Father Snort

Jesus said do not cling to me after he was resurrected because he was going to prepare a place for us. He turned death from an enemy into a doorway into continued life.

Jesus' deepest desire for his disciples is that we love one another. Sadly, we often let little things get in the way of our love, acting as though Jesus never existed.

We have blessing and cursing within us, the ability to say "Hosanna in the Highest!" to Jesus and the ability to say, "Crucify Him!" Jesus has redeemed them both.

Believing in life after this life, we find meaning in this life for it's own sake and in order to become who we are going to be. The greater our love of God and others, the greater our hope in heaven.

In the Story of the Prodigal Son, the father loved both his sons. They both seemed to want to be rewarded from their father, rather than primarily loving him. Our relationships with each other and with God are based, not on economies of exchange, but on economies of grace and love.

Jesus expects us to take his calls to repentance seriously. He also loves us in those calls to repentance, not desiring us to live in constant fear of punishment. By accepting Jesus' invitation, we find life to be more beautiful.

Truly to love God means to trust and love God without an agenda. Loving God to get what we want out of God is really a form of idolatry.

Jesus' temptations by the devil began with the temptation not to follow the Holy Spirit into the wilderness...the nagging doubts that must have been in his mind. For us, temptations are rarely as obvious as the devil telling us directly to worship him. We're tempted by attractive things which don't fill us as much as the seeminly less attractive ways God would have us walk. Faith in God to follow his ways fixes us.

Lenten fasts aren't done to make God happy with us for not drinking coffee (or whatever else) for a month. The purpose is to create need in our lives and fill that need with God, to spend time with God and then serve others with healed hearts.

Jesus rebuked the people of Nazareth - they responded by wanting to kill him. We often do the same when rebuked. We could, however, respond with 1 Corinthians kind of love.