Reflections on Ourselves and the World we live in …

Naomi experienced a number of major difficulties in her life: 1) there came a famine in the land that required she move away from her home and friends to a foreign country, 2) early in that new country her husband died leaving her alone with her two sons, 3) her two sons then proceeded to go against her values and chose wives from the moabites, 4) her sons then died leaving her alone with these two foreign daughter-in-laws.

And yet through all of this Naomi was of such a special character that both of her Moabite daughter-in-law’s did not want to leave her! Naomi had loved them, foreign as they were, to the point with they wanted to stay with her. And in fact even when she attempted to send them away, one of them, Ruth, insisted that she would always go where Naomi went, and further that Naomi’s God would be her God! What a profound influence Naomi had on those women’s lives! She’s the real star in this story!

And she here shows us the gold (GOD) standard for loving the unsaved.

the metamorphosis of shedding an old shell can be very painful for others who are watching, and especially us as we transform. it’s not an evaluation of failure on what’s past, but a trading of what has come into focus as incomplete for something better. so, in looking back, it’s all good, but it’s not all God!!

For a compassionate man nothing human is alien: no joy and
no sorrow, no way of living and no way of dying.
This compassion is authority because it does not tolerate
the pressures of the in-group, but breaks through the
boundaries between languages and countries, rich and poor,
educated and illiterate. This compassion pulls people away from
the fearful clique into the large world where they can see
every human face is the face of a neighbor. Thus the authority
of compassion is the possibility of man to forgive his brother,
because forgiveness is only real for him who has discovered the
weakness of his friends and the sins of his enemy in his own
heart.
… Henri J. M. Nouwen (1932-1996), The Wounded Healer:
Ministry in Contemporary Society [1979], New York:
Doubleday, 2013, p. 41

“If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthy pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud.”

“Yes, all lives do matter. But they only matter when Black lives matter, too.” – Stevie Wonder

“Science is a method,” Rasmussen said. “Just because it comes out in a peer-reviewed journal, that doesn’t mean it’s settled. All studies have their limitations, and the peer review process itself has its limitations.”

— Columbia University virologist Angela Rasmussen.

(https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2020/11/20/inconclusive-results-missing-data-why-experts-are-pushing-back-on-a-study-questioning-masks/)

this was stated in response to a study out of Denmark showing only a 14% difference in likelihood of one catching the covid-19 virus between those wearing a mask and those not wearing a mask, and this result was deemed less than significant.

but the bigger issue here is the acknowledgement that scientific data and conclusions does not deserve the title of final arbiter of truth. many have accepted the rationale that science is irrefutable, but in reality, the current inclination of scientific date may indicate an inclination of truth, while further/future study may totally turn that result away from original conclusions.

why?? because as recognized above, science is a method, and the “results” are our limited conclusions.