Elijah, a prophet who operated in the northern kingdom of Israel in the ninth century BCE, is one of the most mysterious figures of scripture. He was among the few survivors of a general persecution of prophets initiated by King Ahab and his wife Jezebel after they had introduced worship of the Canaanite god Baal. Dressing in rough camel hair and fed by ravens, Elijah survived in the desert. Eventually God compelled him to confront the king with a test of power over Baal by bringing fire to...

Most of us have lost someone in our lifetime, a parent, a sibling, a child, a spouse, or a loving friend. Grief is expressed in many ways. We sometimes feel shock, there is a feeling of loss that affects the pit of our stomach. Sometimes we are angry or we feel “spaced out” because the loss is forever. In the midst of this loss we may even have trouble believing our loved one is gone and, in some cases, we feel that we too would like to go to where our loved one is. The depth of our grief and...

Why do so many people today find faith and trust so difficult? Is it possible that we first need to master what we know before we understand what we believe? The Old Testament words of Isaiah says: “unless you believe, you will not understand”(7:9) Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German theologian of the 1930 – 1940’s who was killed by the Nazi’s, wrote that unless you obey, you cannot believe. Bonhoeffer raised the price of belief to obedience. These comments and thoughts are not to discourage the...

In his book A Tale of Two Cities Charles Dickens opens with the line: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness…” Dickens, who wrote his book in the mid-nineteenth century was certainly commenting on the moral and political climate of his day. Today we could still say the same. At times the darkness seems to be overpowering light. But yet life for us is not so difficult that we cannot get through it. Perhaps we all want the...

I taught students in both secondary school and college for many years. Most students would tell me that they were “spiritual” but not “religious”. I assume the difference was that they believe in a higher power (God) but do not want to do it in an institution like church. The spiritual life, like education, is a process of growing into maturity of thinking and knowing. In this process we make mistakes and we often forget that even within our mistakes we grow. In our spiritual growth we come to...

George Eliot wrote “no soul is a desolate as long as there is a human being for whom it can feel trust and reverence.” To have a friend is, in a sense, to acknowledge that I am tenderly held and can trust another’s love of me. Friendship is the melding of two spirits together in a bond of love and trust. The Book of Ecclesiastes teaches: “Two are better than one, for if they fall, the one will lift the other up; but woe to the one that is alone.” To have a friend is not a marital relationship...

MY FATHER'S WAR There is a PBS program titled “My Grandfather’s War”. I am of the age where it was my father’s war. I am the late child of German immigrants who left Germany before the Nazi regime became unbearable. My father would tell stories of while he worked in Berlin in 1925 he often had to step over dead bodies from the political battles the night before. He and my mother came to America, it wasn’t easy, but they made it. My father was concerned that he would be called to the American...