Pastor Craig's ConSpiritu Blog

In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet , Juliet muses upon her budding (forbidden) love with Romeo. The basic conflict that drives the entire story is that Romeo is a Montague and Juliet is a Capulet, and the two families are sworn enemies. O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name; Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, And I'll no longer be a Capulet. 'Tis but thy name that is my enemy; Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What's Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part Belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What's in a name? that which we call a rose By any other name would smell as swee t… ( Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2) So what is in a name? People give their children names for varying reasons. Sometimes it sounds good with a last name. Sometimes it is to honor a relative. Sometimes it is to evoke or allude to a particular quality evinced in the name, e.g., Peter = “rock,”...

Thanksgiving is rapidly approaching, which means that Christmas is not too far behind. Christmas is perhaps the biggest annual show in our culture. Most of the trappings of Christmas have little to do with the original reason and meaning of the holiday, but even that story is one of the biggest shows around. The Christmas storyline – the one dealing with the birth of Jesus the son of Joseph and Mary of Nazareth, that is – is filled with adventure, intrigue and mystery. It features other-worldly visitors, murderous tyrant, seekers and practitioners of occult wisdom, rustic ruffians, a young family on the run, a birth in desperate circumstances. It is a drama through and through. The story has been so thoroughly rehearsed and replayed  for us that we rarely pause to consider who the people might be in this story. For the next four Sundays, we will be preparing for Christmas by getting to know some of the key players in greater depth. We will be doing this through a series of “int...

In the book of Deuteronomy, Moses addresses the whole company of Israelites as they prepare to enter into the land of Canaan with these words: “When the Lord your God has brought you into the land that he swore to your ancestors…a land with fine, large cities that you did not build, houses filled with all sorts of goods that you did not fill, hewn cisterns that you did not hew, vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you have eaten your fill, take care that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” (Deuteronomy 6:10-12). We all have inherited much in our community and church for which we did not plan nor did we build. How shall we express our gratitude? How shall we responsibly care for our inheritance? What shall we do as members of this household of God, who, like the early Israelites, have been led by God’s providential presence and have received innumerable blessings from God’s gracious hand? How shall ...

Stop what you are doing right this moment and look around at the room you are sitting in. How many of the things you see did you have a direct hand in producing? For instance, the computer you are using to read this blog – did you manufacture it? If you did, did you also manufacture the processor and other electronic components? Did you put together the monitor? Did you manufacture the plastic, or refine and cast the aluminum, did you process the silicon, the other various minerals for the screen? How about the food you eat, and the clothes you wear? The chances re extremely likely that you are responsible for very few of the things you consume or use every day. The point of this exercise is to help us remember that we are totally dependent upon sources outside of ourselves for much of what we need to live or to use everyday. Nothing is self-generated, everything arises out of something that preceded it. We owe our entire existence to things that we had nothing to do with producing. ...