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Love is not Self-Seeking
One of my favorite movies is Marvin’s Room, starring Diane Keaton, Meryl Streep, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Robert De Nero among others. It’s by no means a perfect film. It was obviously adapted from a stage play, and it consequently relies more on dialog than on visual storytelling. But what I like is what it has…
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Fundamental Inequalities
In my youth I was very interested in ideas. Had I known it at the time, I was interested in philosophical questions: How can I know that I know something? How can I be sure what is real and what is not? I read a book by S. I. Hayakawa called Language in Thought and…
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Zach’s Story
Based on Luke 19:1-10 The name’s Zach. I know I’m not much to look at. Never have been. I’m short. Vertically challenged. Lacking in stature. I’ve met 10-year-olds taller than me. I got picked on a lot as a kid. I got tough, and I fought back. Maybe that’s why I became a revenue agent…
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The Wrath of God
My earliest memories of wrath are of my mom. She was a great mom, but she wouldn’t put up with nonsense or misbehavior. When I grew up, discipline meant spanking, so my mom would sometimes spank me if I had done something to seriously displease her. My earliest crime, maybe at the age of three,…
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Rest Requires Faith (or Exhaustion)
The first creation myth in Genesis ends strangely with God’s rest. Of course, in the stories that follow, the Sabbath and observance of the Sabbath often play major roles, and it’s unsurprising that the authors and preservers of Genesis would want to introduce the origins of the Sabbath at the outset. Yet it is odd…