The Good Portion

You need to learn to forgive yourself!  How many times have you heard those words? Maybe they came from a friend, or a counselor, or a book you’ve read. Maybe you’ve said them yourself to someone you care about, someone you want to set free from the burden of guilt and self-condemnation. I’ve heard and said them myself. I’ve tried to follow those words, but the burden of guilt never went away.  I’ve lived a sinful life. I’ve said and done many things I am deeply ashamed of. I’ve hurt others and disgraced myself. And there are witnesses, people who will never forget, and never forgive. How can I be free from the burden of all that guilt and shame? I can’t undo what I’ve done, and I know, deep in my heart, that I have no more authority to forgive my sins against others than I have the right to forgive my own debts.  After King David committed adultery with Bathsheba and arranged the murder of her husband, Uriah, he cried out to God in a prayer that is shocking unless you understand the n

  There’s more than one way to be worldly. There are “heathen” ways and there are “Christian” ways. What they have in common is found in the word worldly itself: this world is at the center of their heart.   “Heathen worldliness” is easy to spot, though its description may vary here and there. It includes things like smoking cigarettes (unless you are south of the Mason Dixon line, where, I’m told, you might even find an ashtray at the end of your pew); drinking alcohol (if you’re a Southern Baptist); recreational drug use; premarital sex and sundry other sexually immoral practices; abortion (obviously); listening to secular music (unless it’s classical), and watching movies rated higher than G (or PG, or PG-13).  And let’s not forget using profanity. Oh, and the heathen worldly are Democrats (unless, of course, you are a Democrat). Humor aside, to the extent that any of these “heathen” ways are inherently sinful, Christians must avoid them. “Heathen worldly” was once my sole definiti

I' ve heard a lot of complaining lately. Complaints about the COVID pandemic and the way it is being handled, complaints about the condition of our state and our city. And I’ve seen more and more people take their complaints on the road, literally. They’re packing up and moving away. Some of them had little or no choice following the Camp Fire, but many others are not being forced out. They are bailing. I’m not blind to the problems we suffer. I’m fully aware of the crime and disintegration of our local way of life. But here I sit, working from home in a house we bought here in Chico less than two years ago. Two years ago Paul and I had finally saved up enough for a down payment on a house. We began researching places to live and decided to move twenty-five miles down the road to Oroville, where we could get a nicer house in a nicer neighborhood for the same amount of money. That October we started shopping and put an offer on a lovely three-bedroom house. We were outbid, but undet

T he book of Hosea shocks me every time. Hosea, was a prophet of God, and as a prophet God, he was called to a difficult life. The very first time God spoke to him was to tell him to go marry “a wife of whoredom” (1:2) and father children with her. Hosea obeyed. He married Gomer, whose faithfulness he could never trust, and fathered children of whose legitimacy he could never be certain, all to paint a visible, flesh and blood picture for God’s unfaithful people. And then there were the children. God commanded Hosea to name his first child, a son, Jezreel, as a reminder of the wickedness of the kings of Israel. His next baby, a girl, was to be named No Mercy, and his third child, another son, was to be named Not My People. As a mother of two children of my own, I can’t imagine making them live with names that represent God’s rejection. We are never told what Jezreel, No Mercy, and Not My People were like. We don’t know if they were happy children, if they were gentle or funny or sweet,