Salvogesis

Ecclesiastes 1:3: What do people gain from all their labours at which they toil under the sun? We've heard the expression and maybe the Hoyt Axton song: work your fingers to the bone and what do you get? Boney fingers. Or maybe we've heard Tennessee Ernie Ford's version from an older song? You load 16 tons and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt. The city of Detroit went bankrupt a couple of years ago. The Detroit Free press last year ran articles on the effect of the city's bankruptcy on pensioners. Some people had to all of a sudden find private health insurance of almost $1000 a month where it was covered before. In Canada pensions that people are working for are not necessarily much more secure. Our country has talked about raising the retirement age to 67 instead of 65 and many people my age and younger have lamented that they may never be able to retire. Hoyt Axton: You work your fingers to the bone what do you get? Boney fingers. Tennessee ...

Romans 12:15: Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. It has been interesting in the news lately. I saw one survey published the other day in the National Post that said that we are, as a society, becoming angrier. This makes sense intuitively if we read all the social media memes and comments. Alongside this in Canada there is also the reality that more people feel less free to share their opinion at all. This has been evidenced by election polling. Polls which once used to be accurate within 3 percentage points 19 times out of 20 now seem to be way off. The Conservative election victory on PEI recently proved that again. The day before the election they were calling for the first Green party government in Canada. All of this is of course a symptom of a sense of powerlessness. And this powerlessness can lead to a feeling of loss and despair. There are many desperate tragedies and other sad events in our world. On and since Easter there have been those horribl...

Now I must admit that when I was a kid I used to be quite good at hide-and-seek: I had a great way to not get caught – it also worked very well with my own kids when they were little – when I was hiding and they were looking for me, I kept my eyes open and watched to see where they were and listened to discover where they were looking and as soon as they had looked in a particular spot, I would move from where I was hiding to that exact spot where they just were, knowing that they won’t look there again. This worked really well in a house with an upstairs and a downstairs because as soon as the kids came upstairs, I would make a beeline straight downstairs. Hide and seek: Did you ever play hide and seek? There is one thing that you notice playing ‘hide and seek’ with mostly little kids but sometimes with older ones as well.    It is really quite neat. Most of them when they are hiding, they close their eyes. So when you call out, ‘1-2-3, I see you’ – you will sometimes he...

I remember one men’s breakfast we had in inner city Toronto where we were posted just before here. We had the breakfast at the corps. There were about 50 men there. It was a great breakfast. The speaker did a good job and didn’t speak too long. There was bacon. It was a great time. At one point someone from DHQ who joined us asked me very politely who the woman was who had come to the men’s breakfast. There was one lady who showed up – a friend of ours here – one of the men was good to send her away, with some bacon. I thought that is who I was being asked about. ‘No, who was the lady who stayed and had breakfast with us for the whole meal? At the next table there?’ ‘Oh. That wasn’t a woman’, I said. Our friend from DHQ was a little embarrassed – there wasn’t really any need to be our friend dressed in stereotypical women’s clothing and may have even wore some padding but he certainly identified as a man, at least as far as getting a free breakfast, and someone from headquarters w...

Reading from Luke 13:1-5: 13  Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices.   2  Jesus answered, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way?   3  I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.   4  Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem?   5  I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” Were the people who suffered worse sinners than other people who did not suffer? Do bad things happen to good people or only to bad people? Were these Galileans worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? Were those 18 who died when the tower fell on them worse sinners than all others because they suffered this way? Were those who died ...