regret, like guilt, is useful only as a passageway to something better. Regret is good in that it gets us to agree with God over what we have done wrong, but it needs to quickly be eclipsed by God’s forgiveness and hope, counting on the new creation that we are in Christ. You regret something only long enough to change. Any longer and it becomes a bondage to one’s past. Continue reading →

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Don’t let your past control your future

Posted on April 9, 2015 by jwfisch
Photo: Gunnar Simonsen

                                                                                                                Photo: Gunnar Simonsen

I learned something very important yesterday. It’s one of those commonsense realities that when you hear it, it seems so obvious you wonder why you haven’t thought about it before. In fact, when you hear it, you think, “Big deal; I know that.” But the more reflection you engage in, you realize that you may know it, but you are not acting on it. Indeed, you are acting on something quite the opposite. Continue reading →

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We are all together

Posted on April 8, 2015 by jwfisch

th-4Over the years I have had the incredible privilege of traveling and sharing the ministry with so many different people in different environments representing different systems of belief and traditions of faith, and the overwhelming conclusion I have come away with in every case, is not how different, but how much the same, we are. Even those who on the surface may appear to be enemies — some of them carrying a history of conflict over certain theological differences or cultural disagreements— with deeper understandings, these differences fall away. In every case, among groups who are supposed to disagree, I have found agreement. Continue reading →

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Song of Moses

Posted on April 7, 2015 by jwfisch

th-2When Moses neared the end of his life, God spoke to him about what would happen to the children of Israel — the people he had led out of bondage in Egypt up to the brink of the Promised Land which lay just beyond the Jordan River. Continue reading →

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Of cold heads and tree trimming

Posted on April 6, 2015 by jwfisch

FullSizeRender 5Our trees have gotten a haircut. At least that’s what it feels like lately when I get up in the morning and find the sun streaming in our windows in places where it hasn’t streamed in a long time. There’s blue sky and a sunrise I don’t remember seeing before out one window, and a view I didn’t even know was there out another. But it feels just like a haircut because there are lots of bare branches with little patches of leaves letting light through where there used to be just a green canopy. Continue reading →

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It’s Saturday …

Posted on April 4, 2015 by jwfisch

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It’s Saturday. Christ is in the tomb. We need to talk about what we’re going to do. Continue reading →

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‘Tetelestai’

Posted on April 3, 2015 by jwfisch

Tetelestai! (It is finished!) – John 19:30

FullSizeRender 4“Tetelestai!” – one word Christ uttered from the cross just before He commended His Spirit into the Father’s hand. “Tetelestai!” meaning, quite simply, “It is finished!.” Done. Completed. Over. Continue reading →

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‘Why …?’

Posted on April 2, 2015 by jwfisch

“My God, my God, why …?” Matthew 27:46

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Of all the words Christ uttered from the cross, these were the most shocking. Why does the God of the universe ask “Why?” If anything should worry us, it would be this. If God doesn’t know what’s going on, where does that leave us? Continue reading →

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‘I thirst’

Posted on April 1, 2015 by jwfisch

Please give me a drink. – John 4:7
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We worship a God who became a vulnerable human being. Superman had his kryptonite. Samson lost his hair. Jack Frost relinquished his wintry powers to become the town tailor. Jesus got thirsty. It’s a story that is played out not only in history, but in fantasy, legend and mythology — someone with supernatural powers gives up those powers to become human, and it is always done for one reason: love. Continue reading →

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