Martha was a doer. When Jesus came to her home, she wanted everything to be just so! She cleaned, swept, cooked a fine dinner, set a beautiful table, and prepared the guest list and the seating arrangements. It was a lot of work. Meanwhile, Mary, her sister, sat at Jesus' feet, drinking in every word the Master spoke. It didn't seem fair to Martha that Mary wasn't helping with all the work, so she complained - to Jesus! "Can't you tell her to help me!" Martha lost focus on her guest and on making things perfect for him; now, she was a victim. Jesus would have none of it, though. He told her that her sister had chosen the better part in his gentle rebuke. Of course, Martha could choose that too, but returning her focus on the One who came to her home not to be served but to serve by bringing light, peace, and salvation. What can we learn from all this about our focus on the One that is necessary?

A listener recently asked about the problem of evil: why does a good God allow good people to suffer, and conversely, why do evil people prosper.? One of the best answers to this set of questions is the one found in the Book of Job. Job is part of the Wisdom Literature found in the Hebrew Bible. In it, we see Job, a man we know to be just and godly because the author has told us this about him in the book's opening paragraphs. But Satan (the accuser) asks God if Job is good because he loves God or because of what God has given him. God believes in Job, and to prove a point, takes away Job's wealth, family, and health and leaves him with nothing but his question:: Why? The answer God ultimately gives Job is also essential to us as we struggle with the problem of evil in our own time.

NASA's new telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope, allows us to look deeper into the Universe than ever before. What does it teach us? We see more, but do we see more deeply. In Psalm 19, David, the Poet King of Israel, reflected on the heavens as he saw them thousands of years ago. His insight is still fresh and beautiful: "The heavens declare, "he wrote, "the glory of God." So they did in David's time, and so they do today. Before the mystery and the majesty of the "heavens," we can but stand back in wonder and awe. Today's show reflects on the Heavens declaring God's glory and more, plus our callers. 

If you have questions you'd like to have addressed on the show, please leave a comment in the comments section of the blog, and I'll address them on the next broadcast. 

Thanks and blessings, 

Pastor Rich

What must I do to inherit eternal life; who is my neighbor, and how big is God? These are seemingly simple questions. To test Jesus, an expert in the law asked Jesus the first two questions. The great pastoral theologian Henri Nouwen was asked the third question by Megan, the four-year-old daughter of Nouwen's friends, the Christensens. In response to the lawyer's questions, Jesus gives us the parable of the "Good Samaritan," one of the most beautiful and challenging stories in the New Testament. Nouwen's response to Megan illustrates the parable, and all these questions, as well as the parable, challenge us to live into God's compassionate, boundless love.

The Declaration of Independence was 246 years old on July 4th, just a few days ago. The men who wrote it gave us not only a magnificent political document, they showed the courage of people desperate for liberty. We must never take their sacrifice for granted, nor forget that the fight against tyranny is never over; it requires the courage of each successive generation to preserve the liberty they won for us. They relied on the providence and guidance of God, and so must we. We must also understand how precious life is - from conception onward. And what is this liberty for which they risked so much? Far from being the license to do as we will, it is the freedom to follow the will of God. Finally, we will never find happiness if we pursue it for ourselves alone. Happiness is found only by losing ourselves in compassion for others.

Luke tells the story (10: 1-24) of how Jesus sent out 70 disciples as an "advance team" to every town and village he was about to visit on his journey to Jerusalem. His directions were as clear as they were unusual: they were to take nothing for their journey. They were to take no toothpaste, shampoo, shoes, or money; instead, they were to rely solely on God and the hospitality of the people they would meet on the way. Jesus warns that they were going among a world full of wolves as lambs. Lambs are gentle creatures, and they are defenseless. While Jesus is the Lion of the House of David, he was also the "Lamb" who, we hear in Revelation, has won the victory and sits on the throne. Jesus' disciples (and we are among them) will bring in the harvest of souls that Jesus told us is ready, not by being like the world, but by being like the Lord. Only then can we bring peace and healing, and only then can we proclaim with credibility that the Kingdom of God has drawn near.

Life is a gift, every moment of it, and we live life in moments - in the present. The past is history, and the future is not yet ours (and may never be), but we love NOW. How can we best appreciate and life this precious gift of life. How can we be "present" to the moment, and thus see the wonder in it. We discuss this and, in advance of US Independence Day, we also discuss the blessings of our liberty and the brave men and woman who risked all to create this one nation under God.

When Jesus "sets his face toward Jerusalem," he is focused unflinchingly on his mission. He is to go to Jerusalem and reveal God's amazing love by being lifted up - on the cross, at his resurrection, and in his ascension back to the Father. As Jesus' disciples, we too are asked to set our faces on our mission: to take up our cross daily and be living examples of the self-gift of God. There is a cost, though, as Deitrich Bonhoeffer warned. "When Christ calls a man," Bonhoeffer wrote, "he bids him come and die."That is our call - to die to ourselves daily as we take up our crosses to follow Jesus on the way.

This episode includes a discussion of a tragedy on the Palisades Parkway and what we can learn from it. We also discuss the importance and power of prayer.

In Luke's Gospel (8:26-39), Jesus makes his first incursion into gentile territory in the land of the Gerasenes. Immediately upon stepping ashore, he met a man so disfigured by his evil that the man was barely recognizable as human. Yet an encounter with Jesus transformed him into his right mind, his proper self, and a witness to God's love. What did Jesus do to bring about this amazing healing?   What can we learn from this story of God's transforming love?