nickels

IF I HAD A NICKEL* for every "random" connection between people I know, I could bailout the auto industry, and have enough left over to finish off my student loans. Seriously.

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Relationships are the grace of God, shaken, pressed down and overflowing. There aren't two degrees of separation between anyone. When I sit down with someone it is simply them, me and God. If I think anything else, I've lost perspective of what is true -- the very image of God. It isn't that humanity is perfect, but I do believe that God uses people as icons of his personhood, and reminders of his desire to be in right relationship with each and every human heart. I must believe that this God's plan for me is to desire that as well, and to participate in the beautiful work of making it happen.

"All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

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I don't have nickels for my people-web, but I do have the relationships, so that is what I will be investing into: people. I have been blessed to see the network of life, and my vision of it, stretch and grow lately. It is powerful to see, and the more I do the more I realize that relationships belong to God. They are central to his transforming work, his bringing sinful people to a point of reconciliation with himself and his work - making them his ambassadors. May we be ambassadors in peace and love, being more and more reconciled with God, and taking the message into our relational world.



*Note: I will be accpeting nickels (and random connections) towards paying off my student loans.