God Loves You

a compilation of posts that contributed to my conversion

well 1) your experiences are not universal and 2)

i do actually believe this stuff. i do believe that God created the universe. i do believe he spoke to the jewish people and made an eternal covenant with them, and i do believe he incarnated himself as a human and was born of a human woman. i do believe he became a religious teacher, traveling around the land we now call the levant. i do believe he was murdered but then came back to life three days later. i do believe that the descendants of his students have more or less kept the faith of their elders since then, and i believe that god still guides them in spirit today. i do believe that the dead will be raised to eternal life to live with God.

'They have no wine'; 'I have this difficulty'; 'this is the way I am feeling'. Our anxiety is itself language enough: to be with Christ, holding that before him, is communication. It provides its own way of prayer.

If my spirit is bleeding inside, I can approach him with that and grasp the hem of his garment. My prayer can be holding that garment; power continues to go out from him. If my spirit aches sorrow or loneliness, I can sit with him as at a table, in a prayer that holds that ache before him; his presence still speaks welcome and healing into that. If I am aware of the waters of death, prayer can mean stretching out my hand, in the faith that he clasps my wrist. Prayer could be staying with that: the hand clasping the wrist.