God

“Sleeping Alone”: for all those hurting in their singleness…

/ Paul Burkhart / 5 Comments

My good (online) friend Lore Ferguson (for whose site I recently guest-posted) just had an old post of her’s published on the site The High Calling. It’s called “Sleeping Alone” and it’s some of her meditations on the sustaining life of God in her singleness.

And wow, is it amazing. It’s raw, honest, unflinching, and gracious. Read it right now and then come back here. Here’s an excerpt:

Singleness is a beautiful thing and when I take account of the past decade I see a faithfulness to its beauty in my life in a way that only comes from grace, but I also see a succession of tiny funerals every step of the way. A cemetery full of them. Adventures I have had alone. Mornings I have woken alone. Moments I have reveled in alone. Each one bringing joy in its experience and mourning in its completion.

Life is meant to be shared and marriage is not the only way to share life, I know this, but the mystery of two flesh becoming one is a mingling that cannot be known by me, with my bed all to myself, 400 thread count sheets, open window, and quiet morning. And I mourn this.

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MUST-READ: “Why I Will Not Divorce the Bible” by Jared Byas

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

My fellow former-Westminsterian (and co-author of a book I plugged a few weeks ago), Jared Byas, just posted an incredible blog post on his blog, Seeking the Good & Claiming it for the Kingdom. The post is called “Why I Will Not Divorce the Bible” and he articulates in such clear prose and winsome graciousness many of the thoughts and perspectives I have when engaging the Bible and then turning to engage the world around me.

Byas writes about how Evangelicals and theological “progressives” both end up devaluing the Bible and not truly respecting it or being “married” to it. He does a great job of exposing the reductionism of both sides as they use various techniques to keep the Bible at arm’s length so they don’t really have to deal with it as it is. (I’ve written similarly before.)
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Pentecost is Coming: on Law & Spirit (p.s. Easter is forever.)

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On the night of Passover, a lamb was killed so that God’s people would live. Fifty days later, God offered his law to his people–a picture of who he was, a mark of who his people would be, and the equipping of his people for the purposes God had for them.

And that’s the New Testament version.

Easter officially comes to an end this Sunday. Then comes Pentecost, the season in which we celebrate the Holy Spirit falling on the apostles, fifty days after Jesus’ death (hence the name Penta-cost). This day is celebrated as the “birthday” of the Church. Jesus had told the disciples to go out into the world ministering this Gospel to the world, but first, to wait. What would be so important as to put the brakes on the mission of God in the world?

The Holy Spirit.
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Compline: Now I Lay me Down to Sleep (for grown-ups)

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

I’ve taken to doing Compline devotions before I go to sleep. In the Church tradition of praying the hours of the day, “Compline” is the word used to describe that twilight space at the completion of the day, between evening and morning. Prayers and devotions for Compline are usually meant to be done right before a person (or couple) goes to sleep (perhaps even done in bed–that’s where I do them).

These devotions have helped mitigate that tendency in myself (which I’ve written about before) to try and ignore the voices of both God and contemplation within my heart as I end my day. These beautiful prayers give me a space that forced me speak to and with God and cry for mercy.
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The Early Church: not so big on grace, so why are we so obsessed?

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments


As promised, today Lore Ferguson, over at Sayable posted my second guest post on her blog, as she is on a sabbatical. My first post went up yesterday. Originally, Lore had asked me to write a post on grace. Ironically, this was the first post I wrote for her (almost an anti-grace article–even thought it’s really not). Anyway, I hope you enjoy it. Leave comments and, like I said yesterday, follow her blog. You won’t regret it. Here’s a preview of today’s post:

I grew up in a pretty stereotypical Evangelical setting, which led to a pretty stereotypical back-and-forth between guilt and self-righteousness. That is, until I heard the Gospel of radical Grace.

Many of us have this same story, where it has been so healing to hear that how God relates to us is not, in fact, based on our performance. Instead, everything necessary for God to be pleased with us has been accomplished on our behalf by his Son.

And so, in response to this, we fall in love with God’s Grace. We pray for it, long for it, and cry for it. We read books about it, write about it, and blog about it (I even did a five-part series on it myself). We try and speak it into others’ lives while trying to figure out why we don’t apply it to our own. We joyfully build our relationship with God on the glorious foundation of His Grace. It is fundamental, primary, and essential.

In short: we love Grace.

Imagine my surprise, then, as I fell in love with liturgy and forms of worship that were centuries-old, to begin noticing the utter lack of “grace” from the prayers and worship of the earliest saints.

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Christianity as Sin Management?

/ Paul Burkhart / 4 Comments

Anyone that follows this site regularly has probably noticed I’ve been taking it easy on the blogging this week. As my want to blog slowly began turning into a need, I knew I had to take a step back and approach it a little more leisurely.

This past week, our Executive Pastor preached a great sermon on the “I am the Vine, you are the branches”/”Abiding with Christ” section of John, and it really re-enlivened my taste-buds for time spent with Jesus. I knew I had to reassess my priorities. My near-daily blog writing was only possible because I was sacrificing sleep to do it (as I’ve done before), which in turn made it all the more difficult to wake up in the morning and do anything resembling communing with Christ.

And so, this week, I have been able to get up more easily, make my coffee, pour some cereal and do some devotional time.
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Thoreau on the Eternal God, made Present [QUOTE]

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‎In eternity there is indeed something true and sublime. But all these times and places and occasions are now and here. God himself culminates in the present moment, and will never be more divine in the lapse of all the ages. And we are enabled to apprehend at all what is sublime and noble only by the perpetual instilling and drenching of the reality that surrounds us…The poet or the artist never yet had so fair and noble a design but some of his posterity at least could accomplish it.

—Henry David Thoreau, Walden (via Austin Ricketts, who’s contributed to this blog before. My thoughts on this topic here.)

Yep. Still Easter. (and you’re already Resurrected)

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, it’s still Easter. Yesterday was only the fourth Sunday of Easter (out of seven).

We’re only half-way through Easter!

The fundamental thing happening at the Resurrection was this: God was ushering in the first part of what would be called the “New Creation”. We usually think of something being “resurrected” as being “brought back”, but what Jesus did was far more than simply moving the clock backwards and rising again. In a sense, he was instead  “brought forward.

As my pastor loves to say, “Jesus is God’s future in our present”. Or, as Eugene Peterson put it in The Message translation, Jesus is “leading the resurrection parade” for the rest of us (I’ve always loved that image).

But how do we personally relate to this Resurrection/New Creation now? When I think of “Resurrection” and “New Creation”, what usually comes to my mind is Jesus, the World being glorified, institutions being made just, a bunch of future stuff that I’ll participate in, and my role in ushering in New Creation; I don’t so much think about my participating in it right now in the present.
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a note on Grace from a friend (I miss you, Michael Spencer)

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

Two years ago (almost to the day), a dear friend of mine passed away. Michael Spencer (or, the “Internet Monk” as he was more widely known) encouraged me for years with his blog writing critiquing the wider church with both wisdom and bite (the site is being continued by one of his good friends and avid readers). He died of cancer, and in that death, the Church lost a great man. His one published book, Mere Churchianity, was published several months later. It’s a great summary of his life and thought. I highly encourage anyone to get it.

While he was still living, I wrote on this site about how he influenced and affected me. I also wrote this piece for Patrol Magazine after he died (I still remember the tears blurring my vision as I typed that up).

Anyway, another dear blogging friend, Lore Ferguson, is going on sabbatical from her own amazing blog and asked me to write a guest post on–of all topics–grace. I told a couple of my friends this the other night, and one of them said, “Wow! That’s you favorite topic!” It certainly doesn’t feel that way.

As I was thinking through that, I was reminded of the best thing I’ve ever read on grace, and I wanted to share it with you all. It’s an essay by Michael Spencer. I cried through this piece as well (a lot of crying in this post. Hmm…). It was the inspiration for the sermon I delivered at my church’s prison ministry that later was turned into a five-part series on this blog called “Holy Week & the Scandal of Grace“.

I want to give you the link to the article, an extended quote, and then the end of his piece that I adapted as a benediction at the end of the sermon. Enjoy. And grab some coffee. And some tissues.

Link: Our Problem with Grace: Sweat. Hand-wringing. “Yes, but…”
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Going Medieval on my Atheist Self (on art & assurance)

/ Paul Burkhart / 16 Comments

Even back in my hyper-Calvinist days–assured that I was chosen, secure, and Elected unto salvation–I recognized the reality that if I were not a Christian, I’d certainly be an Atheist. If there was some way that I could be convinced that Christianity was a fraud (and here are some ways), I would not face any temptation to be a Buddhist or New Age mystic or anything of the like. No, No. I would be a hardened, militant Atheist.

How do I know this? Well, Christianity has the idea that within each believer is the “Old Self” and the “New Self”. This Old Self is, essentially, who we are apart from God.

That Old Self, though we fight it our entire Christian lives, won’t actually be fully snuffed out until the end of all things. And so, in a sense, if we’re sensitive to it, we can sometimes “feel” that “without-God” version of ourselves rolling around in there somewhere in our hearts.
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The Children’s Bible: my favorite devotional [casual fri]

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

Okay, once again, I find myself in what many past saints have referred to as a “spiritual dry season”. I can’t count how many times on this blog I’ve bemoaned being here. And honestly, this is because I think I’ve spent more of my Christian life in these times than out. It’s kind of the norm. Don’t worry, I’m finally getting help.

As is the case with most people experiencing times like this, one of the first casualties is any personal Bible reading. I get to that place where I just don’t want to read the Bible–or, more precisely, I want to, but I just don’t have the spiritual strength to do it (anyone who’s been a Christian for any length of time probably knows what I mean).

But there’s one tool that God has given me that he consistently uses to draw me back to himself. I found myself picking it up again this past week and wanted to to share it all with you.
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Philly’s Outdoor Feeding Ban: Good for the City, the Church, & the Gospel (i)

/ Paul Burkhart / 5 Comments

Update: the second (and final) part of this article is up, where we discuss some ways to look at this theologically.

Just over a month ago, Mayor Michael Nutter of Philadelphia announced a controversial plan to ban the outdoor feeding of homeless individuals in the city parks and on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, home to many of this city’s finest museums, including the soon-to-open (and just as controversial) Barnes Foundation.

This has been met with the expected and understandable anger and protest from many of the city’s hunger-based non-profits and faith-based homeless ministries that participate in these outdoor feedings (the ban is still in process and has not been enforced yet). Some leading homeless advocates support it.

Many of these religious groups understandably feel like this move is an over-reach of cold, heartless government, trying to keep the church from doing its God-given call to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. Many have felt like this is an imposition on the religious freedom of the Christians of Philadelphia.

I would like to, as humbly as possible, disagree.

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{saturday} | prayer & readings for Easter Week (2012)

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For Easter Week: reading sched/reflections + Easter Mixtape + Holy Day poetry.
{More on the why and how of Lent/Easter here.}

prayer.

We thank you, heavenly Father, that you have delivered us from the dominion of sin and death and brought us into the kingdom of your Son; and we pray that, as by his death he has recalled us to life, so by his love he may raise us to eternal joys; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
(from the liberti Lent & Easter 2012 prayerbook & the Book of Common Prayer)

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{friday} | prayer & readings for Easter Week (2012)

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

For Easter Week: reading sched/reflections + Easter Mixtape + Holy Day poetry.
{More on the why and how of Lent/Easter here.}

prayer.

Almighty Father, who gave your only Son to die for our sins and to rise for our justification: Give us grace so to put away the leaven of malice and wickedness, that we may always serve you in pureness of living and truth; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
(from the liberti Lent & Easter 2012 prayerbook & the Book of Common Prayer)

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Holy Day Apathy & Holy Years to Come

/ Paul Burkhart / 5 Comments

I found myself sitting in our joint Maundy Thursday service alongside the other congregation from which we rent space, frustrated. I was a little distracted because I had arrived late and my adrenaline was still going, making my senses heightened and my self-diagnosed ADD kick-in. I was also mad at myself for my own liturgical snobbiness, which had taken note that the service was technically a Good Friday liturgy that they were using on Thursday.

Now, I know I can go too far in chasing mystical and intense dynamics in my relating to God. But still, I was so wanting to feel God on this night, and I sat there in this service confused and saddened at my failure in finding it.

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