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Fast Food Theology

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There is a perspective on God that is often preached as if He were a Burger King God. You can have it your way. Pray, ask for what you want, and if you do what you’re supposed to, you’ll get it. Have problems with what the Bible says you shouldn’t be doing? Just ignore those parts. Think the Bible tells you to do things that are too hard? You can just ignore those parts too. It’s fine. So long as you’re happy, everything else is debatable. If Job taught us anything, its that our happiness is always God’s top priority after all. Other times, God is pitched like Wendy’s. Pay a little money and you can get a lot for it. The four for four for faith, if you will.  Faith is all too often sold and marketed as a generic cure-all. Buy in a little, be a good person, and it’s an easy street to heaven from there. It’s pitched that bad things don’t happen to those who have faith. Since those who have faith are good people, and bad things aren’t allowed to happen to good people
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Mercy

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Psalm 28:6-7 “Praise the Lord! For The Lord heard my cry for mercy. The Lord is my strength and my shield. I trust God with all my heart. The Lord helps me, and my heart is filled with joy. I burst out into songs of thanksgiving.”  The Lord heard my cry for mercy… I can tell you there have been times in my life where things were going so badly I wasn’t sure that if I cried out, God could hear me. But God always hears us, and isn’t that comforting? No matter what we have done, how far we feel from God, or how quietly we may call for God, our voice is always heard. Praise the Lord for that! The Lord is my strength and my shield… That means that God gives us the power we need to fight whatever battles we may face. But also, when we can’t fight, God is our shield - our protector, our guardian. When we believe this, our hearts will be filled with joy! Have you ever been so filled with the spirit of the Lord that you just had to praise God? Maybe in song like the Psalms
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Balancing Fear and Hope

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https://pmd205533tn-a.akamaihd.net/eSalt_Media/888/314/LoveYourNeighbor_PA.jpg The other day, I saw two signs which juxtaposed against each other very harshly.  The first was a church sign.  The second was a house sign.   The church had written on their sign something to the effect of "Fear encouraged is faith abandoned."  The message here was very clear.  Faith is about not being afraid.  Hope and fear cannot coexist together because if you have fear, then you don't have faith. Faithful people have hope and aren't afraid.    N ext door to the church was another sign at a house and this one was home made and written in red paint on a bed sheet so that everyone driving by could read it.  It essentially said "Don't be a jerk, stay home."  The message here was also very clear.  There are very real things to be afraid of in this world, and disregarding these fears can kill yourself and others.  In other words, if you don't have fear you are a ba
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Run The Temple Race With Endurance

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When I was in high school everyone played this iPhone game Temple Run. You played as this Indian Jones-type guy running out of a temple away from these giant gorillas with an artifact you just took from the temple. The point of the game was to run away from the gorillas by successfully navigating the path ahead of you. You had to quickly decide to turn left or right, jump over logs, slide under burning arches, and not fall off the edge at a turn. The difficult part of the game was that you could only see ahead of you so far because of fog, and if you died you had to start completely over.  With no end in sight and no next level to achieve, we all found ourselves addicted to a game we could score high in, but never win.  Our obsession with the game faded and we all found newer ones to play. But out of all the iPhone games I wasted my time with, I never imagined was that Temple Run could prepare me for when life feels uncertain.  Life is so crazy right now, and
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Stay and Grow

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Photo credts: https://www.agrocares.com/en/news/magnesium/ In this current contagious climate, it can be easy to become bored and stagnant in our current situations. It is easy to let ourselves slip into laziness as we lounge about our living rooms. After all, the quarantine keeps us intentionally closed off from the world. Alongside this lag in activity we can allow our spiritual lives to become lax if we are not careful. Our dull routines can run together, allowing us to fall behind on the duties that should regularly fill our time. It is important to keep active in this time of forced inactivity, both physically and spiritually. Thankfully, there are many ways to keep our spiritual lives safely proactive. While churches may have temporarily shuttered their doors, there are still several ways to remain connected to the church body. Most churches are broadcasting their services onto their websites or social media sites such as Facebook and YouTube. Many of these even include pr
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It Means No Worries!

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“It means no worries For the rest of your days It's our problem-free philosophy Hakuna Matata!” – The Lion King With all this self-isolation business my husband and I have been watching a lot more movies than we normally do. And we love movies so that’s saying a lot! Hey it’s 2:00 and I’m finished with work, should we watch a movie? It’s 11:00pm, but is that too late to start a movie? Just woke up…can we watch a movie?  I’ve always found something comforting in watching movies. For two hours you can shut out the world and laugh, cry, sing, or solve a mystery. And now, more than ever, I find myself wanting to shut out the outside world as much as I can. Everything feels negative recently, don’t you think? You can’t even check Facebook without things getting overwhelming.  And what do we do when things get overwhelming? Turn to Disney! Or…is that just me?  Those animated Disney movies are just the best! And what Disney movie is complete with
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Pandemic in the Midst of Holy Week

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Station of the Cross, Station 5 "Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry the cross," Church of the Holy Trinity, Germunden am Main, Germany In most Holy Week celebrations we are often like the disciples who fall asleep when Jesus prayed.  Honestly I can’t blame them for sleeping, for if the disciples were anything like my dad after a big holiday meal it really was inevitable that they’d take a nap! But this Holy Week experience is very different from years past for I now empathize with Jesus like I never have before.  I am restless and unable to sleep, fretting like a deer in the headlights about my inability to do anything about what I see coming my way.  Furthermore, I know I am not alone in feeling abandoned by the people I love.  Social distancing in a pandemic will do that to you.  I too have doubts about God’s plan for me.  Where is God in all of this suffering? Can I also cry out with Christ: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). W
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