We tend to imagine God’s work in the world as a “shock-and-awe” power. The widow shows us more the “God of Small Things.”

Jesus says the commandment to love God with everything you’ve got, and to love your neighbor as yourself is important than any other law or religious ordinance. It would be a relief if it weren’t actually impossible in practice.

We tend to think of spirituality like fast food—we order something, we get

it, and then we’re better people. The Jesus Way is different—it’s more slow

food. A lifelong path of being healed from the inside out.

One of the biggest obstacles people can have to church, faith, God, are the behavior of Christians and their portrayal of God.

Jesus knows the things that, below the surface, gnaw at our souls, the things that enslave us. In this case it's money.

Jesus is pretty hardcore when it comes to divorce. But he's also pretty hardcore when it comes to the joy and blessing of marriage.

Harsh words from Jesus this week, including images of dismemberment and everlasting fire. But these are intended to underline a sense of spiritual urgency.

We see greatness as something achieved, and something to be held over others. Jesus says that greatness is giving all that away in loving service to others.

We see greatness as something achieved, and something to be held over others. Jesus says that greatness is giving all that away in loving service to others.

Following Jesus is cross-shaped: it means a willingness to give up everything to inherit the only thing that matters.