“But to what shall I liken this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to their companions, and saying: ‘We played the flute for you,And you did not dance; We mourned to you, And you did not lament.’ Matthew 11:16-17 I have a street-preacher friend who is a tad dispensationalist, a..
Author: James Riley - page 48
I Mix It Up With a Hero… Well, yes, of course I’m addicted to Facebook. Duh.. If you could have immediate access to the 40 or 50 most interesting people you know, and read the edited, best-self, versions of their lives, tease them while they’re at work, work out thorny problems of theology, culture..
Somewhere, on a Sunday morning, people are filing out of a chapel after the service and the pastor spots a teenage boy, waiting by himself for his parents to finish socializing. There’s an exchange that goes something like this: Pastor: “How are you, Jeff?” Jeff: “Fine.” The young man fidgets, looks off in the..
The deck outside our kitchen window is newly finished, and it aches for teak furniture of some sort, and striped cotton pillows, and iced buckets of chardonnay and the barbecue simmer of steak and green peppers in olive oil. Music would be nice–and friends, of course–and one of those well-buttered conversations that sizzles on..
A Facebook friend was a bit surprised, recently, when I availed myself of the term “golly.” I can certainly understand her concern, and I was flattered to think I had somehow projected the sort of image that would have been blemished by its indiscriminate use. It’s really one of the nicest things you can..
Have you ever attempted a long chat with someone who doesn’t appear to be living on this planet? I have. I could say many things about them, but it’s clear they see no heaven in the here and now. The kingdom is not “at hand,” for them. It’s somewhere else. Somewhere far away. They wish..
iChurch? There’s a new gold rush on in California, and it comes with its own praise music. According to confidential industry insiders, three of Silicon Valley’s biggest technology firms are in bidding wars to buy up the nation’s largest churches. “Not many pastors are truly entertaining,” said a stock market analyst close to the acquisition..
Humphrey Bogart once said ” Acting is like sex: you either do it and don’t talk about it, or you talk about it and don’t do it.” Well, there may be a few Tahitians out there — the sort Margaret Meade never actually met — who just kind of fall into sex the way other..
The Bill Gothard Mess.. Somewhere, out on the prairie, a weary, broad-shouldered rancher settles down on a log by the fire. His wife is nearby. She’s gorgeous. She wears cowgirl denim and a blouse tight enough to reveal the Almighty’s blessings without causing pandemonium amongst the hired hands. She slides down onto..
My wife is a heart-mender. She’s strong but tender; she proposed a get-away week-ender, sort of a tension-ender. So, wenders we, freeway bound, we were brought to a complete stop by traffic and the bender of a fender some miles away, or so we conjecture. She’s driving. So off the freeway I send her, in..