Another Thanksgiving holiday has come and gone. It’s back to work now. December is upon us. The Christmas holiday will be here soon (that’s a good thing). Sometimes it seems like we move so fast these days. I thought it would be good to take another look at Thanksgiving! Here’s an article by a colleague
You really gotta check out this video:
(If the video above won’t play, click here to view it on YouTube).
That was Mary Margaret of Corinth Baptist Church telling the story of Jonah from the Bible. In her conclusion (at 8:05 in the video) in her words, God says, “My love is great.” “And it is for all my creatures.”
I read something in a newspaper recently that got me to thinking about the Bible’s place in society. Of course it is found in Christian churches. It certainly is found in my Christian Science church. And I teach from it in my Christian Science Sunday School. It is found in the homes of Christians. I have numerous copies in my home, most of them a bit worn. Sometimes it is found in the classroom, but only under certain conditions. I remember taking classes on the Bible in college, studying the Old Testament and then the New Testament. These classes primarily looked at the Bible from a literary and historical perspective.
These, of course, are geographical places. And these days the Bible is found in different forms. My favorite is my black leather Bible. I also have the Bible on my computer with additional translations, commentaries and Greek and Hebrew dictionaries for more in-depth study. The Bible is available on cassette and CD. Some have a Pod-cast version. These are the physical forms and places in which the Bible is found.
But thinking a bit more broadly, where does the Bible find its place in the heart?
“It is the information at the core of religion where Believers and Non-Believers still have room to grow.” This was the conclusion drawn by Byron Pitts in his report on The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric on Tuesday, September 28, 2010 covering the survey on religious knowledge in the U.S. conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. With today’s news cycles, that seems like long ago, but Byron’s conclusion caught my attention.
As a Christian Scientist I am a Christian and I strive to follow Jesus’ teaching to love one another. So, a question I have to ask myself is, “do I love enough to gain a basic understanding of the core beliefs that are important to my neighbors?” While we will all likely have areas where we need to agree to disagree, it seems to me that we would all be better off if we had a better understanding of one another’s core beliefs. I took the test that was given as part of this survey, and while I did quite well, I did not get 100% correct. So I must admit that I still have room to grow.
Welcome to my blog. I was thinking this morning about what my life would be like if I could actually be kind and loving every single moment of the day. Wow! This seems hard sometimes, but it’s certainly something to work towards. For me, Christian Science is very relevant today because, among other things like