practical-theology

The Bible does not deny that we were various things__ddicts, homosexuals, hateful, prideful, pornographic masturbators__ut that is what we were (past tense) (1 Cor. 6:9-11; Titus 3:3-5). The emphasis in Scripture is on what we are and what we are called to be. The Christian does not say, Hello, my name is _____ and I am an X Y or Z._ The Christian says I was dead, but now I am alive. The Christian says I am a struggling sinner, yet I am a saint. The Christians says I am a new creation; I am transformed.

On my journey from the fantastical to the practical, spirituality has gone from being a mystical experience to something very ordinary and a daily experience. Many don__ want this, instead they prefer spiritual grandeur, and I believe that is what keeps enlightenment at bay. We want big revelations of complexity that validates our perceptions of the divine. What a let down it was to Moses when God spoke through a burning bush! But that is exactly the simplicity of it all. Our spiritual life is our ordinary life and it is very grounded in every day experience. For me, it is the daily practice of kindness, mindfulness, happiness, and peace.

The Anselmian call for "faith seeking understanding" may start and gather it's energy not in rational study of past theological points but in the pursuit to make sense of our concrete and lived experiences of Jesus who finds us in a hole, knocks us from our horse, or comes to our daughter in her sleep.

The Anselmian call for "faith seeking understanding" may start and gather its energy not in rational study of past theological points but in the pursuit to make sense of our concrete and lived experiences of Jesus who finds us in a hole, knocks us from our horse, or comes to our daughter in her sleep.

...the whole configuration of human development needs to be reconceptualized. A lifetime ought not to be thought of in linear manner, an ascending upward gradient, or a kind of bell-shaped curve in which persons develop from one stage of helplessness as an infant through a lifetime to a final stage of helplessness in old age... In...God resides the ultimate coherence from whom each passion for understanding, each new insight, new stage, new vision of the universe, derives its ultimate intelligibility and toward which all such phenomena point.

Hope trusts in the promises of God. Hope seeks the action of God that brings forth a new reality. Optimism stands in the current reality, wishing to make the best of each individual experience. But hope stands knee deep in the history of this reality by yearning for the action of God to bring forth a new reality in which everything in this reality is reconciled and redeemed.

. . . anyone who wants to elaborate relevant liberation theology must be prepared to go into the 'examination hall' of the poor. Only after sitting on the benches of he humble will he or she be entitled to enter a school of 'higher learning.

The resurrection is the promise that death will not prevail, that nothingness does not have the last word. God promises to overcome it with life... We can trust that God will overcome death because Jesus is the resurrection, because on the third day Jesus rose again, as the first of many.

The arduous nature of practical Christianity makes so many people choose theoretical Christianity! Both are however good, but the former is weightier, noble and solemn than the later! Many are called, but few are dedicated!