The Dropsical Man

At State College Presbyterian this morning, Dean Lindsey was preaching from Luke 14:1-6, where Jesus, on his way to a fancy meal with "a leader of the Pharisees" on the sabbath, pauses to heal a man with "dropsy".  This is the set-up to another confrontation about healing on the sabbath, of course, but I confess that I had never paused to think about what "dropsy" might be and what significance could be found in this particular ailment.  Dean's message really grabbed my attention.  (Afterwards, I went to the big commentary on Luke by Joel Green, where I found the same information developed further.)

Zero Sum v. Abundance

Zechariah

It's probably a fair guess that the book of Zechariah is one of the less frequently studied portions of the Hebrew Scriptures.  It has some surprises though.  This morning I was reading Zechariah chapter 2 and found this

Then I looked up, and there before me was a man with a measuring line in his hand.   I asked, “Where are you going?”
He answered me, “To measure Jerusalem, to find out how wide and how long it is.”
While the angel who was speaking to me was leaving, another angel came to meet him  and said to him: “Run, tell that young man, ‘Jerusalem will be a city without walls because of the great number of people and animals in it..”

A heartfelt plea

My apologies for the silence on Points of Inflection over the last couple of months. I've been busy teaching my math for Sustainability course, and also a series of small group studies on Laudato si... so much to write about, so little time.

Today I am reposting a plea from John Baez over at Azimuth regarding the (what now seem like) annual giant fires in Indonesia and Southeast Asia. He writes

I lived in Singapore for two years, and I go back to work there every summer. I love Southeast Asia, its beautiful landscapes, its friendly people, and its huge biological and cultural diversity. It’s a magical place.
But in 2013 there was a horrible haze from fires in nearby Sumatra. And this year it’s even worse. It makes me want to cry, thinking about how millions of people all over this region are being choked as the rain forest burns.

Read the rest of his post here.