[Propertalk] Fw: Sermon Points - Luke 13:1-9 - Part 3

[Joe Parrish]

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From: Joe Parrish 
To: PROPERTALK.topic at ecunet.org 
Sent: Sunday, March 07, 2010 12:18 AM
Subject: Sermon Points - Luke 13:1-9 - Part 3


In effect, Jesus is saying: 
I've just dumped a lot of manure on you, and I'm giving you a year before I come back to see if you are bearing good fruit or not. 
So pay attention to what I've just taught you. Absorb it. Take it in. 

And let me activate in you what you are already designed for. 

You don't have to become completely different - become a whole new tree. Just bear the fruit that you already have been created for; already have the capacity for. 

http://www.holytextures.com/Luke-13-01-09.pdf

David Ewart, www.holytextures.com 
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I am fascinated by Chaos Theory. A relatively new branch of physics that has been applied in many other fields such as biology and meteorology. Chaos theory stated at its most simple, suggests that systems evolve and are not static, that even orbits can become irregular over time due to irregular actions of "strange attractors".

An early pioneer of the theory was Edward Lorenz whose interest in chaos came about accidentally through his work on weather prediction in 1961. Lorenz decided to cut time on running a very long computer programme, by inserting values, (which the first half of the programme would have calculated), at the halfway mark of the programme. To his surprise the weather that the machine began to predict was completely different from the weather calculated before. Lorenz tracked this down to the computer printout. The computer worked with 6-digit precision, but the printout rounded variables off to a 3-digit number, so a value like 0.506127 was printed as 0.506. This difference is tiny and the consensus at the time would have been that it should have had practically no effect. However Lorenz had discovered that small changes in initial conditions produced large changes in the long-term outcome. Lorenz's discovery, which gave its name to Lorenz attractors, proved that meteorology could not reasonably predict weather beyond a weekly period (at most). 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory

I think Jesus has an invitation for us as the Church and as individuals.

As we face the barrage of opinion and doctrinaire drivel that spews with egotistical certainty from so many pulpits and podiums, we have an opportunity to pause a moment and consider the mystery of all around us and then respond, "It is not certain"

All that is certain is the mystery.

http://thelisteninghermit.wordpress.com/2010/03/01/"it-is-not-certain"/

Peter Woods
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No, said Jesus, don't demonize your neighbor. Don't presume to invoke God's judgment on someone else. You can't purchase God's favor by projecting your fears and anxieties onto others. Then, as he often did, Jesus flipped the story so that its moral applied to the living rather than to the dead. Jesus compared his audience to barren fruit trees. 

http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20070305JJ.shtml

Daniel B. Clendenin
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It might help us all whether nurturing or nurtured to grasp that in the 'great eternal plan' we are all living in borrowed time, every extra day we're granted. (Heart surgery brought that home more vividly than any sermon some years ago!) Time doesn't belong to us, nor should it be allowed to master us. It's there to serve God's ongoing love & compassion for us all, fruitful or not at this stage. Let's none of us ever give up on ourselves or others. God doesn't. (N.B. It's not the owner, but the gardener who represents God in this little parable!) 

http://www.angelfire.com/journal2/laterallyluke/LLK1319LENT2.html

Brian McGowan
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I cling to the words of the vinekeeper, "Let the tree stand." I hold fast to the willingness of the vinekeeper to work on that tree some more if not on this earth, then in the far reaches of heaven where I hear there is redemption and where I am told there are no more tears.

http://teamnoah.info/Stirred/jm.html

Sarah M. Foulger
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