Tag: Faith
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Leviticus and the Butchery of Eid
The animals streamed into the capital in the days preceding Kurbani Eid. The basement of every apartment block became home to half a dozen or so offerings-to-be; mostly bulls, the occasional heifer and even a goat or two. Out in the streets pick-up trucks loaded with these same animals drove back and forth, delivering them…
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The Pigeon and the Coo d’Etat
The chilly air of a Scottish April morning warmed slightly as the sun rose slowly. Or at least, became present in unseen places. It doesn’t shine too intensely in Scotland on a regular basis. Nonetheless, as the dewy ground heated slightly it gave way to a gentle mist, the dawning light catching the edges thereof,…
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30 Years Old: What Lies Ahead?
This week I turn 30. I’m not really one for birthdays. Dee and I have been together for 15 years (yes, I know, too young… moving on). The first year of our childhood romance we enthusiastically bought each other presents… and that was the last time. We are both terrible present buyers, poor celebrators in…
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Soul Ceol
Almost 3 years ago, I teared up one night, when, after our Friday evening church meeting, my then 4-year old daughter came out of her kid’s club and told me about the cycle of the book of Judges; Sin, Enemy, Repentance, Deliverer, Sin, Enemy, Repentance, Deliverer, etc., etc. I teared up because I remember the…
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The Longings of the Human Heart
I didn’t expect this to happen. If you’d asked me 7 months ago what I would be involved with in South Asia, I could have given you a plethora of important answers, and many an idea springing from a (admittedly sometimes overactive) holy imagination. But amongst all those options that my uninitiated brain could formulate,…
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Who Are You?
Slowly, he approached his father’s tent. Heart beating, skin itching, mind whirring. Determination etched on his face; today he would finally steal grace. “Did my brother’s clothes always weigh so heavy?” he wondered. Maybe the weight lay elsewhere. Did he pause for a minute outside the tent door? Did he fortify his resolve with reasoning,…
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Our Feet Shall Tread This Place Again
Recently Dee and I have been watching some David Attenborough documentaries. The last set that we watched were focussed on migration. Sharks that travel to a remote Hawaiian Islands to attack fledgling albatross chicks attempting their first flight, salmon turning bright red, and braving Alaskan bears, to reach their spawning grounds, lay their eggs and…
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Chickens, Elephants, and the Illusion of Freedom
Recently I was visiting a poor rickshaw driver’s family in their home. Our teammates have befriended this rickshaw driver, and treated him well, witnessing to him in word and deed. They live in a field behind a large mosque, with a handful of other small one-room dwellings. Their entire living space is about 7ft by…
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The Blessedness of Kind Mother-in-laws
Mother-in-laws (MILs) can be the recipients of some bad stereotyping in the West. I’ll say it clearly at the start for the record: My Mother-in-law is great! And for a lot of people in the Western world, the stereotype doesn’t have as much bearing as perhaps it did at some point in time. Recently, we’ve…
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3 Months In
Yesterday marked the 3-month mark in our new land. On any given day, 3 months is just a few days, or a quarter of a year. While it has always felt incredibly, blessedly, normal to be here, occasionally it hits home that now we live here. After all the years of praying, dreaming, planning, praying,…
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The Bridling of Death
Why are we, in the West, so uncomfortable with death? Last year Dee and I took a short break in Portugal. It was outside of tourist season, so it was easy to relax. In this Atlantic coastal area, there was plenty to do and see. One day we hiked along the cliffs, as the sun…
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The Master of the Nets
On a lakeshore in Northern Israel stood two men; two experts in their respective fields. One, a fisherman who could mend a net with his eyes shut, who could stand in his vessel on choppy waters without losing balance, who knew the feeding times of the many shoals hidden beneath the surface, whose calloused hands…
Imitators of Those 