“Hello. I’m a daily follower of your blog. You often write that you’re not a Christian, yet you live much of your life the way that Christ instructs his followers to live. Thank you for being an inspiration to me, and I’m sure others, to live a life doing small acts of great kindness. There are many times when your blog just makes me smile with gratitude. ” — Bonnie
Thanks, Bonnie; I am grateful for people like you. It was a priest, I recall, who wrote me saying I didn’t need to worship Jesus to be a follower. This was a revelation for me.
And a good one. I am a follower of Jesus Christ and his teachings. This has a lot of special meaning for me at Christmas time. Small acts of great kindness.
Thanks to those of you who have accompanied me on this trip. We are a community. Happy holidays to all of you.
Justice, mercy, and faithfulness, the 3 values summarize what Jesus was all about.
Justice. Justice was important to the heart of God, we see a focus on justice throughout the Old Testament, the life and teachings of Jesus, and in the early church. Justice involves giving people equal opportunity and fair treatment, irrespective of how they look or their cultural background. Justice is especially important for those who are less fortunate and can’t stick up for themselves.
Notice the right-wing so-called Christians emphasize not justice but freedom of the Constitution. But justice is a big part of the USConstitution which these fake Christians eschew. And sadly “freedom” is code for not spending government funds on people who are less fortunate.
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Mercy is a core characteristic of who God is, and we see this embodied in the life of Jesus. Jesus didn’t treat others as they deserve to be treated; instead, he gave love and forgiveness freely, even to the point of laying down his own life. The core Christian message is that we don’t have to be judged according to our sinful actions; instead we are freely loved and forgiven by God. At the same time Jesus does not suffer the greedy and thieves
Faithfulness. God sticks with us. We first see this in the Old Testament, in God’s covenant with the nation of Israel. Even though the Israelites struggled to obey God, God is faithful, sticking with them through the ups and downs. In the same way, God is faithful to us today, promising to never leave us nor forsake us. The divine goodness that exists in the universe/people’s hearts never completely disappears.