Presby-Musings

Did you know that the Bible is One Big Story of God’s love for people who don’t always feel like they deserve God’s love?  It's true--it's the best kind of story, to be honest. And God has a way of always picking the wrong kinds of people to do what God needs doing.  People who think they aren't good enough, people who the rest of the world thinks aren't good enough--heck, people who really aren't good enough... that's who God seems to love to pick to write God's One Big Story. The Bible is One Big Story filled with heroes and villains, great adventures, epic battles, love stories and astonishing tales.  It’s also the story of a “once and future” King who picked the most unlikely people to help him share the story of God’s amazing love, and how far God was willing to go to save the world.  Today we are continuing our summer sermon series, One Big Story.  And what we're going to be learning over the course of this summer is one very simple fact...

Just a little over a month ago, Nic Wallenda (of the famous " Flying Wallendas " family) became the first man to walk a tightrope across the mouth of the Horsehoe Falls of Niagra Falls.  The wire stretched nearly 400 yards across the swirling falls, and Wallenda walked through wind and mist to other side.  Here's a bit of the back story that made headlines after he made it: The New York Times wrote this about the stunt, "[Wallenda walked ] in a mist so thick he was not visible on the Canadian side for more than ten minutes after he started.  The walk... had an Old Testament feel to it." Old Testament feel...  Why?  Because of the mist? Or because he prayed before during and after he walked four hundred yards on a two inch wire that was stretched across certain death. And it was crazy. And it was something a prophet might do. Maybe all of those things, but I bet it was mostly because of the prayer. Most of us find the time to pray when we are a...

Charles Blondin was the greatest tightrope artist alive in the late 19th and early 20th century.  Some might argue he was the greatest ever.  Blondin made a living out of walking a tight rope across Niagra Falls .  I've been there a couple of times,  so that impresses the heck out of me.   He got so good at it that he would go out on to the high wire in outlandish ways---on stilts, with a lit stove which he used to cook himself breakfast while on the wire... pretty crazy stuff. There is a story of how Blondin once walked out on to a tightrope during an exhibition and then wheeled a wheelbarrow out on to it and back.  The crowd cheered.  Blondin then asked the crowd if anyone believed he could wheel the wheelbarrow out on the wire with a person in it.  They all affirmed that he could do it.  He then asked for a volunteer. That's when things got quiet. Finally, a man volunteered from the crowd and went and got into the wheelbarrow an...

On August 7, 1974 a man by the name of Phillipe Petit somehow strung a high wire in between the two towers of the World Trade Center , and then proceeded to spend the next 40 minutes dazzling New Yorkers with perhaps one of the greatest feats of high wire derring-do ever done. Here is a quick video showing some photos of this, and it's set to soothing music: This forty minute walk took six years to plan. Petit made scale models of the towers, and even snuck into the life size towers several times while they were being built in order to observe security.  Once, he even disguised himself as a contractor to gain access.  The 450-pound cable Petit walked on between the towers had to be gradually strung after Petit and his crew shot a line across with a bow and area to a crew on the other side. The New York City Transit Authority police force was called in to arrest Petit, who mocked them by jumping and dancing on the wire while they watched helplessly.  Finall...

I have been in his brightest shining heaven and seen such things that no man, once returned from there, has wit or skill to tell about.           - Dante from  Paradiso "Peter," said Lucy, "where is this, do you suppose?" "I don't know," said the High King.  "It reminds me of somewhere, but I can't give it a name.  Could it be somewhere we once stayed for a holiday when we were very, very small?"          - C.S. Lewis from The Last Battle What is Heaven like?  What can we learn from visions of Heaven that will give us a renewed sense of purpose here on earth?  How can we defy that old saying, Christians are so heavenly minded, "they are no earthly good?" A Spirit-filled vision of Heaven should give us hope for the future, and a purpose for the present.  When we go to the Bible we find some interesting visions of Heaven... In Isaiah 2:2-4 we have this description of Heaven from the prop...