Tag Archives: grace
Spiritual Friendship: The Skills (6b)
Continuing our look at how language informs meaning, and in particular how the future perfect tense helps us think about…
- the spiritual journey before us…
- how we live in spiritual community.
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Posted in Community in a Mid-Size Church
Tagged community, future-perfect thinking, grace, true/false self
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Spiritual Friendship: The Skills (6a)
Living in the Future-Perfect Tense.
Yet another skill necessary if we would reweave the spiritual community so necessary for our souls to thrive.
Here’s how it works.
We live in Time-X. But the great hope of our tradition is a state of redemption and soul-health. We are moving toward that state, approaching Time Z. The trouble is the getting… from here to there.
Our tradition speaks of another element (Event-Y) that happens on this journey; a means by which we move from now… to then. Continue reading
Posted in Community in a Mid-Size Church
Tagged community, future-perfect thinking, grace, true/false self
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Spiritual Friendship: The Skills (1)
Skill #1: Growth.
Stands to reason doesn’t it? If we don’t have a learning and growing posture, we don’t grow into the skills, competencies, and emotional framework to do spiritual friendships well. Look around if you don’t believe me. As a society, we feel deeply alienated, and as a society, our spiritual, emotional, and relational skills are atrophying at alarming rates.
So, we’re talking about rebuilding them. Continue reading
Posted in Community in a Mid-Size Church
Tagged ancient spiritual paths, community, grace, relationships, spiritual disciplines
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Labor Day Sunday 2012 (Listening to Fenalon)
We’re in the middle of a lesson on authentic spiritual community, but it’s Labor Day Sunday and many of us are traveling. So, rather than continue the lesson that’s building one week on the next, I thought I’d just do … Continue reading
Who Comes to NRCC: The Community Seeker
Recently, the man in our community who helps people find us on the web asked me for help. To help him design google campaigns, he wanted me to define the people for whom NRCC is a fit. “Who comes here and stays,” he asked. ”What kind of people find NRCC good for their souls?” So for an hour or so, he asked me questions and feverishly typed out what I said. Together we came up with four personae (plural for “persona…” who knew?) who find Life at NRCC…
The Community Seeker
The Religious Deconstructor (and it’s companion the Religious Constructor)
The Disillusioned Church Veteran
The Wilderness Wanderer
These are precious people, and this lesson will help us understand each other, and help us help one another move forward on our journeys. Continue reading
Posted in Who Comes to NRCC: Four Personas
Tagged community, grace, NRCC, spiritual community
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Thanksgiving 2010 (part 2)
Continuing where we left off last week, we consider how gratitude, expressed in good works, is manifest in our lives. Continue reading
Posted in Thanksgiving
Tagged Church history, ethics, good works, grace, gratitude, thankfulness, Thanksgiving, The Golden Rule
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Friends for the Fray: The Lost Art of Confession (part 1)
The ancient art of confession is lost to most Christians today. It is a loss that causes great peril to our souls. In this lesson, we talk about the importance of this ancient practice, and some of the reasons we tend to resist it. Continue reading
Posted in Friends for the Fray
Tagged ancient spiritual paths, breathing groups, confession, forgiveness, grace, greed, lust, prayer, pride, self-awareness, shame, sin, spiritual friends
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Difficult People
Today we listen to the wisdom of one of the wise men of our Christian heritage. His name was Francois Fenelon. He lived about 400 years ago, and wrote spiritual letters, many of which have survived. In the letter we look at today, he writes about tolerance for people in their weakness. Have a listen. Continue reading
Posted in Tending Our Souls
Tagged Conflict Resolution, difficult people, grace, mercy, tolerance
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A Living Letter: My Friend Jim Amundson
This week, my dear friend and a fixture in our spiritual community died. Jim Amundson was a letter from God, written for us to read. In today’s lesson, I discuss Divine Grace, and my text will be Jim’s life.
Jim Amundson
1936-2009 Continue reading
Posted in Individual Lesson, Memorial Service
Tagged community, grace, spiritual friends, spiritual journey
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Kindness Toward Evil People and Run-Of-The-Mill Sinners: It’s Different
by Doug Hammack Add synopsis [Download MP3]
Posted in Living in Forgiveness-Land
Tagged compassion/kindness, envy, forgiveness, good/bad judgement, grace, inner voice
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