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Samaritan House

Seeing God’s Back and Seeing God’s Face

Seeing God’s Back and Seeing God’s Face
by Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch
October 19, 2014
Matthew 22: 15-22
Exodus 33: 12-23

Moses is disgusted. He was up on the mountain, receiving the tablets of the Law, the Ten Commandments, from God. When he came down, he found, to his horror and outrage, that in his absence the people had constructed a Golden Calf, a false god that they worshipped because they thought Moses would never return; that he was consumed by the fire and smoke on the Holy Mountain. In his rage, Moses threw down the two tablets of the Law thus becoming the first person to break all Ten Commandments at the same time. He orders the ringleaders killed. Then, perhaps most painfully for the people, he turns his back upon them. They watch Moses walk away from the Tent of Meeting toward the mountain, away from them. They are horribly, horribly ashamed.Read More »Seeing God’s Back and Seeing God’s Face

A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

Some time after seminary, when I was serving my second parish, in rural Virginia, I was in a regular case study group of pastors and counselors led by a Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor. One participant was a very sharp Christian counselor. He presented the case of a young man who came in and confessed that he was gay and wanted to leave his marriage. I can’t remember what the counselor told him, but he explained to us that his philosophy of counseling was that the Bible was like a mathematical formula, into which you plug the variable of a human life, and then you get the answers you need.

We immediately challenged him on this. The Bible is not in fact a formula, or a manual like a car’s manual, or any sort of mechanistic analogy. And people are not variables in God’s formula for life.Read More »A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

Where the Waves Are–Dr. Warner Bailey, Preacher

WHERE THE WAVES ARE

Genesis 37.1-4, 12-28   Psalm 105.1-6, 16-22, 45b   Romans 10.5-15   Matthew 14.22-33

Seeing is not always believing, especially when you look out into the teeth of a storm.  Seeing is not always believing, especially when our heart is full of bitterness, anger, rage, and that sinking feeling of absolute helplessness.  The disciples of Jesus had been with him many months, perhaps a couple of years, and they had witnessed his mighty power many, many times. They knew his face like the back of their hands, and yet when they saw him coming to them over the boiling waves, their last ounce of courage evaporated in the face of the storm. The whole boatload of them convulsed into the despair of overwhelming horror.  They thought he was a ghost, the grim reaper, come to take them to their watery graves.Read More »Where the Waves Are–Dr. Warner Bailey, Preacher