Obedience

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ODB: Every Word Matters

Kim Peek was a savant (a person with extraordinary memory) who memorized all of Shakespeare’s plays. During a performance of Twelfth Night, Peek noticed that the actor had skipped a word from one of the lines. Peek suddenly stood up and shouted, “Stop!” The actor apologized and said he didn’t think anyone would mind. Peek replied, “Shakespeare would.”Words matter. But especial

ODJ: intimidation of the Bible

The Bible can intimidate me sometimes. Certain statements bring on the guilt. Here are just a few of them: “You are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48); “You must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy”(1 Peter 1:15). Psalm 119 elicits enough guilt to last a lifetime: “I have devoted myself to Your commandments” (v.45); “I

ODJ: strong as an ant

Thirty-five years ago Thomas Daigle and his wife signed a home loan. On the way out of the bank he found a penny on the ground. On a whim, they said they should save pennies to pay off their loan. Decades later they had amassed 62,000 pennies. They hauled the accumulated coins to a bank teller to finish off their mortgage’s balance. It took bank employees 2 days to count the coins, but the Daigl

ODB: Obedience Is Worship

While I was traveling with a chorale from a Christian high school, it was great to see the students praise God as they led in worship in the churches we visited. What happened away from church was even better to see. One day the group discovered that a woman had no money for gas—and they spontaneously felt led by God to take up a collection. They were able to give her enough money for several ta

ODJ: bwana asifiwe!

Bwana asifiwe!” is Swahili for Praise the Lord! As I travelled from the dry place of Tala to the slums of Kawangare to the densely populated and dangerous ghetto of Korogocho in Kenya, this is the way every believer greeted me.

Living under the constant pitch of despondency, Bwana asifiwe? Surrounded by the dark shadows of squalor, poverty and destitution, Bwana asifiwe?Living in the

ODJ: remind me

I’ve always needed to be reminded of things, but latelythe problem has reached critical mass. A cycling accident left me with a temporary black eye andnot-so-temporary short-term memory loss.

Recently my daughter found a hot iron plugged in long after I had left the house. On another occasion the sink overflowed when I forgot I was doing the dishes. I constantly forget where I park my

ODJ: five words

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A 2012 survey of people aged 18 to 24 uncovered an interesting trend. The study, led by the PublicReligion Research Institute, revealed that one in four young adults chose “unaffiliated” for their religious commitment. But 55 percent of that group had “identified with a religious group” when they were younger. They had simply walked away from the faith they once embraced.

Sadly,

ODJ: judgement of justice


An acquaintance of mine, who is highly intelligent and has a philosophical leaning, also carries antipathy toward God and religion. He enjoys being provocative, recently quoting the second-century philosopher Epicurus who said: “There is no such thing as justice in the abstract; it is merely a compact between men.”


If Epicurus was teaching that viewing justice as an ideal disconn

ODJ: good religion


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As a pastor, I get interesting responses from people when they discover my vocation. Some will immediately apologise for the language they’ve used. Some offer a forced smile and then come up with an excuse to change the subject. One line I hear often is: “Well, I like Jesus, but I don’t like religion.”


I understand the sentiment. People are suspicious of the church and religi