Author Archives: Chaplainmike

Tuesday with Michael Spencer: We’re Still Waiting

Michael and the Boar’s Head Tavern folks once upon a time had an Advent site. Here is a sample from it — one of Michael’s observant reflections about evangelical churchianity in the Christmas season. • • • We’re still waiting Watched a children’s Christmas program in Northern Ky today. It was familiar to me becauseContinue reading “Tuesday with Michael Spencer: We’re Still Waiting”

Advent Music: An Advent Invitation from Peter Mayer

The promise that comes to us in the darkness… Maybe peace hides in a storm Maybe winter’s heart is warm Maybe Light itself is born In the longest night… • Light a candle, sing a song Say that the shadows shall not cross Make an oblation out of all you’ve lost In the longest nightContinue reading “Advent Music: An Advent Invitation from Peter Mayer”

Sermon: Advent III — Jesus Commends the Doubter

Sermon: Advent III Jesus Commends the Doubter (Matt 11:2-11) Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist… • Matthew 11:11 • • • Jesus gives great praise to John the Baptist in today’s Gospel. He commends him as a strong man of truth, a prophetContinue reading “Sermon: Advent III — Jesus Commends the Doubter”

Saturday Brunch, December 14, 2019

Hi, friends, and welcome to the weekend. Ready for brunch? Well, it’s mid-December, and you know what that means: Superfluous college football bowl games, of course. This year there are 40 (count ’em) bowl games. Which, if my math is correct (an unlikely occurrence) translates into 80 teams playing in a bowl this year. Now,Continue reading “Saturday Brunch, December 14, 2019”

Another Look: My Ambiguous Apologetic

I confess. I have no apologetic. There is no defending God. There is no proving his way is right. To do so would require that I understand God, that I can substantiate the claims of truth my faith calls me to hold. I can explain what I believe well enough. I can demonstrate to aContinue reading “Another Look: My Ambiguous Apologetic”

Review of “Love and Quasars: An Astrophysicist Reconciles Faith and Science” by Paul Wallace, Part 6.

Review of “Love and Quasars: An Astrophysicist Reconciles Faith and Science” by Paul Wallace, Part 6. Chapter 8 is entitled A Scientist Reads the Bible: How Science Enlarges Scripture.  Wallace begins the chapter with the account of “Mad” Mike Hughes the California limo driver who launched himself with a homemade rocket to “see” that theContinue reading “Review of “Love and Quasars: An Astrophysicist Reconciles Faith and Science” by Paul Wallace, Part 6.”

The “No” and the “Yes” of Jesus

One of the resources I use as a Lutheran to help people understand the tradition is a small book called Baptized, We Live: Lutheranism As a Way of Life, by Daniel Erlander. One of the book’s strengths is its consistent rejection of a “theology of glory” for a “theology of the cross,” and its insistenceContinue reading “The “No” and the “Yes” of Jesus”

Another Look: Go forth to meet him?

Another Look: Go forth to meet him? Here we are again, in the early days of December. We are not far away from welcoming the Christ-child at his birth. As we face this season and event, here are some words from Brother Thomas Merton that make me think. For Christmas will come this year, just asContinue reading “Another Look: Go forth to meet him?”

“We sanitize what isn’t safe and therefore lose what is nutritious”

From The Weight of Advent by Ian at Mockingbird [T]he prophetic word of Advent authorizes us to tell the truth about the world. As Edgar pronounces in the final scene of King Lear, “The weight of this sad time we must obey/ Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.” John the BaptizerContinue reading ““We sanitize what isn’t safe and therefore lose what is nutritious””