Grains of Sand

Pixabay The recent political brouhaha here in Canada swirling around honesty, integrity, hypocrisy among the leaders of the major party leaders highlights the importance of Peter's instructions to the pilgrims of his day. He writes: " Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy and slander of every kind ". (1 Peter 2:1) Whenever we see a " therefore " in Scripture we know that something was said earlier that is important. The previous section of Peter's letter had to do with being holy as God is holy. This call to holiness is based on what Christ did in giving His life to provide salvation for these pilgrims, these exiles now scattered throughout the Roman world. They were to love one another deeply as Christ had loved them. And love, being more than "a warm fuzzy" has characteristics. Peter is about to describe what those are. If these pilgrims, and by extension, if we, want to live out our journey in k...

Pixabay Auto workers in a GM plant in Ingersoll, Ontario, are crying “foul” today. They knew that part of their production was being siphoned off to plants in Mexico but had been assured that there was enough in what would remain to keep them all at work. This morning they were surprised to discover that up to 600 jobs are about to be lost. In my search for the origins of the saying “ honesty is the best policy ” I came up with a post that begins with this: “ Many organizations make bold claims about how they value honesty above all else. But deceit has its merits too. Telling the naked truth to your employees can result in panic, stress, or spite. According to new research by Wharton professor Maurice Schweitzer and Wharton doctoral student Emma E. Levine, lying in the right circumstances can be ethical, helps to breed trust in difficult times, and can help boost morale. ” (http://www.inc.com/will-yakowicz/honesty-is-not-the-best-policy.html) Are you out of your mind? But th...

wcsdschools.com (Google Images) John the Baptizer, true to his character, continued to point others to Christ. The day after he identified Jesus as the Lamb of God (John 1:29) to his audience at the river, he pointed out the Messiah to two of his disciples (John 1:35, 36): “ The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God! ’” This prompted the two men to follow Jesus. They spent the day with Him. We know nothing of the conversation but by the end of the day John’s disciples were convinced that what John had told them was true, that Jesus was indeed the Christ, the Messiah, the One they had so long expected (John 1:40-41). Andrew brought his brother, Simon, to the Lord. On the following day, Jesus called Philip to join the growing band of Christ followers (1:8) and Philip, in turn, invited Nathanael (1:45). This was the start of an interesting encounter between Jesus and Nathanael. Philip introduced Jesus as ...