Pity?
Feeling sad? Somerville, in ye olde state of Massachusetts, is the place you need to head to.
Why? They had a “Pity Party” last week! (I’m not kidding.) In Union Square. MA 02143. Two miles northwest of Boston.
(Only in Mass.! Maybe they’ve a lot to be sad about?)
Local artist Greg Cook had the bright idea. People who are sad, he declared, should be together. So the Somerville Arts Council decided to sponsor the shindig.
On the event’s Facebook site:
A pity party
Solo?
Botchi-zoku, they call it. It’s the latest media buzzword in Japan. Botchi-zoku. Betchyu-dunno what botchi-zoku means.
Nope, it’s not a variety of sushi, sumo, or sake, not that I care for any of those (but since DTS has broadened its alcohol policy …). And it’s got nothing to do with botching things up. Nope, that’s not it.
Botchi comes from the Japanese hitoribotchi = lonely/solitary. Zoku = family/close-knit social group.
Together, botchi-zoku is an
Genesis 22:1−19
Fear of God trumps every other allegiance and manifests in self-sacrificial obedience.
The account of Genesis 22 begins with a time-stamp: “Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham” (22:1). What “things”?
Throughout the saga of Abraham, he is shown clumsily stumbling along in his faith. In Genesis 12, he leaves his homeland, obeying God’s call, and goes to Canaan. But the next instant he is in Egypt because of a famine. The first sign of trouble,
Remembering!
Well, folks, here it is: RaMbLeS installment #524. Magic number. Ten years of rambling thoughts on random Scripture. Dispatches from Plano, Dallas, Paris, Aberdeen, London, Berlin, Leipzig, Munich, Zurich, Vienna, Rome, Florence, Istanbul, Kuala Lumpur, Sydney, Jerusalem, Madrid, New Delhi, …. A long ramble, indeed.
It all began when I was heading out to ye olde city of Aberdeen in 2005 for doctoral work. Intended as a platform to update well-wishers of my academic antics
Guide!
Everybody should have a Jim Klubnik in their lives.
I did. He was my first pastor, in more sense than one. Not only did he serve as the pastor of the church I first attended when I came to the U.S. about thirty years ago, he was, indeed, my first shepherd, leading me to finding my niche in life and ministry.
Jim went to be with the Lord earlier last week.
He was a Dallas Seminary grad, and the first one to get me interested in studying the Bible. He pushed me—against my
Memorial!
To them I will give in My house and within My walls a memorial,
And a name better than that of sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name which will not be cut off.
Isaiah 56:5
In the Hebrew, “a memorial and a name” reads yad vashem, literally “a hand and a name.” It indicates a divine intention to establish a means of remembrance for those eunuchs who would, otherwise, have no one to carry their names after their deaths. But the Lord
Ramesh Richard: How I Preach
Ramesh Richard: And this is How I Preach …
[Ramesh is one of my senior colleagues at Dallas Theological Seminary (and was one of my teachers, I might add). A solid thinker and writer on matters of preaching, hermeneutics, and apologetics, he is also the president of Ramesh Richard Evangelism and Church Health (RREACH), a global proclamation ministry with significant impact among leaders and pastors in many continents—the
Abe Kuruvilla is the Carl E. Bates Professor of Christian Preaching at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (Louisville, KY), and a dermatologist in private practice. His passion is to explore, explain, and exemplify preaching.