Faith, Grace, and Hope

At the beginning of time, there was chaos and darkness- disordered nothingness But that harsh environment, in the sharp edges of confusion and potential, There was Love. God’s own self existed- Truth does not exist in a vacuum. There was a relationship within God that is beyond our imagination. There was Love. The Word of Life and the Shaping Spirit worked out the soil, the water, the plants, the animals. The Eternal Creative birthed people for the sake of creation. There was Love. In the calling to co-create through farming, ranching, planting, cultivating, parenting, Friending, building, dreaming, cooperating, and expanding, There was Love. Together, God’s own self revealed kin-dom in one way and then another. Despite rebellion and rejection, brokenness and stubbornness, in the plan of Three in One There was Love. Oil and flour sustained. Wellsprings flowed in the desert. Prophets heard whispers. Women dreamed and did not abandon hope. The t...

John 18:12-27             The writer of the Fourth Gospel loves a dramatic scene. There are some serious contrasts here. If we were writing a script for this, we would flash back and forth between Peter in the courtyard and Jesus in the garden and then in front of the high priests.             In the garden, at the betrayal, there are 600 soldiers. A detachment is an enormous number of soldiers, greatly outsized compared to the threat that Jesus might pose. Of course, if they think there is a possibility that he is God… then the more soldiers, the better. Jesus knows what they are about. When they say they are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus says, “I am.” It sounds better to our ears to finish the sentence as “I am he.” However, the Jewish ears that first heard this gospel pricked up at the “I am.” Where else do we hear that phrase?     ...