“Flowers laughing in the sunlight of their sprightly names. Earth will write them up in its book of rising accounts.” John Hollander
Pilgrim Notes
Reflections along the way.
Author: Doug Floyd (page 5 of 8)
“Gonna change my way of thinking
Make myself a different set of rules
Gonna change my way of thinking
Make myself a different set of rules
Gonna put my good foot forward
And stop being influenced by fools”
On his Slow Train Coming album, Bob Dylan sang, “Gonna change my way of thinking.” (See BobDylan.com). He is talking about a change rooted in “a different set of rules” that take shape in him putting his best foot forward. These lines sound like they could be informed by the psalmist who is meditating upon Torah. Continue reading
Richard Hooker suggests that Scripture presents the Gospel with an Evangelical simplicity, but he cautions against simplistic approaches to Scriptural interpretation. According to Charles Miller in “Richard Hooker and the Vision of God,” Hooker warns against simplistic Scriptural study approaches that fail to grasp the rich history, complexity of content, and hierarchy of laws given in Scripture. Continue reading
“Deep in the Sunday
village, forlorn, the sound of swings
in the empty schoolyard
clinking against
their cold steels standards, like diminished
church bells…” – Sidney Lea
We are learning how to live, how to walk, how to speak, how to love until we breathe our final breath. We continue growing up even as we are growing old. The way of life is also a way of continuous catechism.
Catechism might be understood as formalized instruction in the doctrines of the church for young people preparing to take communion or for new converts to the faith. On a very basic level, catechism is simply a manual of instruction that may include some forms of memorization that help a person entering into the life of a new community, a new field of work, a new language. Continue reading
I’ve been studying Richard Hooker’s debate with Thomas Cartwright about the nature of Scripture, wisdom and creation, and I thought meditate upon their debate in relation to Torah. Here are a few thoughts about humanity, order and Torah.
The Ten Commandments are given to Israel immediately after the Lord leads them through the Red Sea and rescues them from the grasp of Egypt. The Ten Commandments are given again right before Israel crosses the Jordan and enters into the Promised Land. These words, the heart of Torah teach the children of Israel how to live in this world of time and space. These words instruct the people how to live in this world, whether crossing the wilderness, conquering the new land or settling in their new homes. By rehearsing the wisdom of God revealed in Scripture, the people learn how to orient their lives in relation to God, to other people and to the land (and the rest of creation). Continue reading
The word information seems synonymous with content or facts or data. In fact, we regularly use the word information to talk about an accumulation of ideas or bits of knowledge around a particular topic. The very form of the word might also clue us into another more ancient and more specific use of the word inform.
in-form
The MIddle English enforme or informe refers to “give form or shape to” and “form the mind of,” “teach.” The Latin informare comes from “in” or “into” and forma “a form.” As I pause over the word “information,” it makes me think of Torah. The way of Torah is a way of relational instruction: parent to child. The parent images the The Lord as Father of His people who instructs them from His holy mountain, leads them through the wilderness, and shapes them into a nation of priests and kings. At its root, information is a way of formation not simply of accumulation. Continue reading
Every Lent we learn anew to walk the wilderness way. Like children learning to walk, we also are learning how to walk before our Father in heaven. So we return again and again, asking Him to teach by His Spirit, how to pray, how to hear, how to live.
We rehearse the wilderness way, the desert plains, the valley of the shadow of death. There are no experts here. There are no titles, no awards, no recognition. This is a place of stripping off our titles, our grandiose visions, our self-reliance. Continue reading
I’m not sure how people keep up. The amount of information humans produce and consume rains down like a flood across the globe. Last spring, Science Daily suggested that 90% of the world’s data had been produced in 2011 and 2012: 90%. Companies face the never-ending challenge of storing, sorting and analyzing the endless stream of data.
I love and hate technology at the same time. Some days, I feel like I’m struggling to breathe beneath the endless rain of information.
How do people read, let alone write as much as they do? Sometimes I want to simply breathe. Pause. Stare at the dead leaves on my tree in the backyard that refuse to let go and fly away in the late winter breeze. Every year, these leaves will not fall until mid-spring. Continue reading
“‘The whole life of Christians ought to be a sort of practice of piety [pietatis], for we have been called to sanctification’ (3.19.2). For Calvin this practice of piety is itself a divine gift, a gracious way for disciples to participate in a life of communion with Christ.” – Matthew Myer Boulton (Life in God: John Calvin, Practical Formation, and the Future of Protestant Theology)
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