Sometimes in my book, God Is Just Love, Building Spiritual Resilience for the Sake of Our Children and the Creation, I talk about preparing for the future. That has led to some readers asking me, “Are you a prophet?”
“Ken, that subtitle for this column, ‘Speaking Truth to Power….,’ a reader might begin their feed-back to me, “…can’t possibly mean that you are about to tell me that I can, or even must, teach my children to ‘Speak truth to power.’”
Schonfield, like so many teachers and authors I encountered a few years later in seminary, was convinced that he had to understand the Jesus story without looking through the lens of mystery, miracle, awe and wonder. A Jesus without miracles? What kind of crazy talk is that?
Just how important are truth, integrity, reliability? Everyone has to decide who, and what sources, they will trust. Just a couple of days ago, I listened to Larry Buxton’s podcast on leadership and integrity.
What are we to do about the common and very human experience of despair? Often, despair befalls us when we have made a serious mistake. Despair also assails us through circumstances over which we have no control. Being, so many of us, perfectionists and control-freaks, we become paralyzed.
The theme of “Stories for Families” today is again teaching our children about knowing the truth. It is the kind of story that will teach its truth best if it is discussed by adults and children together.
For 25 years I read Oswald Chambers devotional insights and wrote hundreds of notes in the margins. This week I was surprised to find two pages with no markings whatsoever; even though Chambers focuses for two days in a row on one of spirituality’s most important themes and one of humanity’s greatest needs. What is that need?
Yesterday, as I pondered this gospel reading for the fourth day in a row, it dawned on me exactly what it was that kept me coming back to the same story. It was in fact the contrast between “doing” and “being;” between “taking ahold of,” verses, “inheriting;” between, “works” and “faith.”
When the topic is “Truth,” the number of sub-topics is legion. This week’s story continues last weeks sub-theme as, with the help of Fred the Fat Frog we help our children think about the importance of evidence when they are trying to decide what is true.
Awhile back I wrote a story, “A Fat Frog Named Fred,” in order to teach some children about how we decide what is true. We live in a culture where lying has become a culture destroying fact of life.
