In this introduction to Christian mysticism, Baxter helps us understand why this topic is so important to the church today, and helps us to "recover the premodern vision of God in all its fierce joy and heartening wildness.”
As I read through the Bible this year, I am writing a nonet poem for each of its sixty-six books. Here are my nonets for Joshua through 2 Kings.
This is a great reflection on a very moving song/poem/prayer/psalm by Leonard Cohen, “If It Be Your Will.”
Leonard Cohen described If It Be Your Will ‘as more of a prayer’ than a song during his introduction to its performance by the Webb Sisters and Neil Larson. Here I suggest that it is not only a prayer but more specifically a psalm.
Even the title is highly suggestive of a key feature of psalmody—an absolute trust in God. As the song unfolds this trust, we see that this commitment to God is founded in a creature-Creator relationship, as the singer’s finitude is sublimely conveyed:
If it be your will, that I speak no more
And my voice be still, as it was before
The frailty of the singer is in little doubt given their own metaphorical claim to be a ‘broken hill’. Is it pushing our reflection too far to imagine this as an oblique reference and contrast to the ‘holy hill’ (Psalm 2:6; 3:4; 15:1; 24:3; 43:3…
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A few of my favorite quotes on silence, particularly as it relates to prayer.
Jesus feeds the five thousand to teach us that with Jesus, there is always enough. Here is my sermon on this miracle, as recorded in John's Gospel.
In preparation for the next five weeks of sermons on John 6, here is my devotional overview of this "Bread of Life" chapter.
One of my favorite questions in Scripture is this one from Jesus: “How many loaves have you?” And it is one that I remind myself of whenever I am feeling overwhelmed by the needs that I see around me.
A reflection on Dag Hammarskjöld's famous words: "We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny. But what we put into it is ours."
In a world that is busier than ever, Jesus invites us come and find rest. Here is my sermon on Mark 6:30-34.
A Love that Never Quits: A Devotion on Hosea 11.
