The Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:2-17)

May 09, 2022 by Marissa Compton

(3-5) I am your God, your Creator, the only one that can save you. Do not look to anyone or anyone else for healing or rescue, do not think that anyone or anyone else is the key to your happiness.

(7) Remember that some things are holy and treat them that way. There are places, like temples and the tops of mountains, and things, like my name and your sexuality, that are sacred. Be careful not to be casual or selfish with these things.

(8-9) Sunday is a sacred space, and you must find a way to mark it as such. Sunday is for rest—not numbing yourself, but true rest, the kind that fills you up. It is for nurturing yourself and nurturing others.

(12) Love your parents, even when you disagree with them, when you’re hurt by them, when they have been unwise. Recognize and allow them their humanity, and love them in it. Treat them with kindness and honor, care for them in their old age as they cared for you.

(13) Don’t murder people.

(14) Do not have affairs—emotional or physical—when you are married or with someone who is married.

(15) Don’t take things that aren’t yours.

(16) Be as honest as you know how to be, and especially beware of those lies that can be used against others for your own gain.

(17) Don’t make the mistake of thinking that other people’s happy is your sad or that you deserve things. Be grateful for what you’ve been given—your body and breath, the earth, people who love you. It was all given.

3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:

5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them…

7 Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.

8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.

9 Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work…

12 Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.

13 Thou shalt not kill.

14 Thou shalt not commit adultery.

15 Thou shalt not steal.

16 Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.

17 Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour’s.

Genesis 1: The First Creation Story

May 31, 2020 by Marissa Compton

Before the first beginning, God created everything. The world was shapeless, then, dust and water and swirling gravity, a sea of darkness and chaos. The Spirit of God hovered over it all, caressing it.

And God said, "Let there be light," and at Their word light flooded into existence. And God loved the light, and moved it to one side, so that there would still be a place for darkness too. They named the light day and the darkness night.

And it was evening and morning, first day.

(Loosely) Isaiah 55

February 24, 2020 by Marissa Compton

Hey, you, the one kind of struggling—come here. I know you don't have anything to give me back, that's OK. Rest here, draw strength, let me feed you and take care of you. Do you need a hug?

Dear one, why are you putting your resources into things that don't make you happy? Why are you spending your energy on things that don't fill you up?

Come here, listen to me, and you will remember what it's like to feel alive and joyful. I will make the same promises with you that I made with those that came before you, and you will be sure of my mercy and tenderness.

Jeremiah 29

February 20, 2020 by Marissa Compton

(These are my favorite scriptures about “living in the world but not of the world.”)

This is what God said to everyone that was forced out of Jerusalem into Babylon:

Build houses and live in them. Plant roots, grow gardens, dig up the vegetable and pick the fruit and eat it, year after year. Get married, and have kids and then marry your kids off and have grandkids and surround yourself with family. Don't stop living just because this is not what you expected, don't lean into the lessness, make it more.