I was invited recently to participate in the 30 Seconds or Less project of presenting every book of the Bible for Lent. In thirty seconds.
That wasn’t at all intimidating! I was to try to distill the ancient wisdom of the book of Proverbs down to thirty seconds. Or less. Fortunately I was also given a chance to state what I thought the “Good News” of Proverbs was, also in thirty seconds.
Here are my attempts, with text and video. Enjoy!
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What one piece of advice would you offer to a newborn infant? That was the question that kicked off our conversation at Pub Theology Holland last night. After a few quips like: “Go back!” and “A newborn infant wouldn’t be capable of understanding advice,” we decided to stretch it out to a child somewhere between 5 and 8 years old.
Then some real wisdom began to come out around the table. Here are a few of the gems that were shared: Continue Reading..
Along those lines, I read this great piece from the spiritual teacher and mystic Anthony de Mello today. It seems a fitting thing to share today, a tribute to Dr. King’s vision and work. He writes in his book Awareness:
“For instance, I’m an Indian. Now, let’s suppose that I’m a prisoner of war in Pakistan, and they say to me, “Well, today we’re going to take you to the frontier, and you’re going to take a look at your country.” So they bring me to the frontier, and I look across the border, and I think, “Oh, my country, my beautiful country. I see villages and trees and hills. This is my own, my native land!” After a while one of the guards says, “Excuse me, we’ve made a mistake here. We have to move up another ten miles.” What was I reacting to? Nothing. I kept focusing on a word, India. But trees are not India; trees are trees. In fact, there are no frontiers or boundaries. They were put there by the human mind; generally by stupid, avaricious politicians. My country was one country once upon a time; it’s four now. If we don’t watch out it might be six. Then we’ll have six flags, six armies. That’s why you’ll never catch me saluting a flag. I abhor all national flags because they are idols. What are we saluting? I salute humanity, not a flag with an army around it.”
Amen. May we all rise above the narrow confines of our varied nationalistic concerns so that we care equally for the broader concerns of all humanity. Until then, per Dr. King, perhaps we aren’t really living.