The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life: Where is Our Joy?

Introduction…

The Living Hour: The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life takes a fresh and non-dogmatic look at the Lord’s Prayer to reveal new perspectives on the esoteric teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.  It is an SBNR book for Progressive Christians, Unitarians, Agnostics, & all spiritual seekers interested in discovering a more joyful and fulfilling life…

Henry David Thoreau, tucked away in his Walden cabin, famously said that most of us lead lives of quiet desperation. That was in 1845. Today, things are not so quiet. Anxiety and depression are regular rites of passage from which millions never graduate. Civility meanwhile has long been dropped from our national discourse. It’s a sad indictment of a country where so many pride themselves in a Christian heritage. We have the highest levels of church attendance in the world. Almost eighty percent of us say that we believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Yet, where is our joy? Where is our vitality? Where is our peace of mind?

The Son comes to complete our happiness in this life,¹ yet it’s clear not many are receiving “the good news”. Instead, we are sold a gospel that forsakes the living hour for a future heavenly reward: a spiritual reckoning that asks for little and receives even less in return. Simply accept Jesus Christ as your savior, we are told, and you’ll be hanging out with the good Lord for eternity. If it were only so easy.²

Jesus of Nazareth didn’t teach the idler’s path to God. He said that because much has been given us, much is expected.³ He described the kingdom of heaven as a place that doesn’t suffer fools.⁴ And he asked that his followers become as perfect as their Father in heaven⁵ ––a seemingly impossible task, if it were not for the fact that all things are possible with the help of God.⁶

The first step toward perfection, according to Jesus, is to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind.⁷ The mind gets short shrift from many Christians today. We forget that Jesus amazed people with both his miracles and his wits.⁸ All who listened to him marveled at his intelligence and his answers. He was a man, we are told, whose wisdom grew as he grew in years.  Only after reaching maturity did his intellect surpass that of the legendary King Solomon.⁹

Clear thinking is essential for Christians because Jesus asks that we decide for ourselves what is right.¹⁰ Making those correct choices requires intelligence and learning, as well as faith and a loving heart. God did not bless us with extraordinary minds, whose complexity dwarfs that of any computer, only to have us park them in storage. Instead, we are called to develop our logic and reason—to transform our minds into Christ’s “winnowing fans.” So that the chaff might be removed from the wheat¹¹ the dead teachings from the living Word.

Like Jesus, we are asked to sweep away the dictates of the billy-club faithful, the literalists whose passion for scripture¹² is but another form of idolatry. The Pharisees and Sadducees may be historical footnotes, but their modern day equivalents litter the airwaves and pulpits of America—preachers of wealth and brimstone who chop up Biblical passages to feed prosperity theologies and end–time prophecy. And who bludgeon the confused with decrees on personal behavior, sexual orientation, and the evils of science. Like the “hypocrite” teachers before them, they turn the kingdom of heaven in our faces—refusing to enter that realm themselves, while barring entrance to those who try to do so.¹³

Christ comes bringing both love and truth,¹⁴ but discerning the truth has never been easy. Jesus’s first followers failed rather dramatically. Instead of pouring his “new wine” into fresh bottles,¹⁵ they refused to give up their Old Testament belief system that the Father plays favorites: that the people of Israel were God’s chosen, and that they would soon be rewarded with an earthly kingdom ruled by Christ, the Son of David.¹⁶

Jesus didn’t buy into their narrative. He was all about breaking Israel’s religious traditions, not preserving them.¹⁷ Rather than toe the Mosaic line, he replaced the law of an “an eye for an eye” with turn the other cheek, and “honor thy father and mother” with honor only thy Father in heaven.¹⁸ He revealed the hypocrisy of sin-based laws and punishments.¹⁹ And most importantly, Jesus taught that God’s kingdom was no longer a future reward for the race of Abraham; but the divine birthright of all mankind, since the beginning of the world.²⁰ If we had the eyes to see and the faith to believe, Christ would reveal the kingdom of heaven that exists within us²¹ and around us, right now, at this very moment.²²

Jesus’s disciples found this hard to accept. Nothing could persuade them from…

The Lord’s Prayer. To continue reading, click on page 2 at the bottom.

1. I have told you all this so that my own joy may be yours, and that your joy may be complete. – John 15:11 [↩]
2. Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those who do the will of my Father who is in heaven. – Matthew 7:21 [↩]
3. From everyone to whom much has been given much will be expected, and to those whom much has been entrusted the more will be demanded. – Luke 12:48 [↩]
4. Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten bridesmaids who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. 2 Five of them were foolish, and five were prudent. 3 The foolish ones took their lamps, but took no oil with them; 4 While the prudent ones, besides taking their lamps, took oil in their jars. 5 As the bridegroom was late in coming, they all became drowsy, and slept. 6 But at midnight a shout was raised: ‘The Bridegroom is coming! Come out to meet him!’ 7 Then all the bridesmaids awoke and trimmed their lamps. 8 And the foolish said to the prudent: ‘Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.’ 9 But the prudent ones answered: ‘No, for fear that there will not be enough for you and for us. Go instead to those who sell it, and buy for yourselves.’10 But while they were on their way to buy it, the bridegroom came; and the bridesmaids who were ready went in with him to the banquet, and the door was shut. 11 Afterwards the other bridesmaids came. ‘Sir, Sir,’ they said, ‘open the door to us!’12 But the bridegroom answered ‘I tell you, I do not know you. – Matthew 25:1-12 [↩]
5. You, then, must become perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. – Matthew 5:48 [↩]
6. With men it is impossible, but not with God; for everything is possible with God. – Mark 10:27 [↩]
7. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. – Mark 12:29 [↩]
8. And Jesus grew in wisdom as he grew in years, and ‘gained the blessing of God and men. – Luke 2:52 [↩]
9. She came from the very ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon; and here is more than a Solomon! – Luke 11:31 [↩]
10. Why do not you decide for yourselves what is right? – Luke 12:57 [↩]
11. His winnowing-fan is in his hand, that he may clear his threshing-floor, and store the grain in his barn, but the chaff he will burn with inextinguishable fire. – Luke 3:17 [↩]
12. So the Pharisees and the teachers of the law asked Jesus this question: “How is it that your disciples do not follow the traditions of our ancestors, but eat their food with defiled hands?” 6 His answer was: “It was well said by Isaiah when he prophesied about you hypocrites in the words: ‘This is a people that honor me with their lips, While their hearts are far removed from me; 7 But vainly do they worship me, For they teach but the precepts of men.’ – Mark 7:5-7 [↩]
13. But woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, hypocrites that you are! You turn the key of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. For you do not go in yourselves, nor yet allow those who try to go in to do so. – Matthew 23:13 [↩]
14. And the Word became Man, and dwelt among us. We saw his glory—the glory of the only Son sent from the Father, full of love and truth. – John 1:14 [↩]
15. And no one puts new wine into old wine-skins; for, if you do, the new wine will burst the skins, and the wine itself will run out, and the skins be lost. 38 But new wine must be put into fresh skins they insisted on dumping it into the old casks of scripture. – Luke 5:37-39 [↩]
16. The crowds that led the way, as well as those that followed behind, kept shouting: “God save the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! God save him from on high! – Matthew 21:9 [↩]
17. Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus, and said: 2 “How is it that your disciples break the traditions of our ancestors? For they do not wash their hands when they eat food.” – Matthew 15:1-2 [↩]
18. If anyone comes to me and does not hate their father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brothers, and sisters, yes and his very life, they can be no disciple of mine. – Luke 14:26 [↩]
19. He that among you is without sin, let him cast the first stone at her. – John 8:4-9 [↩]
20. Come, you who are blessed by my Father, enter upon possession of the kingdom prepared for you ever since the beginning of the world. – Matthew 25:34 [↩]
21. Nor will people say ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There it is!’ for the kingdom of God is within you! – Luke 17:21 [↩]
22. Now is my kingdom, not from hence. – John 18:36 [↩]

Lord’s Prayer: Give Us This Day

Chapter 6

Give us this day…

(Gathering the Moment at Hand)

Up to this point in the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus has been laying a foundation—one that establishes our relationship to God and his creation. When we recite the beginning of the prayer, we are thus engaging in an act of grounding, reminding ourselves that at the core of our existence we remain rooted in Christ.¹

With the foundation complete, Jesus moves on to what many of us think is the business of prayer: asking for things. But as we mentioned in Chapter 2, prayer isn’t about asking for special favors. In fact, it isn’t even about “asking” at all—since, as Jesus says, God already knows what we need before we ask him.² So what is prayer about? The simplest answer is that it is about gathering and release.

When we think about gathering and Christ, the first image that comes to mind is probably the shepherd. Many of us see Jesus as the “Good Shepherd”³ gathering his lost flock back within the fold of his love. This image is popular because Jesus often used sheep and shepherds as metaphors when he taught. He described those who deliver the gospel of Christ as lambs among wolves,⁴ and those without Christ’s guidance as sheep without a shepherd.⁵ He also warned us of embracing false teachers who come in the guise of innocent sheep but have sinister hidden agendas.⁶

What we don’t usually think about when contemplating gathering is the story of the prodigal son. We talked earlier about how this parable reveals the will of God as a matter of choice. But when we turn our attention to the son, and view the story through his eyes, the parable reveals a different lesson—which is the wonderful thing about parables: like crystals, they reflect new light (insight) as we turn them.

When the young man seeks his inheritance from his father, he doesn’t plead for it. Instead, he speaks with authority: “Father, give me my share of the inheritance.” (A man had two sons; 12 And the younger of them said to his father: ‘Father, give me my share of the inheritance.’ So the father divided the property between them. – Luke 15:11-12)) We often overlook that fact. But it is an important one. Because it shows that the son is claiming ownership over something that he believes is rightfully his.

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus also speaks with “authority”,⁷ and says that when we speak in such a way, our Father will dutifully respond. In fact, he claims that God will grant us anything:⁸ that the dead will rise,⁹ and mountains move at our command, if we but have the faith of a mustard–seed¹⁰ and command it in his name.

This teaching has caused a lot of confusion over the years. Some Christians have taken it at face value and, because of that, acted irresponsibly—such as recklessly barring medical treatment to loved ones (believing that they could heal them through faith alone). Others have disregarded the whole moving mountains thing as just Jesus getting a little carried away with his metaphors. But if we reflect on the teaching a little longer, the true Word begins to emerge.

Let’s begin our reflections by recalling that…

The Lord’s Prayer. To continue reading, click on page 2 at the bottom.

1. By the seed which was sown on the good ground is meant the receivers who hear the message and understand it, yielding a return, sometimes one hundred, sometimes sixty, sometimes thirty fold. – Matthew 13:23 [↩]
2. When praying, do not repeat the same words over and over again, as is done by the Gentiles, who think that by using many words they will obtain a hearing. 8 Do not imitate them; for God, your Father, knows what you need before you ask him. – Matthew 6:7-8 [↩]
3. I am the good shepherd; and I know my sheep, and my sheep know me. – John 10:14 [↩]
4. Now, go. Remember, I am sending you out as my messengers like lambs among wolves. – Luke 10:3 [↩]
5. On getting out of the boat, Jesus saw a great crowd, and his heart was moved at the sight of them, because they were ‘like sheep without a shepherd’. – Mark 6:34 [↩]
6. Beware of false teachers: those who come to you in the guise of sheep, but at heart they are ravenous wolves. – Matthew 7:15 [↩]
7. On the next Sabbath, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach. 22 The people were amazed at his teaching, for he taught them like one who had authority, and not like the teachers of the law. – Mark 1:21-22 [↩]
8. Whatever you ask for in your prayers will, if you have faith, be granted you.” Matthew 21:22 [↩]
9. Even now, I know that God will grant you whatever you ask him.” 23 “Your brother shall rise to life,” said Jesus. – John 11:23 [↩]
10. “For, I tell you, if your faith were only like a mustard-seed, you could say to this mountain ‘Move from this place to that!’ and it would be moved; and nothing would be impossible to you. – Matthew 17:20 [↩]

Lord’s Prayer: Our Daily Bread

Chapter 7

Our daily bread…

(Gathering Our Inheritance)

Knowing that we can claim ownership of our inheritance in the living hour is one thing. But what are we supposed to do with that knowledge? The childhood keys of wonderment and immediacy help unlock the door to the kingdom of heaven, but they don’t have the power to usher us across the threshold. To cross into the kingdom and gather our inheritance, we have to move beyond the carefree world of the child and into the care-driven world of adults—to expand our concerns beyond the “me” to include the “us”.

We can begin by recognizing that although the spontaneity of the child and the adult are similar, they are not one and the same. Take for example the miracles that Jesus performs in the Gospels. If we can set aside the unanswerable question of whether or not these miracles actually occurred, we can begin to see the miracle stories as parables of spontaneity, ones which teach us that living in Christ means immediately responding to the needs of others. Whether it is healing the sick,¹ walking on water,² or turning water into wine,³ Jesus never hesitates but responds spontaneously and confidently to those who call out to him.

Spontaneous charity is taught also by the story of the Good Samaritan.⁴ In this well–known parable a man gets robbed and beaten while on a trip from Jerusalem to Jericho. A priest and a local man pass by him as he lies half–dead on the road. Finally a stranger from Samaria stops, tends to his wounds, and takes him to an inn to recuperate, paying the man’s bills—all without giving his actions a second thought.

The genuine caring shown by the Good Samaritan sheds light on Jesus’s enigmatic teaching: “When you do acts of charity, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your charity may be secret; and your Father, who sees what is in secret, will recompense you.”⁵ By performing our acts of charity spontaneously like the Samaritan, we keep them secret from our egos (that part of us which wants to debate whether we have the time, money, or energy to respond to others in need), and we allow our Christ consciousness to rise (that part of us which recognizes that when others suffer we suffer too). Our charity is thus driven by nothing except a true generosity of spirit.

Jesus encourages us to bring that same spirit to our acts of fellowship. The generosity of Christ is shown by welcoming all the members of our community to our table—the good and the bad, the funny and the dull, the smart and the annoying. Look at the way Jesus accepted twelve very flawed apostles as his intimates. That he took in Judas (knowing full well that he would betray him) and never gave up on the poor, clueless, and overzealous Peter should be a lesson to us all. Furthermore, we are told how Jesus regularly sat down to eat and drink with his neighbors,⁶ regardless of how “righteous” they might be or what other people thought—so much so that he was unfairly labeled a glutton and a wino.⁷

Never has Jesus’s gospel of fellowship and acceptance had more…

The Lord’s Prayer. To continue reading, click on page 2 at the bottom.

1. “Sir,” he said, “my servant is lying ill at my house with a stroke of paralysis, and is suffering terribly.” 7 “I will come and cure him,” answered Jesus. – Matthew 8:6–7 [↩]
2. When evening fell, the boat was out in the middle of the sea, and Jesus on the shore alone. 48 Seeing them laboring at the oars—for the wind was against them—about three hours after midnight Jesus came towards them, walking on the water, intending to join them. – Mark 6:47–48 [↩]
3. Jesus said to the servants: “Fill the water-jars with water;” 8 And, when they had filled them to the brim, he added: “Now take some out, and carry it to the master of the feast.” The servants did so. 9 And, when the master of the feast had tasted the water which had now become wine, not knowing where it had come from—although the servants who had taken out the water knew—10 He called the bridegroom and said to him: “Everyone puts good wine on the table first, and inferior wine afterwards, when his guests have drunk freely; but you have kept back the good wine till now!” – John 2:6–10 [↩]
4. A man was once going down from Jerusalem to Jericho when he fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him of everything, and beat him, and went away leaving him half dead. 31 As it chanced, a priest was going down by that road. He saw the man, but passed by on the opposite side. 32 A Levite, too, did the same; he came up to the spot, but, when he saw the man, passed by on the opposite side. 33 But a Samaritan, traveling that way, came upon the man, and, when he saw him, he was moved with compassion. 34 He went to him and bound up his wounds, dressing them with oil and wine, and then put him on his own mule, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out four shillings and gave them to the inn-keeper. ‘Take care of him,’ he said, ‘and whatever more you may spend I will myself repay you on my way back.’ – Luke 10: 30–35 [↩]
5. Matthew 6:3–4 [↩]
6. The Pharisees and the teachers of the law found fault. “This man always welcomes sinners, and takes meals with them!” they complained. – Luke 15:2 [↩]
7. And now that the Son of Man has come, eating and drinking, they are saying: ‘Here is a glutton and a wino, a friend of tax-gatherers and sinners!’ Matthew 11:19 [↩]

Lord’s Prayer: As We Forgive Those Who Trespass

Chapter 9

As we forgive those who

trespass against us…

(Removing Our Hindrances, Part II)

Removing the hindrances that block the coming of Christ involves more than just seeking forgiveness. It means giving forgiveness, too. And that can be pretty tough sometimes. As Christians we often think that unless punishments are meted out swiftly and severely our communities will turn into modern day Sodoms & Gomorrahs.

In America this fear fuels our continuation of the death penalty, world record incarceration rates, and overflowing court dockets. There is not a lot of forgiveness going around—to put it mildly. Christians know (or should know) that these actions run contrary to the teachings of Jesus and our faith. But we justify our behavior by revisiting Old Testament laws.

An “eye for an eye” makes so much better sense, because it is like a balancing of the ledger books. And it feels a lot better, too. Because it satisfies our desire for revenge. But playing tit for tat doesn’t balance our offenses before God. The book of life is not a ledger of rights vs. wrongs; it is a story of forgiveness and hope. And unless we forgive others, the forgiveness we ask of the Father will not be given.¹ For it has, in fact, never been heard.

To better explain this, let’s return to the parable of water. We already know that water follows the path of least resistance. It also has another defining characteristic: it seeks its own level. This means that when water flows into a container (be it a cup, lake, or pool) it rises to a height that is level all around. Likewise, the Holy Spirit seeks its own level within of us. And its height is largely determined by our ability to forgive others, just as God forgives us.²

When we refuse to grant forgiveness, the water of the Holy Spirit dries to dust—the same dust that Jesus writes in when the angry crowd seeks to stone the adulteress.³ The dust we shuffle through daily, when we demand that others pay for their offenses and failures to live up to our expectations.

In our anxiousness for retribution, we forget that ultimately every offender pays for the offense that matters most: trespassing against the Holy Spirit.⁴ And the payment levied by God is that person’s continued separation from his kingdom and a life more abundant.

We must remember that an individual’s spiritual journey is long and hard, and no journey is the same. When we lose patience and are quick to judge others, we should recall how “slow to learn”⁵ the apostles were. Yet slow to learn doesn’t mean can’t learn. Christ’s wisdom is a seed that grows differently in every person. Even God does not know how and when it will grow inside us.⁶ But grow it will if we have the faith to let the will of the Father run its course, and don’t act as hindrances in its way.

It might seem impossible to forgive someone who has wronged us “seventy times seven times”.⁷ Because it feels like we are letting the offender off the hook. But actually we are leaving ourselves of the hook; releasing ourselves from the anger, frustration, disappointment, and superiority that often accompany our judgments.

A few chapters ago, we mentioned that we can take…

The Lord’s Prayer. To continue reading, click on page 2 at the bottom.

1. Whenever you stand up to pray, forgive any grievance that you have against anyone, that your Father who is in heaven also may forgive you your trespasses. 26 But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses.” – Mark 11:25–26 [↩]
2. Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. – Luke 6:37 [↩]
3. They said to the Master: “This woman was taken in the very act of adultery. 5 Now, the law of Moses says that we must stone her. What do you say?” 6 They asked this to tempt Jesus, so that later they may have something to accuse him with. But Jesus only stooped down and with his finger wrote on the ground. 7 When they continued asking, he stood up and said: “He that among you is without sin, let him cast the first stone at her.” 8 And again he stopped down and wrote on the ground. 9 And those which heard it, being stricken by their own conscience, left one by one, beginning with the eldest unto the last. John 8:4–9 [↩]
4. I tell you that all will be forgiven every sin and slander; but slander against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. 32 Whoever speaks against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. – Matthew 12:31 [↩]
5. The disciples were utterly amazed, 52 For they had not understood about the loaves, their minds being slow to learn. – Mark 6:51-52 [↩]
6. This is what the kingdom of God is like: like a farmer who has scattered seed on the ground, 27 And then sleeps by night and rises by day, while the seed is shooting up and growing, he knows not how. Mark 4:26-27 [↩]
7. Peter came up, and said to Jesus: “Master, how often am I to forgive others when they wrong me? As many as seven times?” 22 But Jesus answered: “Not seven times, but ‘seventy times seven.’ – Matthew 18:21-22 [↩]

Lord’s Prayer: Lead Us Not Into Temptation

Chapter 10

And lead us not into

temptation…

(Overcoming Our Pride)

Having led us through forgiveness, the Lord’s Prayer turns to temptation. Jesus approaches the subject from a curious angle. He asks us to pray that the Father will not lead us into temptation. This inevitably causes us to ask: Why would an all–good God lead us to the devil’s doorstep? If we believe in the Lord, does he not reward that faith by leading us away from temptation?

Before answering those questions, we need to remember that we are partners with God in this life. Although he regularly grants us blessings in the form of our “daily bread,” how we use and respond to that bread is up to us. Every blessing and talent bestowed by the Holy Spirit carries with it the seeds of our salvation, and our ruin.

This lesson is taught through the story of Christ’s temptation in the wilderness. Jesus becomes “full of the Holy Spirit”¹ before it leads him to his sit–down with the devil (a confrontation the Spirit will arrange on our behalf, too, since we must follow in Jesus’s footsteps).² But why does the great tempter appear when we are full of the Holy Spirit and its glory? The popular cry among Christians is for God to save us from temptation because our spirit is weak. The whole sequence of events sounds strange.

We often don’t pray when we feel strong in spirit, because we don’t even recognize the risk—which makes these moments all the more dangerous. But Jesus warns us of the threat we face when he says that many who are first shall be last³ and that the rich man will find it easier to pass through the eye of a needle than the gates of heaven.⁴

The danger is the sin of pride. And it is a temptation that Jesus overcame not only in the wilderness, when he refuses to be tempted by the devil into proving himself to be a Son of God or accepting rule over an earthly kingdom,⁵ but in every village he went to during his short ministry.

That Jesus battles the devil and the sin of pride all the way up to his death is something we often don’t notice. We tend to think that he conquers Satan in the wilderness and that’s the end of it. But in the Book of Luke we are told that the devil, having emptied his bag of tricks, only slips away to wait for his next opportunity.⁶ Knowing that Satan remains with him but in hiding, Jesus goes about his business in ways to reduce those opportunities for the devil to appear and tempt him into pride.

Worried that Jerusalem will replace the gospel of Christ with…

The Lord’s Prayer. To continue reading, click on page 2 at the bottom.

1. On returning from the Jordan, full of the Holy Spirit, Jesus was led by the power of the Spirit through the wilderness for forty days, tempted by the devil. – Luke 4:1 [↩]
2. Calling the people and his disciples to him, Jesus said: “If anyone wishes to walk in my steps, let them renounce self, take up their cross, and follow me. – Matthew 16:24 [↩]
3. Everyone who has left houses, or brothers, or sisters, or fathers, or mothers, or children, or land, on account of my name, will receive many times as much, and will ‘gain Immortal Life.’ 30 But many who are first now will then be last, and those who are last will be first. – Matthew 19:30 [↩]
4. Jesus said again: “My children, how hard a thing it is to enter the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to get through a eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” – Mark 10:25 [↩]
5. Jesus was led up into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted by the devil. 2 And, after he had fasted for forty days and forty nights, he became hungry. 3 And the tempter came to him, and said: “If you are God’s Son, tell these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4 But Jesus answered: “Scripture says: ‘It is not on bread alone that we are to live, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and placing him on the parapet of the temple, said to him: 6 “If you are God’s Son, throw yourself down, for scripture says: ‘He will give his angels commands about thee, And on their hands they will bear thee up, lest ever thou should strike thy foot against a stone.’” 7 “Scripture also says,” answered Jesus, “Thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God.’” 8 The third time, the devil took Jesus to a very high mountain, and showing him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor, said to him: 9 “All these I will give you, if you will fall at my feet and pay homage to me.” 10 Then Jesus said to him: “Begone, Satan! For scripture says: ‘Thou shall pay homage to the Lord thy God and worship him only.’” 11 Then the devil left him alone, and angels came and ministered to him. – Matthew 4:1–11 [↩]
6. When he had tried every kind of temptation, the devil left Jesus, till another opportunity. – Luke 4:13 [↩]

Follow Your Bliss?

Thanks to Bill Moyer’s excellent 1988 documentary of Joseph Campbell, called The Power of Myth (likely available at your local library), the scholar Campbell became a myth-guru famous for his dictum that we should “follow our bliss”:

If you do follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while waiting for you, and the life you ought to be living is the one you are living. When you can see that, you begin to meet people who are in the field of your bliss, and they open the doors to you.

On the surface this sounds like good advice. Indeed, many people have adopted Campbell’s words as their life philosophy–but often not with satisfying results. The reason is that “following your bliss” can at times be a selfish and ego-driven pursuit. If we amble down our bliss path, like Johnny Appleseed on morphine, we are more likely to plant the seeds of our own destruction than reap a generous harvest.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan’s famous phrase “irrational exuberance” is just another term for bliss gone awry. Before the stock market crash, one imagines that the Wall Street boys and girls were following their bliss all the way over the economy’s precipice, as they drug the rest of the country behind them hoping that this would break their fall.

If we are going to take Joseph’s Campbell’s words to heart, we have to add “heart” to them. We have to temper our bliss with a clear eyed sense of right and wrong, one that is driven by a love for our neighbors, colleagues, and friends. Or as the spiritual mentor of Carlos Castaneda put it:

For me there is only the traveling on paths that have heart, on any path that may have heart, and the only worthwhile challenge is to traverse its full length–and there I travel looking, looking breathlessly.

It is this less-traveled path, the heart road, that Jesus asks us to take when he says that we should carry our own crosses and follow him.¹

——

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

To read about writer Isabelle Eberhardt, freedom, independence, an bravery, please go to: The Test of Freedom.

1. And those who do not take up their cross and follow in my steps are not worthy of me. Matt 10:38 [↩]

M. Scott Peck’s Road Less Traveled – Life is Difficult

The late M. Scott Peck begins his wildly successful bestseller The Road Less Traveled with the following pronouncement: Life is difficult. This is the great truth, one of the greatest truths–it is a great truth because once we see this truth, we transcend it. Peck’s train of thought finds its lineage in the Buddha’s 4 Noble Truths, the first of which is: all life is suffering.

Although Jesus and Buddha share much common ground, on this issue they diverge. Jesus’s gospel does not teach that “life is difficult” but rather “we MAKE life difficult” both for ourselves and others. Jesus praises God for revealing his Kingdom to the childlike¹ (or babes, depending on the Gospel writer) because young children are unique among us in not making life difficult for themselves; instead they approach each day with a sense or wonder, joy, and curiosity.

It is only after our egos lead us to believe that we’ve become wise and learned that life turns difficult; that we feel compelled to argue, meddle, and over-rationalize; that we begin to look for hidden agendas under every stone; that we wring our hands over the past and fret over the future; that we preach instead of listen; that we forget that we are all Sons and Daughters of God living out the wonderful drama of creation. It is only after we realize THIS great truth that we can truly begin to transcend our current circumstances, realize the Christ in our lives, and take the road less traveled.

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To read about Miguel de Unamuno and how a life of solitude feeds a life of society and fellowship, please go to: Solitude & Society

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. “I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that, though thou has hidden these things from the wise and learned, thou has revealed them to the childlike! Yes, Father, I thank thee that this has seemed good to thee.” Luke 10:21 [↩]

Call for Manuscripts: SBNR & Thai Language

LivingHour.org is currently issuing a call for manuscripts. We will consider SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) books that involve Progressive Christianity, Buddhism, Taoism, or Islam. For a manuscript to be seriously considered it must be in keeping with the perspective of the material that you see posted on LivingHour.org—so do spend some time reading the website to make sure your submission is appropriate. We appreciate works that are both literary and accessible, books where the author exhibits a sense of humor about themselves and the world around them.

We are also accepting submissions of learn Thai language books that are original and can offer students of the Thai language something which they cannot get from other books.

Do to the amount of submissions we expect to receive, please do not expect a detailed critique of your manuscript. But we will let you know our decision usually within 2-3 weeks after receiving your submission.

Please note that our publishing program for authors is for e-books and POD books. Accepting publication with LivingHour.org means that we will edit your manuscript, prepare it for e-book and print publication, and distribute it online via Smashwords, CreateSpace, Amazon.com, and Barnes & Noble. We also will promote the book via our website, which receives thousands of visitors every month, and other online venues. In return, we keep 40% of the revenue that we receive from our distributors. The author receives 60% of this revenue as their royalty payment. There are no upfront costs for the author required.

For Thai language books wished to be purchased by expats in Thailand, we will print these locally and ship them from our Isaan office.

Submission Guidelines

Please send us a sample chapter, along with a well written cover letter that details who you are, who you see as the audience of your book, what aspects of your book make it original and compelling, and what you will do personally to help promote the book. Submissions should be made to: living [at] livinghour (dot) org.

Lastly, please do not get discouraged if we reject your manuscript. We are a small publisher and can only accept a few manuscripts each year that most closely match the mission of LivingHour.org.

Common Decency

In Albert Camus’ novel The Plague, there is a curious character named Tarrou who organizes the volunteer sanitary teams in the city of Oran, a town afflicted by the bubonic plague. He also assists the lead doctor in his rounds helping patients. Tarrou does this for no other reason he says than his code of morals, which he defines as “common decency“.

A little bit later in the book, though, he mentions to the doctor that he is driven by the desire to become a saint. The doctor is shocked by this pronouncement and replies, “But you don’t believe in God.”

To which Tarrou replies, “Exactly! Can one be a saint without God?”

No answer is explicitly provided by Camus or his characters, but on finishing the novel the reader has the feeling that indeed one can become a saint without God. But how can this be if we hold to the belief that God and sainthood are inextricably linked? The idea that an atheist can become a saint will sound absurd to many Catholics and Christians.

The answer lies in a saying that the renowned psychologist Carl Jung had engraved above the front door of his home and on his tombstone: Vocatus atque non vocatus deus aderit. These Latin words are derived from the oracle of Delphi and translate to, “Invoked or not invoked, God is present.” Or what we might paraphrase enigmatically as, “With or without God, the Christ is present.”

Progressive Christians would be wise to take this message to heart, spending less time looking back toward scripture or forward towards heaven, and spending more time looking directly at ourselves and our neighbors, working with our daily bread in a spirit of righteousness (aka common decency) as we joyfully seek the Kingdom at hand.¹

If we do that everything else will be added to us and fall into place, including the recognition that God has been with us all along, providing us with what we’ve needed to grow, whether we’ve asked for it or not.

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To read about William Blake, poetry, and the power (or lack thereof) of words, please go to: Heaven in a Wildflower.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. “All these are the things for which the nations are seeking, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But first seek his kingdom and the righteousness that he requires, and then all these things shall be added for you. Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own anxieties. Every day has trouble enough of its own.” – Matt 6:32-34 [↩]

The Scientist & Jesus: Sharing the Devout Temper

William James once remarked that while scientists often possess no religious creed, their temper is devout. In other words, most scientists are deeply awed by the majesty of the universe. Thus they approach their work in a way that is earnest, patient, and humble before the face of the world’s grand complexity–regardless of whether or not they possess a religious faith.

These days it often seems that only the scientist retains a devout temper. A coarsening of discourse and temperament has invaded not only our popular media and politics, but our workplaces and even, at times, our churches–with preachers letting their egos get the better of them and using the power of the pulpit not to guide parishioners toward the Christ within, but to transform themselves into what Mark Twain might have called the braying ass.

If humankind is indeed a microcosm of the universe, we need to begin approaching our friends, neighbors, colleagues, and family with a devout temperament equal (if not surpassing) that which the scientist shows his work–recognizing that there is a grand complexity at work within each and every one of us, and that it is our calling to assist and be a part of the smooth working of that system–to grease the wheels, as it were, and not throw wrenches into the gears. Today we have become more or less a society of wrench throwers, and we are paying the price in our economy, or families, and our communities.

Jesus said that the most important commandment was to love the Lord thy God with all our hearts and minds¹ because this is an act which creates a devout temperament; and a devout temper is the first step toward making his Father’s Kingdom Come.

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To read about Jack Kerouac and what Beat means please go to: God is Pooh Bear.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. “Teacher, what is the great commandment in the law?” 37 His answer was: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” 38 This is the great first commandment. – Matt 22:36-38 [↩]

On the Road with Jack Kerouac – God is Pooh Bear

Towards the very end of Jack Kerouac’s classic novel On the Road, he writes several memorable lines, which he read famously on The Steve Allen Show in 1956. One passage is as follows:

“In Iowa I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars’ll be out, and don’t you know that God is Pooh-Bear?…

The comment that God is Pooh-Bear has caused a lot of confusion over the years, with many people claiming that Kerouac thinks that God is a fiction. But to believe that Jack Kerouac felt that God was a figment of our imaginations is to terribly misread him. The so called “King of the Beats” felt God intensely, within each and every hobo, wino, and hard-luck soul he met.

Kerouac defined being “beat” as being reduced to the essentials. But what does that really mean? And why was Kerouac so attracted to people who were beat? Those who have read Benjamin Hoff’s Tao of Pooh probably have an intimation of the answer. In Hoff’s book we learn how Winnie the Pooh is symbolic of the sage who lives in the immediate moment.

When we are reduced to the essentials (beat) we have no choice but to live inside the immediate moment, and thus are close to God, as is revealed by Jesus’s parables of spontaneity. Close to God, though, does not translate to Being with God. For that to occur we must let charity, patience, and love drive our actions rather than the demands of the ego.

We must throw ourselves into the spontaneity of Christ (our true selves), as so often Pooh does in service to his friends and neighbors, without ever giving it a second thought.

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Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

To read about William Butler Yeats and Christ’s Second Coming please go to: Jesus’s Second Coming.

Nothing New Under the Sun

In the world of Progressive Christianity and the SBNR (in its various forms), there seems to be a growing belief that we are on the cusp of a new age of spiritual enlightenment. This has engendered an enthusiasm much like in the 1960s, when the “spiritual but not religious” of that time thought they were ushering in the Age of Aquarius–a time when peace, love, and understanding would reign. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.

The hippies of the 60s and early 70s quickly became the yuppies and capitalists of the 80s and 90s. All that talk about letting the sunshine in was well just talk. Many who grew up during that generation simply chalked it up to youthful idealism. While others grew bitter that the generation which held such promise turned slowly into a Generation of Swine. Such is the way of the world. And the way it has always been. Every generation likes to think itself as special. And in many ways every generation is special, with unique experiences to celebrate and unusual challenges to overcome. But we ought to leave it that.

Think globally, Act locally is an ecological dictum. It doesn’t translate into spiritual affairs–which demand that we act locally and think locally. In other words, the big picture will work out on its own if we simply endeavor, like Gandhi said, to become the change we want to see in the world. This “becoming” though is a lifelong process. It is not a pinnacle that we reach which then allows us to go conquer the world as missionaries or become spiritual gurus for the public at large. To nurture the idea that we are igniting some grand church revolution or world awakening is little more than self-aggrandizement–which is why such transformations never actually take place.

So the next time we find ourselves becoming enchanted with ideas of ushering in a bright new spiritual epoch, let’s turn to the wisdom of Ecclesiastes:

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.

Or in the words of David Byrne & The Talking Heads

Same as it ever was…same as it ever was…
same as it ever was…same as it ever was…
same as it ever was…same as it EVER was…

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Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

Praising Contradictions – Progressive Christian Writers

There is one thing that many scientists and orthodox Christians share: that is, a dislike of contradictions. That an electron can appear as either a particle or a wave is as disturbing to the scientist, as the mystical phrase You are God and not God is to the evangelical Baptist. Literal Bible readers take extraordinary flights of fancy to erase the many contradictions of the Good Book, or simply ignore them altogether. Even among Progressive Christian writers, contradictions are usually avoided while they try to build a logical edifice on which to hang their theological hats.

But there is no inherent shame in contradictions. Contradictions are not always antithetical to logic and reason, but often arise from the very nature of human reality, a direct result of the limits of human language and individual perception. This is the reason why neither Jesus nor Buddha wrote down their teachings.

It is the tension of opposites (between good and evil, particle and wave, heaven and earth) that gives rise to the Spirit of Truth. It is through paradox’s window that we view the unity and diversity of Life.

George Orwell once said that “to accept an unorthodoxy is always to inherit unresolved contradictions”. That is the inheritance of Progressive Christianity, and one which we must embrace wholeheartedly. A contradiction need not be a sign of weakness but one of strength.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes. — Walt Whitman

In the end, we just might see that there weren’t any contradictions after all: only apparent contradictions.

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If you would like to read about why Progressive Christians do what they do, please go to: Why Progressive Christianity?

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

Jesus Laughing

The Dalai Lama of Tibet is said to have an extraordinary laugh, one that rises frequently and joyfully from deep within his body. This is something we don’t attribute to Jesus much: laughter. We get so caught up with Jesus’s end game and the “man of sorrows” image that we lose sight of how much fun he must have been to be around.

After all, Jesus certainly wouldn’t have been welcomed to the dinner table of so many sinners and outcasts had he been a bore¹. He kept telling his disciples to “be of good cheer,” and he wasn’t the kind of teacher to be all talk. Jesus must have been full of cheer himself, with a spontaneous sense of humor and a hearty laugh.

When we laugh we leave ego and pride at the doorstep; we forget and forgive ourselves, as well as the trespasses of others. We move closer to Christ and the kingdom of heaven at hand. Eternity is a mere moment, said the writer Hermann Hesse, just long enough for a joke.

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Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

To read about whether or not God is Winnie the Pooh, go to: God is Pooh Bear

1. Now that the Son of Man has come, eating and drinking, they are saying: “Here is a glutton and a wino, a friend of tax-gatherers and sinners!” And yet wisdom is vindicated by her actions – Mat 11:19 [↩]

If You Meet Jesus On The Road, Kill Him

A famous old piece of Zen wisdom says: “If you meet Buddha on the road, kill him.” There are a couple of reasons why we are called to take Buddha out. The most commonly cited reason is that the prophet in the road is not really Buddha at all, but a figment of our imaginations–a psychological projection of the person we want Buddha to be. To approach the real Buddha we have to eliminate (kill) these projections.

The other reason for killing Buddha in the road is that by doing so we drop our last crutch and begin walking our spiritual path with full freedom and independence. In other words, we kill Buddha in the road to attain Buddha-hood ourselves. By killing Buddha we honor Buddha and ironically give him life.

This teaching actually finds great resonance in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. In the Gospel narratives, the disciples insist on seeing Jesus of Nazareth only through the prism of their own psychological projections, expecting him to assume the crown of an earthly king,¹ all the while refusing to truly honor Jesus by accepting the kingdom of heaven within, where Christ reigns eternally.

So, today, let the Progressive Christian be the Zen Christian: If you meet Jesus on the road, kill him.

Where you want this killin’ done? God said, “Out on Highway 61.”
- Bob Dylan

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Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

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1. On the following day great numbers of people who had come to the festival, hearing that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem, took palm-branches, And went out to meet him, shouting as they went: “God save Him! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord: the King of Israel!” John 12:12-13 [↩]

The American Character

One of our relatively forgotten Founding Fathers is James Wilson, a signatory of The Declaration of Independence, a member of the Continental Congress, and among the first six Supreme Court justices chosen by President George Washington. One the most prominent lawyers of his time, Wilson is often credited as being the most learned of the Framers of the Constitution.

James Wilson was also someone who fretted over the youth of America and strongly advocated teaching young children the principles of liberty, freedom, and justice which inspired the American Revolution. Wilson takes on the teacher’s role in the following passage (from Of the Study of the Law in the United States), where we find him touching on the topic of the American character and how both the law and religion can degenerate into ridiculousness when in the hands of their “injudicious friends” who today many would say have become the majority.

Were I called upon for my reasons why I deem so highly of the American character, I would assign them in a very few words–that is, that the American character has been eminently distinguished by the love of liberty, and the love of law. The science of law should, in some measure, and in some degree, be the study of every free citizen, and of every free person. Every free citizen and every free person has duties to perform and rights to claim. Unless, in some measure, and in some degree, you know those duties and those rights, you can never act a just and an independent part.

Happily, the general and most important principles of law are not removed to a very great distance from common apprehension. It has been said of religion that though the elephant may swim in it, the lamb may wade there too. Concerning law, the same observation may be made. The home navigation, carried on along the shores, is more necessary, and more useful too, than that which is pursued through the deep and expanded ocean.

You have heard much concerning the forms of process, and proceedings, and pleadings. Much has been written in praise, and much has been written in ridicule, of this part of law learning. It has certainly been abused: in some hands, it has become, and daily does become ridiculous. And what is there that has been exempted from a similar fate! Religion herself, elegant and simple as she is, assumes yet an awkward and ridiculous appearance when dressed in the tawdry or tattered robes put upon her by the false taste of her injudicious friends.¹

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Read the next article in our series on the Founding Fathers: Ethan Allen on God, Reason, Prayer, & Religion.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. The above quote by James Wilson has been lightly edited for brevity and ease of reading. [↩]

Thomas Jefferson on Jesus, Religion & Reason

This week in our special series on the Founding Fathers, we return to Thomas Jefferson, who likely wrote more on the subjects of God, Christianity, and Religion than any of the other Americans we attribute “founding father” status. Indeed Jefferson went so far as to famously write The Jefferson Bible, or The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, in an attempt to clear up many of the misconceptions he felt surrounded the Nazarene and were being promulgated by the Church. As such, Thomas Jefferson might genuinely be considered the Father of SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) Progressive Christianity in America.

The following passage is not taken from The Jefferson Bible, but rather a letter written to a young man named Peter Carr, studying in Paris. In this letter (dated Aug. 10, 1787) Jefferson offers his advice on Carr’s ongoing education, and in the excerpt below, on the subjects of religion, reason, and the person known as Jesus of Nazareth.

Religion. Your reason is now mature enough to examine this object. First thing, rid yourself of all bias that favors novelty and singularity of opinion. Indulge them in any other subject except that of religion. It is too important, and the consequences of error may be too serious. On the other hand, shake off all the fears and servile prejudices under which weak minds are submissively crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve of a homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.

You will naturally want to examine first the religion of your own country. Read the old testament bible then, as you would read the books of the great philosophers. The facts which are within the ordinary course of nature you will believe on the authority of the writer, as you would with the writers of other great works. The testimony of the writer weighs in their favor when the laws of nature do not contradict them. But those facts in the bible which contradict the laws of nature must be examined with more care, and under a variety of perspectives.

You will next want to read the new testament. It is the history of a personage called Jesus. Keep in your eye the pretensions of those who say he was begotten by God, born of a virgin, suspended and reversed the laws of nature at will, and ascended bodily into heaven: and of those who say he was a man of illegitimate birth, of a benevolent heart, enthusiastic mind, who set out without pretensions to divinity, ended up believing them, and was punished capitally for sedition by being crucified according to the Roman law.

Regarding books that discuss these matters, keep your reason firmly on the watch when reading them all. Do not be frightened from your inquiry by any fear of it’s consequences. If it ends in a belief that there is no God, you will still find incitements to virtue and the love of others. If you find reason to believe there is a God, a consciousness that you are acting under his eye, and that he approves you, will be a vast additional incitement; for if there be a future state, the hope of a happy existence in that increases the appetite to deserve it. And if it turns out that you believe Jesus was also a God, you will be comforted by a belief in his aid and love.

But I repeat that you must lay aside all prejudice on both sides, and neither believe nor reject anything because any other people or institutions have rejected or believed it. Your own reason is the only oracle given you by heaven, and you are answerable not for the rightness but uprightness of your decisions.¹

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Read the next article in our series on the Founding Fathers: John Adams, Knowledge, & The Character of Literary Men.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

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1. The above passage by Jefferson was slightly edited to make it easier to read by the modern reader [↩]

Patrick Henry & The Great Christian Divide

Any series on the Founding Fathers and Christianity would be remiss without addressing the topic of slavery. For us today it seems amazing that such enlightened men, who demanded liberty and freedom for themselves, couldn’t see the hypocrisy in keeping slaves. But many of the Founding Fathers did clearly see the evil of the slave trade and bore no illusions as to themselves being masters over another race.

For some perspective on this matter, we turn to Patrick Henry, the former governor of Virginia, who is famously remembered for his “Give me Liberty, or give me Death!” speech, which was a call to arms against the oppressive British government. The following passage from Patrick Henry is taken from a letter to a friend who had sent him a book condemning the slave trade. What is especially poignant in this commentary (for the modern reader) is Henry’s observation of the great divide that exists between what Christians know is wrong in their heads, and what they actually reject as wrong in real life. It is great chasm that still exists today, even among Progressive Christians.

I take this opportunity to acknowledge the receipt of Anthony Benezet’s book against the slave trade. I thank you for it. It is not a little surprising that the professors of Christianity, whose chief excellence consists in softening the human heart, and in cherishing and improving its finer feelings, should encourage a practice so totally repugnant to the first impressions of right and wrong.

What adds to the wonder is that this abominable practice has been introduced in the most enlightened ages. Times that seem to have pretensions to boast of high improvements in the arts and sciences, and refined morality have brought into general use, and guarded by many laws, a species of violence and tyranny, which our more rude and barbarous, but more honest ancestors detested.

Is it not amazing that at a time when the rights of humanity are defined and understood with precision in a country, above all others, fond of liberty, that in such an age and in such a country, we find men professing a religion the most humane, mild, gentle and generous, adopting a principle as repugnant to humanity, as it is inconsistent with the bible, and destructive to liberty? Every thinking, honest person rejects slavery in theory, yet how few in reject it in real life from conscientious motives!¹

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Read the next article in our series on the Founding Fathers: Thomas Jefferson on Jesus, Religion, & Reason.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. The above passage from Patrick Henry was edited lightly to make it easier to read by the modern reader. [↩]

The Founding Fathers On Christianity, God, & Religion

Many of the Founding Fathers of the United States could be best described as SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) Progressive Christians. We at The Living Hour often look back to them for inspiration, for they were leaders who possessed a solid sense of reason that was backed by an understanding of the divine nature of creation and their place in it. As such, they strongly demonstrated all the characteristics of the truly progressive Christian.

Therefore for the next month, our SBNR Motivational series will be featuring passages from Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, John Adams, and other early Americans, on the subjects of Christianity, God, and Religion. To get the ball rolling, let’s begin with the following passage from Thomas Jefferson, taken from a letter to Moses Robinson, the governor of the Vermont Republic who helped usher Vermont to statehood.

In this passage we find Jefferson commenting on the Christian clergy, the Church, and the State, comments which still are very relevant today. Jefferson’s hope that “good sense” will prevail among orthodox Christians is unfortunately still waiting to be realized:

The Eastern States will be the last to come over, because of the dominion of the clergy, who had got a smell of union between Church and State, and began to indulge in reveries that can never be realized in the age of science. If, indeed, they could have prevailed on us to view all the advances in science as dangerous innovations, and to look back to the opinions and practices of our forefathers, instead of looking forward, for improvement, a promising groundwork would have been laid.

But I have hopes that their good sense will show them that since the mountain will not come to them, they had better go to the mountain: that they will find it in their interest to acquiesce to the liberty and science of their country, and that the Christian religion, when divested of the rags in which they have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity of its benevolent institutor, is a religion most friendly to liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind.

I sincerely wish with you, we could see our government so secured as to depend less on the character of the person in whose hands it is trusted. Bad men will sometimes get in, and with such an immense patronage, may make great progress in corrupting the public mind and principles. This is a subject with which wisdom and patriotism should be occupied.¹

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Read the next in the series: Benjamin Franklin’s Religion & Jesus of Nazareth.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. Some very small edits were made to above passage to make the reading easier for the contemporary reader [↩]

The Moral Effort

In our last motivational, we quoted the progressive Christian Leo Tolstoy as saying that we all can wake up to a real, happy, and peaceful life, as it exists in our consciences (God’s Kingdom within), if we just make the moral effort. That was easy for him to say. While Tolstoy might have inspired Martin Luther King and Gandhi with such words, few of us think we are capable of the moral effort of a Gandhi or MLK. Can’t we all just slide into Heaven by just accepting Jesus Christ as our savior?

Well, that would be nice. But as we talk about in The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life, Jesus never preached that kind lesson. He told us that we must carry our own crosses¹ and seek to become as perfect as God in Heaven². This, unfortunately, requires a little moral effort on our part.

But we don’t have to get all intimidated by the situation. Moral effort is a lot like will power in that once we break it down, and see it just as a small series of individual choices (the things we choose to do and not to do each day), it becomes a whole lot easier to master. The issue here is not becoming a saint, but summoning the moral courage to make one right choice at this one moment in time. As they say, a thousand mile journey begins with a single step.

Moral effort is also made easier when we begin to reduce the clutter–in other words, removing all those things that are often nothing more than background noise to the soundtrack of our lives. This is especially true today, when computers, iPhones, and Blackberries serve up an endless stream of chatter to fill the empty spaces of our minutes and hours, but do little to bring clarity to our moral efforts: to those progressive Christian efforts which require both solitude and reflection, as well as the silence to ask the question, :In what way is what I am about do or say going to benefit others?”

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Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. Calling the people and his disciples to him, Jesus said: “If anyone wishes to walk in my steps, let them renounce self, take up their cross, and follow me. Mark -8:34 [↩]
2. “You, then, must become perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” – Matthew 5:48 [↩]

Immortality & The Evolution of Christianity & Religion

Continuing with our theme of cultural evolution and the long arc of the moral universe, we turn to the subject of the evolution of Christianity, Religion, and Christian thought. For insight we go to another progressive figure who long has been forgotten by many: British historian Henry Thomas Buckle, who arguably was the first scientific analyzer of social evolution. Like the Unitarian minister Theodore Parker, Buckle is an individual who Progressive Christianity can look toward in re-discovering its heritage.

The following passage on immortality comes from The Essays of Henry Thomas Buckle circa 1863 (unlikely to be found at your local library, unfortunately). Here the SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) Buckle talks not just of immortality but the necessary evolution of religion and religious creeds.

One thing I would repeat, because I honestly believe it to be of the deepest importance. Most earnestly would I again urge upon those who cherish the doctrine of immortality, not to defend it by arguments which have a basis smaller than the doctrine itself. I long to see the glorious tenet rescued for the jurisdiction of the narrow and sectarian theology, which foolishly ascribing to a single religion the possession of all truth, proclaims other religions to be false, and debases the most magnificent topics by contracting them with the horizon of its own little vision.

Every creed which has existed long, and has played a great part in our history, contains a large amount of truth, or else it would not have retained its hold upon the human mind. To suppose, however, that any one of them contains the whole truth is to suppose that as soon as a creed was enunciated the limits of inspiration were reached, and the power of inspiration exhausted.

For such a supposition we have no warrant. On the contrary, the history of mankind, if compared in long periods, shows a very slow, but still a clearly marked, improvement in the character of successive creeds; so that if we reason from the analogy of the past, we have a right to hope that the improvement will continue, and that subsequent religious creeds will surpass ours.

Using the word religion in its ordinary sense, we find that religious opinions depend on an immense variety of circumstances which are constantly shifting. Hence it is that whatever rests merely upon these opinions has in it something transient and mutable. Those of us who take a distant and comprehensive view are thus filled with dismay when we see a doctrine like the immortality of the soul defended on such transient grounds.

These advocates imperil their own cause; they make the fundamental depend on the casual; they support what is permanent by what is ephemeral; and with their books, their dogmas, their traditions, their rituals, their records, and their other perishable contrivances, they seek to prove what was known to the world before it existed, and what, if these transient things were to die away, would still be known, and would remain the common heritage of the human species, and the consolation of myriads yet unborn.*

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*A few small edits were made to Buckle’s text to make it more easily read and understood by contemporary readers.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

The Progressive Christian: A Working Definition

Readers of LivingHour.org have noticed that we cast a pretty wide net when talking about Progressive Christianity and the works of Progressive Christians. In our online bookstore, our motivational series, and our video picks we include people who’ve never identified themselves as Christians, much less Progressive Christians. Indeed we’ve even included atheists, like Albert Camus, among our sources of Progressive Christian inspiration.

Although our definition of a Progressive Christian may seem a little loose, it is by no means vague. At The Living Hour we see the writers, scientists, philosophers, and preachers that we’ve placed inside the Progressive Christianity circle as all possessing certain defining characteristics–all of which find a voice in the life story of Jesus of Nazareth. These characteristics are:

1) A Progressive Christian questions established thought and refuses to accept blindly the status quo.
2) A Progressive Christian uses their vocation to push the world a little further in a positive direction.
3) A Progressive Christian approaches their work with both joy and a devout temper.
4) A Progressive Christian demonstrates great intellectual curiosity and a generosity of spirit.
5) A Progress Christian shows genuine concern and compassion for humanity.
6) A Progressive Christian follows the truth wherever it may lead.
7) A Progressive Christian is fearlessly honest.

Ultimately a Progressive Christian need not identify themselves as a Progressive Christian to be one or to fall within the circle of Progressive Christianity. For as Jesus once said, there are many folds of people¹ and one doesn’t need to follow Jesus and his disciples directly to do the work of Christ.²

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1. “I have other sheep besides, which do not belong to this fold.” – John 10:16 [↩]
2. “Sir, we saw a man driving out demons by using your name, and we tried to prevent him, because he does not follow you with us.” “None of you must prevent him,” Jesus said to John; “he who is not against us is for us.” – Luke:9-49-50 [↩]

Progressive Christianity & SBNR Bookstore

Press Release (6.13.09) The LivingHour.org has announced the addition of an SBNR & Progressive Christian Bookstore to its online activities. The new online bookstore for spiritual progressives is in association with Amazon.com, and will include fiction, poetry and non-fiction on various subjects. “We are looking to include in our booklist more than just the usual suspects read by Progressive Christians and the SBNR,” says Pastor David, director of The Living Hour.

“Spiritual life in the 21st century should encompass everything: science, history, philosophy, pop culture, literature, etc., and (as Gandhi once said) we should all keep learning about these things as if we expected to live forever,” explains Pastor David.

The first listing of books for Progressive Christians and the SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) include Jacques Barzun’s fascinating history survey From Dawn to Decadence; psychologist Carl Jung’s seminal work on the unconscious, The Undiscovered Self; theologian Paul Tillich’s classic call to vocation, The Courage to Be; Michael Talbot’s explosive unification of science and spirituality, The Holographic Universe; and Brenda Ueland’s If You Want to Write, a book on art, independence, and living joyfully.

According to Pastor David, all of the books are chosen with the aim to help readers better understand the world and our place in it. In addition, every selection has been read by LivingHour.org and was picked not just for its brilliance but for its clear, crisp, and entertaining writing style. All are highly accessible and will challenge readers’ perceptions in fesh and exciting ways. New books will be added weekly.

Video picks are also included at the bookstore, including cult director Hal Hartley’s Book of Life (a comic retelling of the apocalypse, where Jesus arrives at JFK airport), and Eliseo Subiela’s provocative Spanish film Man Facing Southeast (Hombre Mirando al Sudeste), about an enigmatic patient at a mental institution, who may or may not be from this world.

Also available from LivingHour.org is the website’s free e-book The Lord’s Prayer For Daily Life, with New Century Gospels, which provides new insight into Jesus’s beloved prayer, as well as his parables and teachings.

To view The Living Hour’s online bookstore please click the following link: SBNR & Progressive Christianity Bookstore.

The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing

The wolf in sheep’s clothing is a favorite metaphor of the conservative Christian establishment in the United States. For centuries now they’ve used it whenever confronted by folks driven by compassion, love, and everything Jesus encapsulates so perfectly in The Lord’s Prayer, but who don’t subscribe to their own world view. It’s no wonder then that the wolves in sheeps’ clothing warning is trotted out increasingly by the Christian right these days, as Progressive Christianity secures a stronger foothold in American society.

All of this talk about wolves can be traced back to the Gospel of Matthew (7:15-16), where Jesus says, “Beware of false teachers: those who come to you in the guise of sheep, but at heart they are ravenous wolves. By the fruit of their lives you will know them.” Jesus also gives us another clue to discern who these wolves might be. A few lines later in Matthew, he says, “Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those who do the will of my Father who is in heaven.”

That is the line which truly speaks volumes. There is an old saying that claims the Devil’s greatest trick was convincing the world he doesn’t exist. But that was not it. The Devil’s greatest, most intelligent, trick is when he convinces Christians that they are benign sheep, when in their hearts they are the ravenous wolves, “winning souls for Jesus” by whatever means it takes, while manipulating the Gospel of Christ to suit their purpose–which is not to serve the will of our Father in Heaven (as they convince themselves), but the ego driven desire to be in the winner’s circle. It is to these individuals that Jesus offers the warning: there are many who [think] they are first who’ll end up last.¹

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The Living Hour’s SBNR motivational series combines history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion to help bring about new perspectives on Progressive Christianity and spirituality. Sign up by entering your email address into the “Opening the Small Gate” box in the right corner of this web page.

1. “I choose to give to this last man the same as to you. 15 Have not I the right to do as I choose with what is mine? Are you envious because I am liberal? 16 So those who are last will be first, and the first last.” – Matthew 20:15-16 [↩]

Jesus, Graham Greene, & Ways of Escape

The Catholic writer Graham Greene famously summed up his life as a search for “Ways of Escape.” He said that his abundant writing and travels were simply a means to escape the panic fear, madness, and melancholia of contemporary life. Green’s life summation goes a long way in helping to explain some events found in the canonical Gospels of Jesus the Christ.

It often strikes the objective reader as odd that the future disciples drop everything on a dime when the stranger named Jesus comes walking along and says “follow me.”¹ But is it really that strange? As Thoreau said, the majority of us do live lives of quiet desperation, and thus are seeking ways of escape.

Yet few of us have the intestinal fortitude of Graham Greene–the courage to fashion an escape route on our own. But if we have the opportunity to follow someone else, someone who can lead us, then the decision to break away becomes much easier. Strength in numbers, as they say. That is why cult leaders are so successful.

Jesus wasn’t a cult leader, though, no matter how much his disciples wished him to be one.² Jesus sought to give his followers the strength to escape the chains that bound them, but once the break was clean, he wanted them to walk their own path.

Jesus Christ calls us all to be strong. Not strong for him, but rather our true selves, for the Christ in us.

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The Living Hour’s SBNR motivational series combines history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion to help bring about new perspectives on Progressive Christianity and spirituality. Sign up by entering your email address into the “Opening the Small Gate” box in the right corner of this web page.

1. As Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers–Simon, also known as Peter, and his brother Andrew–casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. “Come and follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will make you fishers of men.” The two men left their nets at once and followed him. – Matthew 4:18-20 [↩]
2. On the following day great numbers of people who had come to the festival, hearing that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem, took palm-branches, 13 And went out to meet him, shouting as they went: “God save Him! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord: the King of Israel!” – John 12:12-13 [↩]

Your Personal Legend?

In our SBNR motivational about William Blake and seeing Heaven in a Wildflower, we talked about the transcendent personality of Jesus Christ and how that should be one of our goals as Progressive Christians (or as Sons and Daughters of God, regardless of our religious persuasion).

Some readers have interpreted this motivational to imply that we advocate the building of personal legends ala Paulo Coelho. Nothing could be further from our intent. Legends are by their very nature simplistic but fanciful variations of the genuine life–which is littered with multiple twists and turns, failures and triumphs, and punctuated by long bouts with the mundane.

Legends are often built on the idea of the mythological hero, who follows a straightforward path of separation, initiation, and return. That is, we (as heroes) leave our homes and/or comfortable surroundings (separation) to confront new, mysterious, and life-altering experiences (initiation), which ultimately lead us back again to our community (return) as a kind of savior or spiritual gift giver.

If only life worked out in such a tidy fashion. But it doesn’t, and never has. For centuries we’ve been building personal legends around prophets and artistic geniuses, forgetting that it was not they who built their legends but us. How much better for the suffering artist legend of Van Gogh to have him cut off his own ear and give it to a prostitute than tell the more likely story that it was cut of by his friend (and fellow painter) Paul Gauguin because Vincent attacked him.

To truly build a personal legend we have to give up all ideas of a personal legend, and simply live, laugh, and love. That is how we build the transcendent personality of Christ. To the victors (survivors) go the spoils, as well as the legends they create about their predecessors.

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The Living Hour’s motivational series combines history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion to help bring about new perspectives for Progressive Christianity and anyone who seeks a better understanding of “God” and life’s purpose. Sign up to have these progressive Motivationals delivered to your e-mail box three times a week.

Why Progressive Christianity?

In the latest e-bulletin from The Center for Progressive Christianity, President Fred Plumer includes some letters sent by readers. One writer says that the members of his liberal community have “long ago opted out of the Christian cultural-linguistic game altogether and have become either Epicurean Gourmands, Secular Humanists, Process New Thought, Global Mystics, Unitarian Universalists, or else they define themselves as Unaffiliated Life-Long Learners and Spiritual Seekers who have turned from organized religion to an integral cultural creative lifestyle that synthesizes an interest in spirituality, philosophy, literature, history, arts, science, psychology, sociology, economics, politics, cosmology and ecology.”

He finishes off his letter by asking, “Do Progressive Christians really believe that secular and spiritual but not religious social liberals are going to be drawn back to ‘Christianity’ by holding radically immanent theological assumptions and progressive social views that secular folks already hold, but without any need or desire to identify these assumptions and values as distinctly or uniquely ‘Christian?’ If so, I can only say, Really?”

To the letter writer, our answer at The Living Hour is yes, we think they will. Not all of them. And not right away. But down the road those of us working within Progressive Christianity think it will happen because while all those belief systems are fine which your community members have embraced, they lack the archetypal power of the Christian religion. Christianity is filled with an abundance of iconography, rituals, and mythology that can fulfill the spiritual life of people in a way that Secular Humanism and other philosophies find hard to match.

It is thus the work of Progression Christian leaders and churches to refashion and reinterpret these rituals, symbols, and stories so that they can find a welcome home in the modern, educated, and multi-cultural mind. In addition, it is the “organized” function of Progressive Christian Churches not to organize theology (as it was in the past) but to provide an organizational base to strengthen the fabric of local communities, a place where citizens can partake in fellowship and coordinate good works for those in need. It would be a mistake to underestimate the great power of these religious aspects in helping us transform our lives, or the great yearning we have as human beings for them–regardless of whether we all acknowledge it.

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If you would like to read about a childhood prayer to replace “Now I lay me down to sleep…” please go to: The Lord’s Prayer for Kids.

Please sign up for The Living Hour’s free Progressive Christianity series. This SBNR Motivational series combines history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion to help bring about new perspectives for Progressive Christians and anyone who seeks a better understanding of “God” and life’s purpose. Sign up in the right corner of this web page to have these progressive Motivationals delivered to your e-mail box three times a week.

SBNR News: Ian Lawton Launches SBNR.org

In Progressive Christianity news, the website SBNR.org was launched in April in Grand Haven, Michigan. The new organization aims to serve the world-wide population of people that describe themselves as spiritual but not religious (SBNR). It is estimated that in the United States alone over fifty million people are SBNR. The company was founded by Ian Lawton, an independent spiritual teacher and the former Vicar of St. Matthew in the City (Auckland, New Zealand). Today he leads an emerging group of Progressive Christians at Christ Community Church (C3) in West Michigan, which has a sizeable population of church alumni.

SBNR.org offers spiritual services to individuals that find little or no connection with traditional religion. “As humanity evolves so too should the way we experience spirituality,” explains Ian Lawton. “Living impassioned, ethical and spiritual lives outside of organized religion is part of this evolution. It’s not surprising that spiritual people seek to be affirmed outside of the dogmatic traditions. Our purpose is to promote wonder and the rapture of truly being alive.”

SBNR.org provides written, audio and video content using the most recent technological advances. Daily affirmations, weekly sermons, spiritual articles and other content are delivered for free via the Internet and email. Recently the company launched Today’s SBNR Affirmation, a website that delivers short spiritual but not religious (SBNR) affirmations Monday through Friday. “Our purpose is to promote wonder and the rapture of truly being alive,” says Ian Lawton. “These short affirmations are designed to remind the SBNR community that the Divine is accessible in all the ordinary moments of our day.”

The company expects to launch its SBNR Facebook presence in May. Over one hundred million people log onto Facebook each day. Ian Lawton believes Facebook is a great place for spiritual people to interact and affirm their experience of God. “Wherever people meet they can celebrate the Divine. Meeting on Facebook is just as good as meeting in church,” proclaims Lawton.

Income for the company is provided solely from monthly contributions made by the community. “Our business model is simple,” says CEO Steve Frazee, “We focus on serving the SBNR community and in return we ask the community to affirm us by providing monthly contributions. It is a beautiful symbiotic relationship.”

The Living Hour welcomes SBNR.org and Ian Lawton to the online community of spiritual progressives and wishes them all the best in their work.

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Please sign up for The Living Hour’s free SBNR Motivational series. This Spiritual but Not Religious series combines history, literature, philosophy, psychology, and religion to help bring about new perspectives for Progressive Christians and anyone who seeks a better understanding of “God” and life’s purpose. Sign up in the right corner of this web page to have these SBNR Motivationals delivered to your e-mail box three times a week.

The Caduceus & God’s Longissima Via

How do I find God? If God does exist, what path should I take to his doorstep? What road less traveled should I shimmy down? We can look for answers in the Bible, the Gnostic Gospels, the Koran, the Tao Te Ching, and other religious texts. Or we can look toward symbols to discover the nature of God, our divinity, and life on earth.

One ancient symbol that is rich with meaning is the caduceus. The caduceus is a staff entwined by two serpents in the form of a double helix–a form which today often refers to the structure of DNA. In Greek mythology, the caduceus was wielded by Isis, the messenger of the Gods. It was Isis who linked the Gods to humanity, traveling like the wind between the Kingdoms of the heavens and earth.

Sans the snakes, the caduceus bears resemblance to the Christian cross, the staff being intersected at the top by wings. But what are we to make of the snakes? Weaving up the staff, they ultimately end up face to face with each other. This in fact is a wonderful representation of our longissima via, our journey toward God, which is not straight like but serpentine–full of detours and set backs as we struggle to find and grasp our divinity and its meaning.

When we finally let go of the struggle, of the desire to find and take hold of God, we unexpectedly come face to face with the Christ that has been traveling with us all along, and thus find our wings.

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Please subscribe to The Living Hour’s free Daily SBNR Motivationals by entering your email address box in the right corner of this web page. This Progressive Christianity series combines literature, religion, and the arts, and is written for all who seek a richer life.

Common Sense Christianity

The old saying “there is nothing common about common sense” has never rung so true as it does today. We live in a course and relativist age where the noble drive for fairness and balance has been misdirected toward conflating opinions with facts, and where common sense lies buried beneath a rubble of truthiness. That being the case, it might be a good idea to return to the writer of Common Sense, Thomas Paine, for a little refresher on reasonable thinking.

Wrongly accused of atheism by the orthodox Christians of his time (and, later on, a strident Teddy Roosevelt), Thomas Paine is among the many American figures who form the bedrock upon which current Progressive Christianity has its house. With regards to an afterlife, Paine held the reasonable position that we can hope for happiness after this life but shouldn’t presume to guess what lies in store for us:

I consider myself in the hands of my Creator and that He will dispose of me after this life consistent with His justice and goodness. I leave all these matters to Him, as my Creator and friend and I hold it presumptuous to make an article of faith as to what the Creator will do with us hereafter.

It was by leaving the afterlife to God, and the dead to bury their dead¹, that Thomas Paine was able to follow Christ, carrying the kingdom of God within himself, to fulfill the living hour of his time.

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To get more Common Sense Christianity posts delivered direct to your email box, please sign up for The Living Hour’s Daily SBNR Motivationals by putting your email address into the box on the right corner of this page. For an example of a common sense Progressive Christian metaphor, please go to: And the moon rose over an open field.

1. To another man Jesus said: “Follow me.” “Let me first go and bury my father,” said the man. But Jesus said: “Leave the dead to bury their dead; but go yourself and carry far and wide the gospel of the kingdom of God.” – Luke 9:59-60 [↩]

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