Below is an excerpt from the personal devotional included in this year’s 1517 Advent Resources.
The Lord’s provision doesn’t rest on the strength of our gratitude.
A Bit of Earth is about the garden, but it’s also about us—as we are made from dirt.

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In an age when families are already fractured beyond comprehension, are we seriously going to separate parents from children in the one service in which God himself is present to unite us to himself and one another?
Amazing grace is a sweet sound not just because it saved a wretch like me, but because it saved a whole wretched world like me.
Whenever I read the Genesis account of Abraham, I’m more impressed that he’s often a clumsy, mess of a man than that it’s “faith that’s accounted to him as righteousness.”
In God’s eyes, we cannot be too fat or ugly, mean or selfish, shamed or abused, corrupted or inadequate for him not to love us.
Some have built an entire theology on the false assumption that when God commands us to obey or believe, we have the ability to obey or believe.
We all look forward to Lent’s conclusion and the celebration of Resurrection Sunday. This is the Sunday of victory and joy as the Church enters into the reality that Christ has defeated death and hell, declared victory over such enemies and set history on its final course of consummation.
Give us eyes to see the face of Jesus in that little child wriggling in front of us, tugging at his mom’s sleeve, wanting a drink of water.
As sinful humans, we are adept at taking what God gives as gift and making it into a work. Nowhere is this made more evident than in the universally misunderstood doctrine of sanctification.
I cannot recall how many times I sang along to this theme song, punching and kicking as a kid in the 80s. But much of my desire to join the Marine Corps had its genesis in the 80s cartoon “G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero.”
Jesus becomes who you are and you become who he is. His kindness and patience and courage are given to you, and your lust and meanness and impatience are reckoned to him.
A good place to start is to work hard at loving those no one else seems to love. I can’t think of a more Christ-like action.
“The strongest person in the room doesn't win the fight," she said, "it’s whoever's the meanest…” I was fifteen years old when my aunt taught me that.