"Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

St. Francis of Assisi (Iconography)
Acrylic Paints & Pens on Natural Wood Slice
Friday Face OFF 

Hello!  ¡Hola!  I want to begin by thanking everyone that visited my blog last week.  Your kind words encouraged me to write this second post, after my extra long hiatus.

Today, is the 5th Sunday after Pentecost, so I wrote a sermon on Luke 12:32-40, which is the appointed lectionary Gospel.  Here's an excerpt:

When Jesus declares “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” he means that we can train our ways of thinking, our wills, and our ways of living, through the ways we use our treasures.  If you spend your treasures only on yourself, your heart will be focused on possessions.  But if you use your treasures to help and give to all those in need, your heart will go where God wants it to go.  Most importantly, your heart will find God in the process, as we seek and serve Christ in all persons.

Enjoy! (Card & Envelope Set)
Coffee Themed Paper Piecing,
Tim Holtz' Tea Time Bigz Die by Sizzix (Retired),
and Dymo Label Maker
T is for... Drinks

But as simple as this sounds, it is not easy, for Jesus is speaking about more than Venmoing Jesus, making donations, or making charitable contributions.  Almsgiving is not just a transaction in which people give their excess for the sake of self-righteousness.  That is condescending.  Almsgiving is an expression of true solidarity with others.  It’s about refusing to let inequalities stand.  It’s about striving for justice and peace among all people.  It's about respecting the dignity of every human being.  Jesus wants kingdom people, in a radical dependence on him, to enact nothing less than a reversal of the world as it is presently known, lived in, and legitimized.

Therefore, Jesus calls for a shift away from a world in which some people survive only because some privileged people choose to act morally from time to time.  He wants a radically different world, a kingdom with kingdom people.  This reality entails the destruction of all divisions, autocracies, and nationalism.  Almsgiving isn’t about offerings to help those with less money; it’s about sharing power and advantage with everyone.  Such transformative solidarity creates an unfailing treasure in heaven.

Blessed (Collage)
Scraps of Hand Painted Papers,
Distressed Photo, and Marker Calligraphy
What's On WOYWW 844/64 

In closing, I want to leave you with an old photo of our treasured grandson in a collage I did.  He's almost 2 now, but he wears size 3T!  He's a handsome red headed little man with blue eyes.  There are blue eyes on both sides of our families, but the red heads are in my wife's family, who are of Scotch Irish descent.  We have a second grandson on the way, and can't wait to see what genes he has inherited!

Thanks for visiting!  ¡Gracias por su visita!