Category: The Magazine

So you’re ready to invite a friend to church… How might you do that?

Emotional labor” has gone viral recently – the unpaid management of feelings (their own or others) required of those who work in service industries. Confusingly, in the popularization of the phrase, the distinction has gotten lost about what is actually “emotional labor” and what are other kinds of labor we simply have feelings about.

It is hard not to be spellbound by Paul Thomas Anderson’s disturbingly beautiful Phantom Thread, Daniel Day-Lewis’ mystifyingly memorable Reynolds Jeremiah Woodcock, and Vicky Krieps’ enigmatically sensational Alma. It is a most unconventional, unparalleled older boy meets girl story.

During this week, when Valentine’s Day collides with Ash Wednesday, it is worth reflecting more on that delightful phrase.

A presenter at the Q Christian Fellowship Conference on behalf of the #BornPerfect Campaign reflects on the experience

It feels like we humans have a spiritual spot which is like the dog’s paw or the human foot…sensitive, tender, easily triggered because of so many alert-nerve-endings.  We have, inside us, a spot which humans and God can “touch” that triggers us.

Over the next few weeks we will be looking at “raising people.”  A healthy church will need to “raise money” each fall so that they have the financial resources to fuel their mission.  Similarly, a healthy church will want to “raise people” in the spring so that they have the human resources to fuel their mission.

I came to see how the Holy Spirit can work through us in the most unexpected ways, to let peace begin in small places, and maybe spread to the whole world.

Seeing the strays eke out a life in the desert of the Holy Land was a reminder that God surrounds us even in the hardship and mundanity of our life. Seeing them reminds me to stop and appreciate the beauty and abundance of the world God gave us.

When I bit into this Orange, I could feel the juice – drink it.  I could feel the chill.  I could catch some sweet and some tart even.  A miracle. The color – orange and pink with a white-orange halo – Holy, Holy, Holy.