outWORD by Matte Downey

The posts have not been too regular lately because I am in Africa. Even as I type this I find it hard to believe that I sat in an airplane for nearly 24 hours and emerged halfway around the world in another hemisphere. I feel surprisingly at home (perhaps it is the good friends I am staying with who make that so) and though I have seen many interesting and strange sights and have met a wide array of African and international people, the similarities seem more pronounced than the differences. I will write more on my trip later, but last night as I was lying in bed, I was suddenly struck by a truth (enough to make me get out of bed, turn on the light, and write some thoughts down in my journal). Lately, spurred by various discussions with people and different encounters, I have been thinking about what our words mean in different contexts and last night as I laid down, this phrase ran through my head: We have divorced our words from our actions. With God, they are one. When God spoke in

I am reading through Deuteronomy and have once again encountered God’s warning not to make a form, an image, or an idol representing God. This is a hard concept for us to grasp in our modern, mostly iconoclastic society, but today as I was reading, I think I caught a glimpse of something very distasteful that I have often seen in religious circles and (ugh) in my own practice of faith. It is hard to explain or put your finger on exactly, but it is a certain smugness at doing the right thing, an ignorant pride that comes with knowing partial truth, a bravado at having somehow managed to be on the winning team and looking pitifully at those still waiting to be picked. When a particularly gifted evangelist comes to town, the committed Christians crowd the place and knowingly nod at every profound point, giving a sideways glance at those poor sinners who have ventured into the meeting and surely must be on the verge of repentance, I mean, how could one not be under this anointed preaching?