Specific details of birth, form, circumstance are accidental—happen without consent, often can’t be changed, yet don’t impose the essence of who we are, unless we never choose otherwise. When we do, we are transubstantiated, even as our accidents remain. youtu.be/lj8Z6K-M5_4

What if heaven isn’t the end of our journey, but the beginning? What if we’ve lived whole lifetimes hoping to secure a heaven that has been right here all along, just under the surface of our uncertainty? youtu.be/c_8A5NRdG6E

The last two segments of the interview between Bill Protzman and Dave Brisbin on collective consciousness opened into particularly universal themes, and here's one segment: "Is it really as easy as love one another?" youtu.be/5KwfqnTmTq4

Do you have faith? How do you know? Because you believe you believe? What if there’s the slightest doubt? Is it still faith? As long as we imagine faith as mental agreement, we can run round these questions forever without ever really knowing. youtu.be/NUAUA_nQHlw

James tells us to speak and act as if we are to be judged by the law of liberty… The only “law” that liberates is a love that never separates. To live that love is to know we are judged only by standards we set for ourselves, chosen or instilled. youtu.be/tFzz97KqVh4

I don’t usually do verse-by-verse scripture studies. Too easy to get lost in details, lose the forest for the trees. Too easy to be consumed with commentary and lose the application to everyday life. An exception is the Book of James...all application. youtu.be/BEvkLZovtLM

We hear all about Peter and Paul as leaders of the early church, but in the confusion following the crucifixion, there was only one man who had the reputation, trust, and kinship to hold the fledgling movement together: James the Just, Jesus’ brother. youtu.be/RNw8rg1SiwQ

We'll be starting new book study on Wednesday evening, September 23rd. Our study group meets Wednesday evenings via Zoom at 6:30PM PST, and we will be working through selected portions of the book, Thomas Merton: Spiritual Master. theeffect.org/book-study-tho…

Ever awaken at 3:30 in the morning? Maybe coming out of a disorienting dream, disembodied in the dark with all it means to be you laid aside? It’s right there in that naked vulnerability that a lot of the work of Jesus’ Way is already done for you… youtu.be/zWaWvyPWeNs

Jesus’ Way is a dive into the right mind by living as if all life is one, experiencing loving the enemy while relinquishing the dominance of the left mind, selling off everything that obscures us as one with. It’s a way of having a spiritual stroke. youtu.be/xUcw0Mw6aa0

We were taught that Jesus came to save us from our sins. Not true. Not sins plural as in the harmful choices we make. Jesus came to save us from the separation that is the sin of the world. But to do that he first had to save us from shame. youtu.be/ykj-ChLL2E0

Wise man say the path is made by walking on it. Life is not a worn path in the woods, stretching out behind and before. It’s like a ship at sea. You see the wake behind, ahead only trackless ocean. A cloud of possible futures... youtu.be/xu0zkvbbobA

Jesus called himself the Way. Not as propositional truth to use as a litmus test for orthodoxy, but as the invitation to participate and experience relational truth that could promise liberation no other way. youtu.be/DV7PLyCQntQ

We think of eternal life as a long time, an eternal future granted by God in exchange for believing the right things. But all time is just one moment, eternally. In Aramaic, eternal life is not life that goes on eternally, but life that is eternally alive youtu.be/lGnod623_CM

Jesus is a micro revolutionary calling us to fight an interior revolution for spiritual liberation. The moment our longing for freedom exceeds the fear of claiming our right to unalienable love, the revolution begins. youtu.be/7c561vGMVgU

Jesus said that the bread was his body and wine a new covenant in his blood, but how we understand the word covenant has everything to do with how we understand communion. We've understood it as a contract, but for early followers, it was a last will. youtu.be/KH4TD22IRbk

Ancient Hebrews imagined God’s presence as a pillar of cloud, right herenow among them, but without form that could be pinpointed or represented. And they were forbidden to try. They knew God is always in the cloud. A cloud of mystery and probability. youtu.be/ZckaW2H4BJQ

If God is forgiveness, then God doesn’t forgive. Forgiveness is the essence of the field of God’s presence. Enter the field, enter forgiveness. There is no prerequisite for forgiveness. No contrition, confession, penance required. youtu.be/Dzq0hIl9MZQ

God doesn’t forgive; God exists as indivisible restoration to the oneness we call forgiveness. We aren’t forgiven as an act God performs or not, we simply walk into the freedom from victimization that is God’s presence. Or not. youtu.be/AiLqgDIjFH4

We say sin leads to separation, but sin is separation itself. Any act that leads to separation is sinful, but to focus on behavior, on symptom, is to lose sight of the cause—our separation anxiety. The Good News is any sense of separation is illusion. youtu.be/HoSWgIh_qKo