Okay, I know this isn’t Sunday, but I had some more thoughts about the reading from the Gospel According to Matthew from a couple weeks ago and I wanted to pass them on. So in order to refresh your memory regarding the issue, let me very briefly paraphrase the story so you know what I’m talking about. Jesus was speaking to some people and teaching in parable. A parable is basically an analogy. It is a story designed to teach an abstract concept that can’t really be understood intellectually. In fact, the parables of Jesus are very much like the koans that Zen masters use to teach their students....

So this guy who owns a small winery goes out at the break of day in his pickup truck to find some day laborers. He goes over to Home Depot and picks up a few guys and takes them back to his vineyards. He offers them a fair wage, fifty dollars for the day, (if you can call less than minimum wage fair) and puts them to work picking grapes. By nine AM, however, he sees he’s going to need more guys. “Damn Mexicans!” he thinks, and gets in the truck and heads on out again in search of more workers. He finds some guys, says he’ll pay them a fair wage, and brings them back to the vineyards and...

He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself; for every man has need to be forgiven. –Thomas Fuller There is a story about a young boy that had never said a single word.  You know, most kids start talking when they are little babies and then they never shut up.  But this kid never talked at all.  When he was a toddler, the mother took the boy to the doctor to find out what was wrong with him.  The doctor examined the boy thoroughly, but could find nothing wrong with the child.  Eventually, the parents just accepted the sad truth that the boy would never...

I  like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. –Mohandas Gandhi Ghandi’s rejection of Christianity grew out of an incident that happened when he was a young man practicing law in South Africa. He had become attracted to the Christian faith, had studied the Bible and the teachings of Jesus, and was seriously exploring becoming a Christian. And so he decided to attend a church service. As he came up the steps of the large church where he intended to go, a white South African elder of the church barred his way at the door. “Where do you...

Saint Francis de Assisi was born to Pietro di Bernardone, a rich cloth merchant. He had every advantage that one might expect of a young man born to a wealthy family in the Middle Ages. As a young man, Francis was a troubadour and wished to be a writer of French poetry. In 1201, he joined a military expedition against Perugia where he was taken as a prisoner and was not released for a year. A strange vision made him return to Assisi. He claimed to have had a mystical experience in the Church at San Damiano. Francis claimed to see the crucifix come to life and say, “Francis, Francis, go and...

One of the things I find truly astonishing about the human animal is the number of teachings and traditions that we have handed down time out of history for thousands of years from teacher to student, person to person. These are things that cannot be learned from books. You cannot learn to dance from a book. You cannot learn to play an instrument from a book. You cannot learn a martial art from a book. You cannot learn Zen from a book. If nothing else, you need a teacher in order to tell you if you’re getting it right or not, or, if you’re getting it wrong, what you must do to correct yourself....

I love art. I have to confess that I really know very little about it. That is, I only know what I have learned from my mother who took me to the art museum every Sunday when I was little, and from my various readings and interest. So I guess I know a little bit about art and art history, but not a lot. But, as the cliché goes, I know what I like. When I was first separated from my first wife, I used to like to go to an art gallery in a shopping mall near the bank where I worked. I liked to just walk through the gallery and look at the paintings for sale. They had paintings by Chagall and by Picasso,...

If the last ten years have taught me anything at all, it is the power of fear. After 9/11, our nation was turned upside down by fear. We went to war with a country that had nothing to do with the terrorist attack over fear. If that fool, Bush was re-elected legally (of which I have some doubts), it was because of fear. We have handed over our civil liberties because of fear. Indeed, many of the problems we are facing in our economy have been caused by fear. Nobody is buying a house now because of the fear that house will lose value in the next few years, so the people who need to sell their houses...

*********LONG BLOG ALERT—SORRY EVERYBODY******* (I hope it’s worth it….) Charles Swindoll (not that you know who that is) tells a funny story about a nine-year-old named Danny who came bursting out of Sunday school like a crazy monkey. His eyes were darting in every direction as he tried to locate either mom or dad. Finally, after a quick search, he grabbed his Dad by the leg and yelled, “Man, that story of Moses and all those people crossing the Red Sea was great!” His father looked down, smiled, and asked the boy to tell him about it. “Well, the Israelites...

Of course all of you are too young to remember, but there was once a wonderful comedian by the name of Jack Benny. He made several films, including “The Importance of Being Earnest” (the Wilde play), had a regular radio show, and was able to make the leap to television. Jack Benny’s character was known for two things, playing the violin badly, and being cheap. One of the most famous of his radio bits involved Jack leaving the studio one night after the show. As he leaves the studio, a robber points a gun at him and says, “Your money or your life!” There was a long pause. The robber repeats,...