Prayer is not so much about convincing God to do what we want God to do as it is about convincing ourselves to do what God wants us to do.

MOST of the ugliness in the human narrative comes from a distorted quest to possess beauty. COVETING begins with appreciating blessings: MURDER begins with a hunger for justice. LUST begins with a recognition of beauty. GLUTTONY begins when our enjoyment of the delectable gifts of GOD starts to consume us. IDOLATRY begins when our seeing a reflection of God in something beautiful leads to our thinking that the beautiful image bearer is worthy of WORSHIP.

That is the power of the Eucharist. At the communion table you have rich and poor together in the early church and they were being challenged.

There are financial bankruptcies in many parts of the church. No question about that. But we see the possibility of reimagining and revitalizing the church.

We are faithful not to the triumphant golden eagle (ironically, also an imperial symbol of power in Rome) but to the slaughtered Lamb.

We think of justice sometimes as getting what you deserve, you know  -  what crime was committed and what is the punishment for that crime. That's how a lot of the criminal justice works. But God's justice is restorative, so it's not as interested in those same questions of "What did they do wrong?" and "What is the punishment for that?" It's more about what harm was done and how do we heal that harm, and that's a much more redemptive version. So, it definitely doesn't turn a blind eye to harm, but it does say we want to heal the wounds of that.

We can tell the world that there is life after death, but the world really seems to be wondering if there is life before death.