Amid the complexities of John’s theology, we find two simple statements: God is love, and no one has ever seen God. In our concrete experience of love, therefore, God becomes “visible.”

"Truth, Justice, and the American Way”—many of us thrilled to the sound of those words narrated over the opening credits of the old Superman series. Sure, it was schlocky and idealistic, but sometimes such ideas have the power to stir us as much as any serious, reasoned argument, perhaps more!

For I’m no longer going to be visible in the world; They’ll continue in the world While I return to you.

I feel lucky that I had a relatively technology-free childhood. The internet wasn’t widely used until the end of my college years, which was about the same time people started getting cell phones. My parents couldn’t keep tabs on me the way parents can today.

I used to be picked last when my grammar school friends and I gathered to play 16-inch softball. It wasn’t because I was that bad a player. Actually, I was pretty good. But because I worked after school in my father’s grocery store most evenings, I just didn’t have the opportunity to play as often as the other guys.

Tom is a photographer and art director by profession and a Nebraskan by birth. Maybe the combination of creative vision and Midwestern common sense keep him on such an even keel. Whatever it is, few have seen the man display anger or lose his cool on the job, though no one would say he was without compassion or sympathy.

If we love one another, God remains in us. The First Letter of John can sound lofty, but we know that in families, love often shows up in very mundane disguises. For example, I once heard a woman, an attorney, describe an early warning system that alerted her about the state of her marriage.

Believing in a God who shows us kindness, we ask for God’s mercy as we continue our Easter journey toward the fullness of the Spirit at Pentecost.

Let your heart be an altar. Then, with full confidence in God, present your body for sacrifice. God desires not death, but faith; God thirsts not for blood, but for self-surrender.