HOLY FOOLS:

 

To follow Jesus is to pay the cost of discipleship, and then to die to ourselves, to our own interests, our own agendas and reputations. 

 

 For all its profundity and pathos, the role of the fool bearer would not seem to help us much with communication, and its main significance has always been for discipleship.

 To follow Jesus is to pay the cost of discipleship, and then to die to ourselves, to our own interests, our own agendas and reputations.

 It is to pick up our crosses and count the cost of losing all that contradicts his will and his way—including our reputations before the world, and our standing with the people and in the communities that we once held dear. It is to live before one audience, the audience of One, and therefore to die to all other conflicting opinions and assessments. There is no room here for such contemporary ideas as the looking-glass self, and no consideration here for trivial contemporary obsessions such as one’s legacy.

Os Guinness, Fool’s Talk 

 

 Final Comment:

Given that the role of " Fools for Christ " is the  appointed yet truly rich definition to wear in this timeframe, where our supposed lack of common sense, our non- self -aggrandised state and out- of- popularity standing,would deny our humble status. Remember that God's foolishness is (still) higher than our ways and our thoughts.

 

Any comments, drop by...and drop your thoughts below 

Respect:

Quote:

When it comes to relationships,everything begins with respect, with the attitude to place value on other people.

Unknown.

 Postmodernism:

 

 A Quote.

 Postmodernism has made our own age as crazily relativistic and as worldly today as at any age since just prior to the Reformation. The result is a severe crisis of authority that leaves the church in many Western countries sounding as either a mumbler, a mute, a hypocrite or someone speaking out of several sides of his mouth however loudly he tries to speak.

Os Guinness, 

  The Mocked King:

 

 Prison of the Heart and Mind vs Prison of the Physical.

 

"Conditions in most prisons in the world are rife with cruelty and degradation, and executions only heighten the dehumanization. The victim being processed for death is usually reduced to something less than a man long before the authorities cut off his life as a man. Warders, soldiers and assistants, those who elsewhere in life are normal fathers, neighbours and colleagues, feel nothing personal against the victim, but often they vent their suppressed emotions in the thick of the grisly business of processing a person for death."

"So the high priest’s servants played a sadistic version of blind man’s bluff, and then in a mean mockery of the reputation of Jesus, they twisted the game into “Let’s see who’s the prophet now.” They were probably as skeptical about the supernatural as their masters, the Sadducees. In which case, they saw prophecy as a complete fraud, but Jesus provided a handy butt for their derision. Having beaten him, they blindfolded him, struck him while helpless and asked him, “Prophesy! Who is it that struck you?”
Then when Jesus refused to play their game, remaining silent before their humiliation, he was handed over from Herod’s guards to the Roman soldiers, and finally to Pontius Pilate, the governor himself."

" The climax of the torture has been captured in countless paintings of Ecce Homo—Jesus standing before his tormentors, suffering but silent, the crown of thorns pressed down on his head, the purple robe draped around his shoulders, the reed scepter thrust into his hands, hailed with the mock acclamations—and then the final parody of the trilingual inscription above his head on the cross: 'Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews'.”

Os Guinness, Fool’s Talk:

 

How you and I think often reveals how we approach life. How we view knowledge of Jesus' mock trials and subsequent crucifixion reveals more about our inner life than it reveals the attitudes of the religious correct of that timeframe in ancient history.

 

( Its my solo belief that similar to the political correct of our timeframe is to the religious correct of theirs.) 

 

 By Digital Anvil.

 

Drop by and comment below. 

Bare Bones of Truth:

 . Life is much more than reason, so it can never be captured and explained by reason alone—crucial and valuable though reason is. Apply reason as carefully and systematically as you like, and there will always be things it cannot explain, things that simply will not fit into its categories, however hard you push, press and pull.

Os Guinness.

 

It was von Neumann who conceived the idea of programming that led to the computer—the notion that you can break down a problem into a series of simple steps that can be manipulated as numbers are manipulated. But what works for a machine does not work for a human being. If only we humans were more logical, or were only logical

Os Guinness.

The bare bones of truth ? Is that the reality,what do you think ? Drop by and comment below.

By Digital Anvil.

Early Retirement

Many people are desperately trying to retire early for an easy life. But as one article put it…

“Early retirement… too often it turns into a nightmare void with nothing to do, ­nowhere to be...”

The Japanese have a term for men with nothing in their lives; it's nure ochiba, or ‘wet fallen leaf syndrome’, where men follow their wives around "everywhere like a leaf stuck to a shoe.”

So why is retirement so difficult?

 

 Because life with nothing to do, nowhere to be and nothing to achieve is actually pointless. If you want a fulfilling later life, it’s not found in retirement. It’s found by using your time in some useful endeavour, serving others or committing to a cause, it’s how God created you. Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord…”

Share this daily- reading:

Karl Faase,thanks.

( from Digital Anvil )

 Globalization:

 

 

"One of the effects of this level of globalization is plain. Active and interactive communication is the order of the day. From the shortest texts and tweets to the humblest website, to the angriest blog, to the most visited social networks, the daily communications of the wired world attest that everyone is now in the business of relentless self-promotion—presenting themselves, explaining themselves, defending themselves, selling themselves or sharing their inner thoughts and emotions as never before in human history."

 by Os Guinness.