Fooling with Scripture podcast, Ep 5 -- When Healing Calls

Check out the fifth episode of the Fooling with Scripture podcast (or find it on iTunes), in which I talk about the call to be healed in the story of Bartimaeus.

You can read the full story -- it's a quick read! -- in Mark 10:56-42.

My favorite commentary on Mark's gospel comes from the first chapter of a book by William Placher called Narratives of a Vulnerable God: Christ, Theology, and Scripture (Westminster John Knox Press, 1994).



I mention a couple of sources about calling and vocation in the podcast. The first is the famous definition of vocation from Frederick Buechner. I've seen a bunch of different versions of that quote from different sources; here's an extended quote from one source, Buechner's book Wishful Thinking: A Seeker's ABC (HarperSanFrancisco, 1973, 1993):

It comes from the Latin vocare, to call, and means the work a person is called to by God. There are all different kinds of voices calling you to all different kinds of work, and the problem is to find out which is the voice of God rather than of Society, say, or the Superego, or Self-Interest. By and large a good rule for finding out is this: The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done....The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet (pgs. 118-119)

I also mentioned Parker Palmer's book Let Your Life Speak (John Wiley & Sons, 2000), which is one of my all-time favorites. The paraphrase of Father Howard Gray is from a personal conversation I was privileged to have with him a few years back.

Also, if you're interested in questions of purpose and calling, and especially if you're a young adult, check out the latest issue of Ignited Magazine -- and consider submitting your writing and/or art!

I hope you find some of this helpful, and even more so that you find a space for healing and wholeness this week!

Questions? Comments? Want a particular scripture fooled with? Want to be a guest? Email me!

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