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Joshua 2: 1-22 Matthew 25:14-30 The mountains lay beneath our plane as we began the descent into Comolapa Airport. You could see the small mountain roads circling edges of deep drops into the valleys below. What's always been amazing to me is not that an airplane can take
off – that I understand. What's always amazing to me is that it
lands without killing all on board. Our group had booked the flight on Continental, which we chose over the cheaper national airline of Salvador, known as TACA, an acronym for Transporte Aereros de Continente Americano, or as more familiarly known by English-speaking development workers, Take a Chance Airways.
International visits, especially in the years immediately following the peace accords between the government at that time, ARENA, and the rebel force...
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Micah 3: 5-12; Matthew 23: 1-12Several years ago, an incredible event occurred: more than 450 years after the execution of Hans Landis, the Anabaptist leader in early seventeenth century Zurich, the Swiss Reformed Church had invited his religious descendants from America to share in a service of reconciliation. Because true reconciliation does not occur until after the sinner has confessed, the Swiss Reformed Church confessed to its
sin – that was the word used – of executing Landis and then asked forgiveness from his spiritual heirs, the Mennonites. And, true to their belief in forgiveness, they did indeed forgive Landis' martyrdom. Forgiveness and reconciliation definitely go against the grain in today's world where the cry for justice is little more than a cry for judicially sanctioned retribution.
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Isaiah 49: 8-16; Matthew 6: 24-34About a month ago I began looking at garden catalogues. For anyone who loves to garden, they are just as beguiling as the serpent’s words to Eve. Replete with color photographs of gardens that only could be created by master English gardeners, they hold out the promise: You, too, can have a garden like this. You, too, for only buying this bulb or that seed can grow something that will not only be the envy of your neighbors but will create beauty beyond your wildest imaginations. You, too…. You, too … And, of course, every year, I ask myself: Can I
really? Can
I really?
Can I?
Plants, of course, multiply, and that corner of bright sunlight in Fellowship Hall seems to expand every winter as plants that some of us have no...
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