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Looking Up

Gary Furr

I’ve begun a weekly short video devotional online called, “Looking Up.” In part I got the title from the King James Version of Luke 21:28 And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh. The context of the  verse is Jesus teaching about “signs of distress” and how to interpret them. That seemed useful to me in this moment. Anxiety causes many well-meaning but not well-informed folks to assume that every time the world goes through calamity that it means “the end is near.” Beyond the obvious … Continue reading Looking Up

Advent, Art, Bill Monroe, Bluegrass, Christianity, Christmas, Family, Home, Mother, Story, Uncategorized

Christmas Time Is Coming

Gary Furr

“Christmas TIme’s a-Comin'”is the name of a bluegrass Christmas song. When I was playing a lot more often than these days on the bluegrass and banquet circuit, I was always struggling to come up with bona fide mountain and bluegrass Christmas tunes. Generally we would simply take regular carols and hymns and sing them with a banjo and a mandolin. The few tunes from that world I came across were thanks to Emmy Lou Harris, who introduced me to“Beautiful Star of Bethlehem.” And then there was Bill Monroe’s tune, “Christmas Time’s a-Comin’,” whose words contained a single sentiment, “I’m going home. The house is ready, can’t wait to see all my people.”  One verse goes

Holly’s in the window, home where the wind blows

The cane foam’s a runnin’, Christmas time’s a comin’

Can’t you hear them bells ringin’, ringin’? Joy, don’tcha hear them singin’?

When it’s snowin’, I’ll be goin’ back to my country home

Most of us have never seen “cane foamin’.” The irony is that the song was written by Tex Logan, an electrical engineer from Texaswho worked for Bell Laboratories with a Master’s degree from MIT and a Ph.D. from Columbia, where he pioneered what became digital audio. Like his father, he was a fiddler. He played with a lot of famous people, including the Bee Gees. So much for the “country” roots.

But maybe that’s what Christmas music of all kinds does for us—connects us to deep and old roots, the places that were “home” no matter where we are now. This past Sunday we were inspired by beautiful music, some new, most familiar to us, but all around the theme of peace was woven also a sense of “home.” This season is the one in our church that is most deeply traditional. Amid all the rapid changes and chaos of Continue reading “Christmas Time Is Coming”

Alabama, Children, Citizenship, Family, Family, Uncategorized2 Comments
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Helping Alabama’s Children

Gary Furr

Alabama Coalition for Healthy Mothers and Children This Giving Tuesday, consider making a small donation to help mothers and children in Alabama receive the help they need to live happy, healthy lives. Our website and app are designed to provide information and access to food banks, diaper banks, clothes, and other vital resources. Join us in supporting the women and children of Alabama. EVERY dollar will go to the work of spreading our effort to connect all faith-based and public organizations help give easier access to information and help to the public so that we may improve the health of … Continue reading Helping Alabama’s Children

Cancer, Faith, Family, fear, God, Grace, Hope, Kate Bowler, spirituality, Suffering, Theology, Uncategorized

Everything Happens for a Reason? Review

Gary Furr

Review of Bowler, Kate. Everything Happens for a Reason and Other Lies I Have Loved. Random House Publishing Group.

By Gary Furr

Kate Bowler begins her book in the doctor’s office.  “I had lost almost thirty pounds by the time I was referred to a gastrointestinal surgeon at Duke University Hospital.” And then, the thud of reality.”

ONE MOMENT I WAS a regular person with regular problems. And the next, I was someone with cancer. Before my mind could apprehend it, it was there—swelling to take up every space my imagination could touch. A new and unwanted reality. There was a before, and now there was an after. Time slowed to a pulse. Am I breathing? I wondered. Do I want to? Every day I prayed the same prayer: God, save me. Save me. Save me.

There are plenty of books about the problem of suffering, but every now and then one comes along that makes us feel it. All humans eventually suffer in life somewhere along the way—but it is undeserved, unfair and untimely suffering that is the most crushing variety. Enter Kate Bowler, a professor at Duke Divinity School and church history. Bowler’s first book came from her dissertation, a study of the Prosperity Gospel, entitled Blessed: A History Of The American Prosperity Gospel. She befriended and studied the world of name it and claim it Christianity, embodied in the megachurch worlds of Kenneth Copeland and Joel Osteen.

This book, though, is a personal one, a wilderness wandering through the most difficult and intractable questions all religious people face: why suffering, why now, why me? She gets my vote for the most interesting title of the year and she does not disappoint. Kate is a wickedly funny writer but also gut-wrenchingly honest about her journey through Continue reading “Everything Happens for a Reason? Review”

Christianity, creation, Faith, God, Theology and Life, Uncategorized

Four Echoes of the Divine

Gary Furr

From Sunday’s Sermon “In his book Simply Christian NT Wright says there are four traces of the call of God in every human being. They are the echoes of the Creator’s voice in us. The longing for justice The quest for true spirituality The hunger for relationship The delight of beauty These four echoes are truly the best of what it means to be a human being. Since if they truly represent God‘s highest purposes in life, then those of us who aspire to that life should see evidence of these things as we make progress.” If you would counter … Continue reading Four Echoes of the Divine