Posts By This Author
Verse of the Day: 'Who could stand?'
If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered.
- Psalms 130:3-4
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Voice of the Day: Glen Stassen on the Death Penalty
Christians who remember their Lord was unjustly and cruelly given the death penalty have a hard time being enthusiastic about imposing the death penalty on others.
- Glen Stassen
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Voice of the Day: Coretta Scott King
The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members, a heart of grace and a soul generated by love.
- Coretta Scott King
Verse of the Day: 'Be patient with all of them'
We urge you, beloved, to admonish the idlers, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with all of them. See that none repays evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to all. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
- 1 Thessalonians 5:14-18
Voice of the Day: Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Do what is right not only to respectable citizens, but especially to the disrespectable ones as well; be at peace not only with those who are peaceable, but especially with those who do not wish to let us live in peace.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Verse of the Day: 'Clothe yourselves with love'
As God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.
- Colossians 3:12-14
Verse of the Day: 'Dissentions and offenses'
I urge you, brothers and sisters, to keep an eye on those who cause dissensions and offenses, in opposition to the teaching that you have learned; avoid them. For such people do not serve the Lord Christ, but their own appetities, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the simple-minded.
- Romans 16:17-18
Jim Wallis on NBC's Today Show
Voice of the Day: Mother Teresa
It is more difficult to fight poverty in a rich country than in a poor one.
- Mother Teresa
Brian McLaren: Compassion and Hope in the Haggard Scandal
As a representative of the Red Letter Christians, I was asked the other day to participate in an NPR dialogue about the recent resignation of Ted Haggard. Two things struck me about the dialogue.
First, compassion. The tone of the [...]
Verse of the Day: 'Learn to do good'
Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.
- Isaiah 1:16-17
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Voice of the Day: Thomas Cahill on Prophets
Prophets are, by their nature, inconvenient party-poopers. It is a mistaken notion that prophets can see the future. Rather, they tell us what is true right now.
- Thomas Cahill, in Hey You, Listen Up! Sojourners, March-April 2003
Jeff Carr: Evangelicals 'Didn't Show Up'?
Some of you will remember that I wrote an open letter to Dr. James Dobson a few weeks ago, and posted it here on this blog. Well, Dr. Dobson released a statement yesterday regarding his assessment of what happened in the election on Tuesday. According to Dr. Dobson, "Many of my colleagues [...]
Verse of the Day: coming into the light
For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.
- John 3:20-21
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Voice of the Day: Maya Angelou
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
- Maya Angelou
Jim Wallis: A Defeat for the Religious Right and the Secular Left
In this election, both the Religious Right and the secular Left were defeated, and the voice of the moral center was heard. A significant number of candidates elected are social conservatives on issues of life and family, economic populists, and committed to a new direction [...]
Tony Jones: Why I Didn't Waste My Vote
For the third election in a row, I voted for the Independence Party candidate in the Minnesota gubernatorial election. (Yes, if you're counting backward, that means that I voted for Jesse "The Body" Ventura - and proudly so!) This year's candidate, Peter Hutchinson, garnered only 6% of the popular vote, but that [...]
Verse of the Day: 'Do not envy the violent'
Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. Do not say to your neighbor, "Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it" - when you have it with you. Do not quarrel with anyone without cause, when no harm has been done to you. Do not envy the violent and do not choose any of their ways.
- Proverbs 3:27-31
Verse of the Day: 'Be doers'
But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in the mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they look like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act - they will be blessed in their doing. [...]
Voice of the Day: Murphy Davis on Words and Deeds
So long as the word remains in any way theoretical and is not incarnated by actions and translated into deeds, then it is not faith. It might be theology, not very good theology at that, but it is not faith. Faith is a combination of conviction and deeds, and it cannot be one without the other. Faith divorced from deeds is as lifeless as a corpse.
- Murphy Davis in "Turning Dreams [...]