Author Archives: salooper57

Unknown's avatar

About salooper57

Husband, father, pastor, follower. I am a disciple of Jesus, learning how to do life from him. I read, write, walk, play a little guitar, enjoy my family.

Tomorrow may be too late

In all the class pictures that my mother kept and stored, from kindergarten on, I can find the same towheaded boy. His name was David. He was my sometimes friend and sometimes adversary. David was in nearly every class I … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Faith, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A difficult truth to face

Many years ago, an acquaintance approached me and said, “Hey, I hear you’re having a baby!” And I said something like, “That’s good to know. I hadn’t heard that.” Now having children is really good news. I have three and … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Faith, In the News, Lifestyle, Spiritual life, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Questions at the heart of the gospel

In the four Gospel accounts of the life and death of Jesus, no one ever used the word “resurrection” to describe Jesus’s return from death, neither the ancient writers nor the people whose words and actions they reported. This surprised … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Faith, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Don’t shrink-wrap the truth

I suspect that if any of the “new atheists” were to describe to me the God they don’t believe in, I would congratulate them for not believing and explain that I don’t believe in that God either. The God they … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Faith, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Who gets to say what is right and what is wrong?

Who gets to say what is right and what is wrong? Is there such a thing? And if there is, on what basis can anyone claim the moral authority to judge it? Those questions underlie a recent and very public … Continue reading →

Posted in In the News, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Fascinating: the role of emotions in human life

Would Captain Kirk skip out on Mr. Spock’s funeral? Not on your life. So when William Shatner, who played Kirk in the Star Trek franchise’s television show and movies, missed Spock actor Leonard Nimoy’s funeral, people were outraged. No, Kirk … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Lifestyle, Spiritual life | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

One place even God will not go

In “Burnt Norton,” the first poem in T. S. Eliot’s celebrated Four Quartets, the renowned poet writes, “…human kind cannot bear very much reality.” Eliot seems to have been thinking specifically of the deep-seated reluctance to face the end to … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, Faith, Spiritual life, Theology | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

The boot is now on the other foot

During the 1990s, a person couldn’t turn around without bumping into the word “tolerance.” Tolerance was everywhere: tolerance for people’s sexual orientation, tolerance for people’s religious beliefs (or lack thereof), and tolerance for people’s choices regarding career and family, to … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, In the News, Lifestyle, Marriage and Family | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Whoever exalts himself will be humbled

NBC anchor Brian Williams stopped reporting the news and became the news after several soldiers contradicted his sensational account of a 2003 trip to Iraq in which, he says, the helicopter he was in was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. … Continue reading →

Posted in Christianity, In the News | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

The power of love, the power of marriage

Too often people get married with a demolition permit in their back pockets, and for some reason it doesn’t dawn on them that their children will be in the home when it comes crashing down. It was never meant to … Continue reading →

Posted in Faith, Lifestyle, Marriage and Family | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment