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Have we forgotten the three questions of friendship?
It seems we have forgotten how to make and keep friends. New research indicates that one in four people feel lonely at least once a week. Apparently, experts are declaring that loneliness might well be our next public health epidemic. I am convinced that the reason this is happening is that we are losing our understanding of the nature of true friendship and also the art of relationship negotiation that is an essential part of any healthy friendship.
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If we truly want peace, we need to stop dividing the world into “us” and “them”
Media outlets in North America have become experts at this. A tragedy happens, amateur social media videos are lined up one after the other, professional “experts” give their paid opinions and reporters stand in locations they have never been, acting like they know what they are talking about. Everyone is looking for answers, hoping that this will be as simple as the good guys versus the bad guys. It never is. Like normal, people are trying to reduce complex issues to simplistic stereotypes. Right now there are loud voices proclaiming that the whole problem is either the police, the #BlackLivesMatter movement or Barack Obama. If it wasn’t so tragic, it would be…
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Divisions form in the rift of unresolved pain
It was interesting to hear my wife’s response to my reflection yesterday. She said “it sounds like you aren’t going to do anything when anyone does something wrong”. I can see how she would have picked that up from what I wrote, but that was not what I was intending to communicate. We were watching a movie last night and the soundtrack featured a song by the band Sparklehorse called “Revenge”. The song captures the dilemma of dealing with injustice. One lyric particularly stood out: “somehow forgiveness lets evil make the laws”. I can really identify with this lyric. Somehow “the Jesus way” can feel a bit like the way…
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Lest we forget
Well today is ANZAC day. For those outside of Australia and New Zealand, ANZAC day is like Armistice Day for the rest of the Western World, except there is a deep resonance in our culture that grows stronger each year, rather than fades through the mists of time. These days it’s popular to decry war, but ANZAC day cannot be easily dismissed by a simple cliche. ANZAC day is not about the battles or the generals, it is about the ordinary men and women who risked and sacrificed their lives for our nation.
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Faith and Courage
Hanging on I’ve been doing more thinking about the wrestle with faith, and more and more I am seeing a link between faith and courage. The world tells you what normal is, and basically it is doing whatever you can to be in a position of independence, where you can be master of your own destiny. Jesus tells me to let go of the ambition of independence and to trust. Martin Luther King, Jr. said: Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase. That means going against all the messages I hear on the television, in the newspaper, from school, from friends, from almost…
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Step six: Allow them to be them
Can you let them be different? Once you have worked our what matters for you and what your feelings are, and done your best to work out what matters for them and what their feelings are, the next step is for that to be ok! One of the great journeys of my married life was the dawning realisation that Leeanne was different to me. If you are experiencing conflict it is because the other person/party sees the world differently to you. Is that ok?
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If you want next year to be different meet people and read books that challenge your “normal”.
The real question of healthy sexuality
In the wake of #metoo we need to rediscover the implications of a controversial passage of the bible that points to a model of a healthy relationship between the sexes.
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Step One: What’s really going on?
What is this fight actually about? The Devil’s main weapon against us are lies that cause division. As I said yesterday, conflict isn’t a bad thing, in fact the absence of conflict can sometimes be like a cancer. Napoleon Bonaparte said: “The people to fear are not those who disagree with you, but those who disagree with you and are too cowardly to let you know.” Proverbs 27:17 says: As iron sharpens iron,so one man sharpens another. I love this picture because the only way for iron to sharpen iron is for friction to wear away the part that is blunt. Conflict helps sharpen me. But it is important to step back…
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A different kind of freedom
What would Jesus really do? A number of years ago a trend was for Christians to have the letters WWJD? emblazoned on jewellery, pencil cases and bumper stickers.. It’s a good question. Turns out what he would do is come and be a model of a completely different value system than our world values. Turns out that he is asking us to also model that same value system. And know what? Turns out he doesn’t think it will help us be very popular!!
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We were reminded by a New York Billionaire that it is words and not ideas that change us.
Reflecting, learning and listening to that part of you ready for the new adventure that God lays before you today is the only way to having a full life.
Do you have a dream like Martin Luther King Jr.?
