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Joshua 24:1-25
Bill Murray had completed school and was doing very well for himself. He was vice-president of an airlines and owner of a printing plant. Bill had been away from his family for about twelve years when his mother, Madelyn Murray O'Hair, asked her son to come home and salvage her failing organization. Dutifully, Bill returned to Austin and assumed leadership of the American Atheist organization (AAC). An astute businessman, Bill quickly increased the gross income of the organization from $3,000 to $30,000 a month.
During his eighteen months in Austin, unfortunate changes came upon Bill Murray. He needed a quart of coffee to get going in the morning, through the day he smoked four packs of cigarettes, and at night he consumed a fifth of liquor in order to sleep. His behavior continued to deteriorate until one night he struck his wife and fired a rifle at the approaching policemen.
Bill also had a troubled conscience that questioned the ethics of the organization he represented. Why, he wondered, were the proceeds always used to buy luxuries such as a new Cadillac, instead of necessities such as an x-ray machine for a hospital? Why did the organization have to sue an astronaut to keep him from praying on a space mission? Bill realized the answer to these questions: his mother was basically a negative and destructive person.
Unable to live with himself any longer, Bill walked out on the AAC. He spent six months living in the Arizona desert. After leaving the desolate land, he joined Alcoholics Anonymous, about which he said, "I saw some miraculous things people were able to accomplish with faith and I couldn't help comparing all that with atheism." Bill Murray surrendered his life to Jesus and is now a Christian evangelist.
Bill Murray came to a different understanding than his mother. Murray could confess, "but as for me and my household, we shall serve the Lord."
Ron L.
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
In the television show The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Will is a ladies man who for years had no intention of settling down. In one episode, however, he realizes his love for his girlfriend, Lisa, and decides he can finally be a "one-woman man." His confidant, Geoffrey, tells him, "You know what you have to do," and in the next scene, Will passes on his little black book to his cousin Carlton in a dramatic ceremony. Will realized that if he wanted to commit himself to Lisa, he had to leave his past behind and sacrifice the idea of other possibilities.
In the same way, Israel had to give up all of its old gods, as much as they were a part of Israel's history and former identity. If they were going to move forward in a relationship with the Lord, it would be as a one-god people.
Brian H.
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Choices. Life is about choices. No one understands this more, perhaps, than refugees. Forced from their home by war or injustice, refugees are unwilling immigrants to new lands, new places. New cultures. New customs. And from that point, life is an endless stream of difficult choices. Old world or new? What clothes to wear? What food to eat? What language to speak? What religious practices to keep? What people to be friends with, what freedoms to allow your children, question after question after question after question. They cannot have both old and new in everything. There must be choices. There will always be the old but there must be some new too. Everything is changing. And everything becomes a choice.
Leah T.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
N.T. Wright interprets this passage quite differently from the usual "rapture theology" popular in our day. First of all, he reminds us that Paul's expression of the Lord descending and the living saints being snatched up in the air is a rich metaphor and not to be taken literally.
Wright goes on to explain the meaning of this metaphor by telling a story about the way people related to the Roman emperor in the time of Jesus. When the emperor would visit a colony or a province, the citizens of the country would go to meet him at some distance from the city. They didn't want the emperor to arrive at their gates without being greeted properly. Once they had greeted him they would escort him royally into the city itself. In other words, unlike the "rapture theology" the believers would not rise up in the air, but rather they would escort the emperor back to the place from whence they came.
Richard H.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
I have no idea how people who don't believe in God deal with death, to be honest. My family recently lost a close friend, one they had known for years. If this life is all there is, everything that man was, his life, his feelings, his dreams -- all of it is lost forever. There truly is no hope with that philosophy.
However, we who know that there is a God can gain comfort knowing that the death of the body is not the end of the story. "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep" (vv. 13-14).
Craig K.
Matthew 25:1-13
Jessica left her dress in Sacramento. It was a stupid thing to do -- she'd flown all the way out here, all the way to Pittsburgh for her sister's wedding and she left the stupid dress in Sacramento. There was no way to get it to Pittsburgh in time, even overnight express… if only she'd realized it yesterday morning. Or even the day before. But no, she was too busy helping her mother, calming down her sister, meeting the rest of the wedding party, to even think about it. And so there she was. The day of the wedding. Instead of standing up beside her sister where she belonged, she was sitting between her parents in the pew. It was a beautiful wedding to watch and at least she herself was there… but she couldn't help but feel like she'd let her sister down. That she'd let herself down. She'd promised to be there… she just wasn't ready.
Leah T.
Matthew 25:1-13
Ten college friends were camped out in line for tickets to the concert of a lifetime. After waiting all day without an end in sight, they were starving. Half of them took out food and began to eat but the rest hadn't packed anything. They begged their friends to share but the five insisted that if they did there wouldn't be enough to sustain them through the rest of the line. Several hours later, the unprepared friends were feeling weak and lightheaded. Finally they conceded to stepping out of the line to get some food. By the time they returned, however, their friends had already made it inside to the counter and secured their tickets. The rest had no choice but to file into the back of the line several blocks away and it wasn't long before the word reached them that the tickets were sold out.
Brian H.
Matthew 25:1-13
Did you know the saying "God willing and the Creeks don't rise" was in reference to the Creek Indians and not a body of water? It was written by Benjamin Hawkins in the late eighteenth century. He was a politician and Indian diplomat. While in the south, Hawkins was requested by the President of the United States to return to Washington. In his response, he wrote, "God willing and the Creeks don't rise." Because he capitalized the word "Creeks" it was understood that he was referring to the Creek Indian tribe and not a body of water. Over the years we have lost the original meaning and Creeks is no longer capitalized, and it has come to refer to a stream or a river.
Whether we recall the saying to be on guard against an Indian uprising or refer to it in terms of an unexpected swollen body of water, in either case it means we must be on our guard, we must be prepared. This is the message of the parable of the Ten Bridesmaids -- that we must always be on guard, always be watchful, always be prepared for the Second Coming. With this sense of being on guard, we will live our lives accordingly.
Ron L.
Bill Murray had completed school and was doing very well for himself. He was vice-president of an airlines and owner of a printing plant. Bill had been away from his family for about twelve years when his mother, Madelyn Murray O'Hair, asked her son to come home and salvage her failing organization. Dutifully, Bill returned to Austin and assumed leadership of the American Atheist organization (AAC). An astute businessman, Bill quickly increased the gross income of the organization from $3,000 to $30,000 a month.
During his eighteen months in Austin, unfortunate changes came upon Bill Murray. He needed a quart of coffee to get going in the morning, through the day he smoked four packs of cigarettes, and at night he consumed a fifth of liquor in order to sleep. His behavior continued to deteriorate until one night he struck his wife and fired a rifle at the approaching policemen.
Bill also had a troubled conscience that questioned the ethics of the organization he represented. Why, he wondered, were the proceeds always used to buy luxuries such as a new Cadillac, instead of necessities such as an x-ray machine for a hospital? Why did the organization have to sue an astronaut to keep him from praying on a space mission? Bill realized the answer to these questions: his mother was basically a negative and destructive person.
Unable to live with himself any longer, Bill walked out on the AAC. He spent six months living in the Arizona desert. After leaving the desolate land, he joined Alcoholics Anonymous, about which he said, "I saw some miraculous things people were able to accomplish with faith and I couldn't help comparing all that with atheism." Bill Murray surrendered his life to Jesus and is now a Christian evangelist.
Bill Murray came to a different understanding than his mother. Murray could confess, "but as for me and my household, we shall serve the Lord."
Ron L.
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
In the television show The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Will is a ladies man who for years had no intention of settling down. In one episode, however, he realizes his love for his girlfriend, Lisa, and decides he can finally be a "one-woman man." His confidant, Geoffrey, tells him, "You know what you have to do," and in the next scene, Will passes on his little black book to his cousin Carlton in a dramatic ceremony. Will realized that if he wanted to commit himself to Lisa, he had to leave his past behind and sacrifice the idea of other possibilities.
In the same way, Israel had to give up all of its old gods, as much as they were a part of Israel's history and former identity. If they were going to move forward in a relationship with the Lord, it would be as a one-god people.
Brian H.
Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
Choices. Life is about choices. No one understands this more, perhaps, than refugees. Forced from their home by war or injustice, refugees are unwilling immigrants to new lands, new places. New cultures. New customs. And from that point, life is an endless stream of difficult choices. Old world or new? What clothes to wear? What food to eat? What language to speak? What religious practices to keep? What people to be friends with, what freedoms to allow your children, question after question after question after question. They cannot have both old and new in everything. There must be choices. There will always be the old but there must be some new too. Everything is changing. And everything becomes a choice.
Leah T.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
N.T. Wright interprets this passage quite differently from the usual "rapture theology" popular in our day. First of all, he reminds us that Paul's expression of the Lord descending and the living saints being snatched up in the air is a rich metaphor and not to be taken literally.
Wright goes on to explain the meaning of this metaphor by telling a story about the way people related to the Roman emperor in the time of Jesus. When the emperor would visit a colony or a province, the citizens of the country would go to meet him at some distance from the city. They didn't want the emperor to arrive at their gates without being greeted properly. Once they had greeted him they would escort him royally into the city itself. In other words, unlike the "rapture theology" the believers would not rise up in the air, but rather they would escort the emperor back to the place from whence they came.
Richard H.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
I have no idea how people who don't believe in God deal with death, to be honest. My family recently lost a close friend, one they had known for years. If this life is all there is, everything that man was, his life, his feelings, his dreams -- all of it is lost forever. There truly is no hope with that philosophy.
However, we who know that there is a God can gain comfort knowing that the death of the body is not the end of the story. "But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep" (vv. 13-14).
Craig K.
Matthew 25:1-13
Jessica left her dress in Sacramento. It was a stupid thing to do -- she'd flown all the way out here, all the way to Pittsburgh for her sister's wedding and she left the stupid dress in Sacramento. There was no way to get it to Pittsburgh in time, even overnight express… if only she'd realized it yesterday morning. Or even the day before. But no, she was too busy helping her mother, calming down her sister, meeting the rest of the wedding party, to even think about it. And so there she was. The day of the wedding. Instead of standing up beside her sister where she belonged, she was sitting between her parents in the pew. It was a beautiful wedding to watch and at least she herself was there… but she couldn't help but feel like she'd let her sister down. That she'd let herself down. She'd promised to be there… she just wasn't ready.
Leah T.
Matthew 25:1-13
Ten college friends were camped out in line for tickets to the concert of a lifetime. After waiting all day without an end in sight, they were starving. Half of them took out food and began to eat but the rest hadn't packed anything. They begged their friends to share but the five insisted that if they did there wouldn't be enough to sustain them through the rest of the line. Several hours later, the unprepared friends were feeling weak and lightheaded. Finally they conceded to stepping out of the line to get some food. By the time they returned, however, their friends had already made it inside to the counter and secured their tickets. The rest had no choice but to file into the back of the line several blocks away and it wasn't long before the word reached them that the tickets were sold out.
Brian H.
Matthew 25:1-13
Did you know the saying "God willing and the Creeks don't rise" was in reference to the Creek Indians and not a body of water? It was written by Benjamin Hawkins in the late eighteenth century. He was a politician and Indian diplomat. While in the south, Hawkins was requested by the President of the United States to return to Washington. In his response, he wrote, "God willing and the Creeks don't rise." Because he capitalized the word "Creeks" it was understood that he was referring to the Creek Indian tribe and not a body of water. Over the years we have lost the original meaning and Creeks is no longer capitalized, and it has come to refer to a stream or a river.
Whether we recall the saying to be on guard against an Indian uprising or refer to it in terms of an unexpected swollen body of water, in either case it means we must be on our guard, we must be prepared. This is the message of the parable of the Ten Bridesmaids -- that we must always be on guard, always be watchful, always be prepared for the Second Coming. With this sense of being on guard, we will live our lives accordingly.
Ron L.
