He Kept Reaching
The leper wasn’t the only one. Again and again Jesus crossed the line the law drew around the unclean — the leper, the bleeding woman, the dead — and every time, it was the uncleanness that gave way, not him.
-
-
A Bridge Language
Words are only one of the languages we speak. A look at symbolism as the bridge between words and reality — and at one symbol, death, sounding the same note at every level, from a garden to the Holy of Holies.
-
Why Isn’t It Called the Tree of Death?
Why is it called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil — and not, simply, the tree of death? Two trees at the center of the garden, and their names don’t match the way you’d expect.
-
We Weren’t There
Strip the familiarity off a baptism and it’s a strange thing to do to someone — laid all the way back until the water closes over the face, held under, then lifted out. A staged death, with a rising on the end of it. And the claim underneath it is stranger still: that it’s his death, and we’re joined into it — even those of us who weren’t there.
-
Why Seven Feasts, but Three Seasons?
Seven feasts. But God specifically names three feast times — three seasons that group the seven. Why the distinction? One verse in James makes the grouping visible, and it changes how the whole calendar reads.
