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Leaning Into a Life of Never-Arriving
In my journey of faith, if I’m honest, I’ve always wanted to get somewhere. As a teenager, I thought I had God figured out. Sure, I could continue to grow in my understanding of God but all the major puzzle pieces were in place and no tectonic shifts were going to take place. That felt […]
Maybe Certainty Makes Jesus Angry & Other Inspirational Thoughts
If I ever posted inspirational quotes on social media, which I don’t because it would ruin my sarcastic win streak I have going on Facebook, I know which one I would post first. It’s a paragraph from Jack Caputo’s book What Would Jesus Deconstruct? that has inspired me ever since I read it when it came […]
Judaism and the Jesus Movement Were Both Solving an Old Testament Problem
Hear me out. One way (not the only way, but one way—hold your horses) of describing the Old Testament is as a story of striving for national identity. Yeah, that sounds “secular,” but it’s not. We’re in the ancient world here, folks, and there is no secular vs. sacred dichotomy when it comes to nationalism. […]
The Bible, Wisdom, and Our Sacred Responsibility
[The following is adapted from the conclusion of How the Bible Actually Works.] Christians and Jews have always been “reimagining” God—adapting the sacred past of their tradition to discern God’s presence here and now. That process of adapting the past is also baked directly into the Christian Bible itself, Old and New Testaments. The biblical […]
The Idolatry of the Oscars
When I was an impressionable youth I had an adult compare the Oscar statue to the idols of old, those stone figures that the Israelites foolishly worshipped instead of the true God. And so, for as long as I remember, Hollywood and Christian were mutually exclusive. Fortunately for me, unfortunately for my parents, my thirst […]
The Bible’s True Purpose Is to Make You Feel Good About Yourself (JK)
From where I stand, the Bible’s true purpose is more than supplying spiritual information to be downloaded. It holds out for us an invitation to join an ancient, well-traveled, and sacred quest to know God, the world we live in, and our place in it. Not abstractly, but intimately and experientially. A quest—meaning this is […]
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This week on The Bible for Normal People, we have Austin Channing Brown as our guest. She shares about her experience growing up in various churches, her love for the black church, and shows us what we can learn from black churches – especially when it comes to preaching the Bible. www.thebiblefornormalpeople.comwww.peteenns.comwww.patreon.com/thebiblefornormalpeople
The Thing That Changed How I Read the Bible
