Wade Poe

Orphans come in versions, ages, and ways you might not imagine. Believers are to watch out for widows and orphans. Jesus' brother, James, even said, "Religion that is pure and faultless before God is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress" (James 1:27) Usually we interpret that as children who need to be adopted or have foster care provided for until they are adopted or "age out" of the foster care system.   And that's a valid way of saying that in today's terminology.   But I believe it incomplete to some degree. _______________ It is 100% true that people without parents need to be "visited" or taken care of because they will be lost, abused, and or die without care. Several older translations say "fatherless" rather than orphans, because "back then" if you didn't have a father, you were essentially an orphan, culturally speaking. To grow up without a father often meant no lineage, no inheritance, no male ...

"Where are all the people?  Have we really had a bunch of people who didn't show up?"  It was an amazing wedding and reception, but for a moment at the beginning of the reception, I looked around and was a little sad and disappointed for my daughter and our family a while.   "Why did people not come?  Why did so many not come to the reception?" At some point, a few minutes in, my wife observed in passing that the chair rental place had set up way too many chairs.   We'd asked for six places max, per table, following a carefully planned seating chart and they'd set up eight or more, making it look like a lot of people didn't show up - at least to me.  And only for a little while. It is interesting how details can change how we see situations.  Just a few extra chairs and I thought we'd had people who'd abandoned us after the wedding. After my wife's comments, my mind went back to standing in front of the audience while reading the couple...

Paul, the guy who wrote much of the New Testament, wasn't trying to get people to quit having sex.  He also wasn't trying to get people to a place where they enjoyed what we'd call "Christian culture".  And Paul wasn't setting up a new religious following that would permanently financially benefit anyone. __________ It's easy to project the culture you grow up in on to just about anything.  I certainly learned to project what "church" taught me back in time, into the Bible - as if "Bible times" and the time I was growing up in the church were similar.   Kind of like when we went to "The Great Passion Play" in Eureka Springs, Arkansas - white people, for the most part, dressed in VBS clothes acting out the life of Jesus - that's what the Bible and it's events were like - we just lined up our teachings and ideas and projected them back into scripture. It is very hard not to do this.  Everyone does it.  But that doesn...

Some years back South Park had a couple episodes where a set of characters showed up and changed everything.  They were called "member berries" and when eaten, the childlike berries made you reminisce constantly about the past, how wonderful it was, and great it would be to "get back there" - or something like that. Member Chewbacca? Member Ghostbusters? Member feeling safe?  Etc. They represented the hopeful times of parts of the past and, at the same time, sour grapes over the fact those times were gone and that they also were mixed with less than great and hopeful things. It was pretty funny and kind of made a good point about how fond memories for good times in the past can lock us into a way of being that glorifies the past and keeps us from engaging the reality around us now with hope and relevance - especially for those who weren't part of the past we enjoyed. Though it's changing a little, there's still a staunch collective in my tribe of origin ...

"Have you quit beating your wife?" Back in the 80's when learning logic, dialogue, debate, etc, we discussed how you have to unpack the question itself before you answer it or you're at the mercy of the person asking the question. The above question was one of the sample questions we unpacked because it had so many assumptions built it.  For example, it assumes 1) the person is married, 2) the person they're married to is a woman and 3) that they have been beating their wife. A person answering that question would need to confront and counter the misleading options or statements in the question, otherwise they're walking into a verbal trap. _______________ "If you don't go to church, how will you be spiritually fed?" One of the common things I hear from people on this journey over the past several months is that question.   It's not a bad question, but it assumes a lot of things.  Like the question at the top of the post, it's one of thos...

A blessing from God recently – I got to listen to a “hero of my growing-up-faith” speak at a local gathering of believers. 20+ years ago, I would have been hanging on each word, being led by the emotion of songs sung prior to the speech, feeling the social pressure of people who I likely wanted the approval of, and listening to the message with a personal interpretation of conviction and direction, etc.  This time it was a different kind of experience.  Don’t get me wrong - I am grateful for those who were encouraged and built up by that moment. I am glad that things of that nature are available for people who need them to move forward, day-to-day.  At least I think I’m glad for them. For me, it was very different in that it seemed like the same song and dance that I have ever heard in most every church message I have ever listened to growing up and yet I could hear it completely differently for the first time, without trying - it was just different. The message was “God ...