for years i have sent out a weekly challenging Christ-following email message called 'Thort for the Week' which you can sign up for by emailing me at brettfish@hotmail.com and asking to be added to TFTW... but this week's one i really felt i should share here as well... In Isaiah 52 the prophet says, 'How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, [...]
Jesus has just fed a crowd of more than 5000 people using one child's lunch so how does He follow that up? By slowing things down and spending time with His Father, feeding His soul and replenishing His batteries... after which He is right back at it as He catches up with His crew by taking a stroll on the lake to meet them... Come and take a listen as we read Mark 6 verse [...]
When trying to feed a big gathering of people, it is normally essential that you plan way in advance and consider things like seating, table settings, courses of food, what time the function will start, who has been invited and the like... Jesus decides to skip all that by throwing an impromptu crowd feeding... did i mention that He attempts this without food? [Don't worry, He passes the buck to His disciples - "You feed [...]
last nite i was invited by some new friends we've made here to join the Oakland City Watch team in a walk they do around the neighborhood [we live on 61st Ave and we walked around the streets closer to 90th so not crazy far away] that has three messages for the people of the community: # We care! # We want to see an end to violence, especially gun violence! # How can we [...]
Rule number 1 when trying to keep your head attached to your body - don't piss off the king. More importantly, do not piss him off directly to his face by telling him exactly how you think he is publically sinning. If you do happen to inadvertently do that, be sure to be interesting enough when talking about God and life and the kingdom that he will keep you around out of curiosity and actually [...]
this is a really short psalm and i don't have a lot to say about it... seems like another bad day in the office for David, starting with: 'The fool says in his heart, "There is no God.” They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good.' [verse 1] i mean, come on now David, that seems a little overly dramatic... and are you including yourself in that or [...]
i feel like the previous few Easters have kind of passed me by with not too much impact - being the easily recognised dreadlock wearing Easter Bunny at the Simple Way is all i can remember and i'm not sure where i was the year before but in the middle of preparation to leave for the Simple Way and so life was a fair bit chaotic... the last Easter that comes to mind was when [...]
another week, another 'Coffee with Jesus' cartoon strip holding a mirror up towards us, this time in the area of prayer... Psalm 46.10 reads, 'Be still and know that I am God.' quite often most of us forget the 'be still' part as illustrated really well here: of course too often we also get the 'and know that I am God' part pretty wrong as well, but that's another post...
so last nite tbV and i finally watched the movie 'Lars and the real girl' which had come highly recommended by our Philly friend Janell Anema and it was indeed well worth the watch. Ryan Gosling [who i have been completely against since he starred in 'The Notebook' which is a movie which irritated me beyond belief for reasons that most people don't really care much about] is phenomenal as Lars, who is a likeable [...]
i have seen these 'Coffee with Jesus' comic strips around every now and then and have generally found them to be thort-provoking and profound and more recently my friend Robert has been sharing some that i have really liked and so i intend to stick a few on here from time to time... hopefully they will provoke more thort and even some action as they provide a bit of a mirror for those of us [...]