I am selling off all my 2009 inventory of my original artworks at sale prices. I’ve gone through a kind of personal transformation that I trust will be manifested in my art. I am turning a new leaf, so to speak. So I am sort of “purging” my older pieces. I still love them, but it’s time for them to go and find their new homes. There are some incredible deals so you might want to hurry to select yours. I will continue posting them on my art site, so stay tuned. Also, I am providing FREE SHIPPING for a limited time. Go HERE and enjoy shopping for some very affordable art.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
I just read something from Huston Smith’s fairly recent book, The Soul of Christianity. He suggests that:
there is a new mood in Christendom, a more conscious, general recognition that though for Christians God is defined by Jesus, he is not confined to Jesus.
I like this. However, I’m not sure it is complete enough. I agree with the first part that God is defined by Jesus, that Jesus as represented in the scriptures is an analogy of what God is like. The second part, that God is not confined to Jesus, is less satisfactory to me. I know what he means… that the revelation of the divine encompasses Jesus, but that revelation is more than that and can be received through many kinds of means. I think we can all agree that the revelation of the divine is not only in Jesus, but also in nature, philosophical truth, science, etc. Some Christians might argue that the one and only revelation of God is in Jesus, that God is confined to Jesus, but I wouldn’t find that sustainable.
Rather, may I suggest that the Mysterious and Unknown is willingly confined to the incarnational and revelational, which Jesus embodies? Is it possible that the incarnational, revelational movement of the Mysterious and Unknown may be defined by Jesus but not confined to Jesus? To say that God is not confined to Jesus implies a pluralism I’m not ready to embrace. So, I ask myself if it is possible that all revelation is part of one unfolding movement? We know things according to time and according to space. But is it possible that this unfolding movement is not time specific or spatially specific? Although we might know that there have been different revelations down through history, is it possible that what look like isolated instances of revelation are really a grand, unfolding, incarnational movement? I think it is worthwhile asking these questions.
The painting is one my watercolors called Cold Winter River (6″x10″; 15cm x 25cm).
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
This last weekend I was at a conference. One day one of the speakers spoke on love. I was moved to desire to love more deeply. Here’s some of the commitments I made:
- I relinquish all control of others, and commit to the liberation all people.
- I choose to be kind, even to the meanest.
- I celebrate the success of others, even my enemies.
- I refuse to protect, secure or improve my reputation.
- I renounce pride, and consider others as better than I.
- I decline making demands, even when it would be expected and accepted.
- I forsake irritation, even with the most irritating.
- I quit resentment, and keep no record of any wrongs done against me.
- I work for and celebrate justice for others.
- I propagate the truth of unconditional love, confident that it will win the day.
- I will not give up on, lose faith in, or cease hoping for anyone.
- I choose a love that endures through all circumstances.
That should keep me occupied. At least for today.
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
Hey everyone. Sorry I won’t have a cartoon up today. I’m at a Vineyard leaders conference. I’m typing this post from my iPhone. Did I ever tell you how much I love my iPhone? It’s the best cellphone I’ve ever had, and that’s just the phone part. All the other stuff makes it an incredible device. It’s the fourth person of the trinity!
I never look forward to these things, but I’m always glad I went. It’s the connecting with others. It’s like what research has discovered about therapy: people improve because if the connection with the therapist, not because of the therapy itself. Same here. I don’t think much is gained from dissemination of information. It’s the connections.
Peace out!
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
Bear with me as I give you an extended quote from William Glasser’s Choice Theory:
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.The simple operational premise of the external control psychology the world uses is: Punish the people who are doing wrong, so they will do what we say is right; then reward them, so they keep doing what we want them to do. This premise dominates the thinking of most people on earth. What makes this psychology so prevalent is that those who have the power- agents of government, parents, teachers, business managers, and religious leaders, who also define what’s right or wrong- totally support it. And the people they control, having so little control over their own lives, find some security in accepting the control of these powerful people. It is unfortunate that almost no one is aware that this controlling, coercing, or forcing psychology is creating the widespread misery that, as much as we have tried, we have not yet been able to reduce.
This misery continues unabated not because we have thought it over and decided that controlling others is best. Read More
Check out my t-shirts HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my contemplative art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
If people visit our community because they think it’s cool, they are going to be disappointed. Sure, our music is contemporary with a full band. We dress down and casual. We are laid back. The teaching time is sometimes loose, interactive, and different than what’s normal. We have coffee. We are quite young (I’m among the oldest). I often read from unorthodox versions. But that’s all incidental. We don’t try to be these things. This is just what we are. I disdain the thought of being cool just for the sake of being cool.
Some might complain that we’re not cool enough. We have a building. We are found within the broad parameters of what others would recognize as normative. Generally speaking, we haven’t strayed away, in my opinion, from the teaching. We do have a basic structure to our Sunday mornings. We have elders. We have staff (me and one other guy who does kids and youth). We have bibles. We are a part of a denomination. But this is incidental also.
I am not interested in modernization. I’m not interested in progressivism. I’m not interested in being contemporary. I’m not interested in being cool. But, neither am I interested in being orthodox or true to tradition. What I’m interested in and passionate about is how we as a community can live the truth that the Son of Man was in all things reconciling them, and that the Other is now the all in all. How do we live that out? I’m not interested in theologies that don’t wrestle with this. They fall short of the cataclysmic disclosure of universal grace.
Because I am more interested in the reconciliation of all (and yes, in one place), in preference to being orthodox, this causes problems. We are more interested in orthodoxy and being right than changing our minds in order to love, include and respect those who we think are believing and living wrong. When it comes down to it, I would rather include an unbelieving sinner, present tense, and be a heretic than to exclude him and be orthodox. This, I believe, is what is offensive about my blog. This is what, upon scrutiny, is offensive about our community. And this, I believe, is what gets me in trouble.
Check out my tees HERE. I’m growing my inventory all the time. And check out my landscapish art here and my nakedpastor art here.
Contributions to nakedpastor are greatly appreciated.
David Hayward is a pastor artistically stripping to the essential.
