The Pharisee valued fasting and giving tithes, but could not find value in his fellow sinner.
God is not a tool in our hands. He does not exist to serve our goals, our metrics, or our platforms.
The gospel isn’t for the strong but people who know they aren’t.

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We can’t all afford to travel the world, but the more we read from outside our own context, the bigger we see the world.
Sometimes, the bible bores me. Sometimes, I take scripture, grace, and Jesus lightly.
Original sin produces violent fruit.
Our righteousness and the righteousness of our neighbor have nothing to do with what we eat or do not eat.
According to the Law, everyone will be judged by their own deeds, on his own work. So, before the judgment of God we only have our own works to boast in and not our neighbor’s. But the Gospel shows us a wonderful exception.
The following is an excerpt from “Crucifying Religion” written by Donavon Riley (1517 Publishing, 2019).
Our past, present, and future receive healing from Jesus’ wounds.
It was during one of these garbage burns, however, that I was bathed in a fresh remembrance of grace.
I’d like to offer a short reflection on the theme of “worldliness” as it appears in his later work and how that’s connected to an item of his Lutheran heritage: the theology of the cross.
[This text] describes a journey to a foreign region where Jesus engages in a confrontational conversation with a legion of demons, performs a violent and scandalous exorcism, and leaves behind a community gripped by terror. Apparently, the only thing more frightening than a naked, graveyard-dwelling demoniac is this visitor from Nazareth who reigns over everything.
Baptism demolishes all boasting, for it is passively received and all that is received is pure gift. No one can, therefore, boast a better salvation than another.
Perhaps best known for his “wager,” Pascal is often associated with this curious argument for the existence of God and eternal blessedness.