Harmony of Grace

Most Christian children are taught to say grace before meals.  The obvious reason for this is to show our gratitude to God for the food that we are about receive. The practice come from the Latin  gratiarum actio , meaning "act of thanks." I believe that there is more to saying grace than just offering thanks. As we quieten ourselves before a meal, we are acknowledging Christ's presence with us in that moment. When Jesus shared in the first Holy Communion with his closest friends at the last supper, he declared that they should do the same, as often as they can, in remembrance of him. Most churches officially participate in the sacrament of Holy Communion once a month or even weekly in some contexts. Some Christian communities share the Eucharist together every day, sometimes even two or three times a day! While we may not follow the official communion liturgy or practice every time we break bread and drink wine together, perhaps our act of saying grace before a meal can ...

I recently heard Jason Mraz's cheerful new song called  Look For The Good . Here are the words of the chorus: Look for the good in everything Look for the people who will set your soul free It always seems impossible until it's done Look for the good in everyone It reminded me of how often we are negative rather than positive; how we so often see the so-called bad parts of a person before we see the good things about them; how we focus on the dangers of a situation before we see the opportunities. There is a prevalent idea in many Christian circles of original sin. Basically, because of Adam's decision to sin against God in the Genesis creation story, all future generations have suffered the consequences. We are told that we are born into sin and there is no way that we can escape being sinful. Some Christians even claim that if a child dies before they are baptised, they will be condemned to an eternity in a fiery hell... Can you believe it?!  While the claim of original s...

Many Christians claim that they first met God in a church or while reading their bibles. My story is a bit different. "God writes the gospel not in the Bible alone, but on trees and flowers and clouds and stars." - Martin Luther   I was introduced to metal music at a young age. I loved the husky screaming over grungy, melodic riffs on the electric guitar. When I rocked out to Avenged Sevenfold and Killswitch Engage, my soul felt refreshed and overjoyed. I starkly remember visiting one of my friend's youth events at a strict, fundamental church and being told by a leader there that rock music is from the devil and as Christians, we should only be filling our lives with good and pure things (which according to him was the multi-million dollar worship industry of the time). According to this youth leader, there was no holiness to be found in the rock-music scene and it was our duty as Christians to take Jesus to them! The problem was that, while I enjoyed some of the worship...