May 19

  • jfohara
    jfohara added a text contribution Stumbling into Battle
    Joshua's strategy in overtaking Canaan would seem quite out of place stacked next to much of the church growth literature available to pastors and church leaders today: given the charge to "be strong and courageous," He and his fighting men seem to be doing only two things: ritual cleansing, and entering the land that is to be possessed. Is it really that simple? Should we shelve all our sociological studies, polls, sermon illustration websites and strategy manuals and simply ded… Read more »

Apr 7

  • jfohara
    jfohara added a text contribution Unsafe Sex
    There's a dynamic tension between the people Israel sleeps with and her spirituality. Would God's definition of safe sex include a spirituality component? Read more »

Mar 5

  • jfohara
    jfohara added a text contribution True Encouragement
    A new friend of mine, who has undergone some rather difficult, yet admittedly deserved, public scrutiny, shared these verses as an encouragement to me. Having undergone some far less visible crises, I'm beginning to realize an important quality of a disciple of Jesus: they absorb godly discipline and receive it as a blessing. Yet this is far from a masochistic love of punishment. Rather, we are learning to accept and love ourselves just as Christ loves us. right where we are, warts and a… Read more »

Feb 13

  • jfohara
    jfohara added a text contribution Ears Made Deaf By Sorrow
    Israel did not listen to Moses' hopeful prophecy of deliverance because it didn't line up with their present reality. In what ways do we shape our theologies to explain our circumstances, instead of framing our faith around the God of our deliverance? What does it mean to trust the prophetic report of Yahweh in today's circumstances? The greatness of this passage of scripture is that Yahweh continued on to his saving agenda, despite Israel's inability to believe. God'… Read more »

Jan 29

Jan 12

  • jfohara
    jfohara added a text contribution Love and Sacrifice
    Perhaps our soteriology (how salvation works) can obscure the nature of its' very soul: a God who loves, and calls his subjects to love as he does. When Abraham obeyed Yahweh, he was placing his and his son's life completely in the hands of God. Too often, I fear, we simply gloss over the passage and claim it as a foreshadowing, pointing to the eventual sacrifice of Jesus for the sins of the world. I agree wholeheartedly, however, that reality shouldn't lessen the weight of w… Read more »