Good morning... As I look back on our week of learning, this bonding wisdom draws me like a magnet. "God is always saying to us, 'If you give Me everything, I will give you everything," says my vibrant 93-year-old friend Betty Skinner. "It is a constant coming, a constant offering, a constant struggle to let go in order [...]
Good morning... If I had one superpower I think I might choose the ability to control time. Wouldn't it be cool to turn back time, returning to a day we would love to last forever? Wouldn't it awesome to speed up time, fast-forwarding through a dark, hard season to get to our bright future? Wouldn't it be empowering [...]
Good morning... The person with the most nicknames in our family is our youngest son, Jeremiah. Jay. Jerry. Jay-bird. J.J. Jubes. Jerold. Jay-bar-tinkle (not sure where that one came from). Jesus himself had lots of nicknames. Lord. Christ. Master. Son of God. Son of man. The Word made flesh. The list goes on and on, but currently my favorite nickname for [...]
Good morning... Very graciously she said to me, "I don't want to open your blog and hear about negative stuff happening in your community. Cancer. Suicide. Tragedy after tragedy. I have enough hurting people struggling around me. I don't need your painful experiences piling on mine, dragging me down. I read your morning messages hoping to be inspired, [...]
Good morning... Remember the hard labor I experienced last month? I felt like I was birthing a 12-pound baby as I delivered into the world the manuscript for this year's Advent devotional entitled With God Weather Life. Well, since I pushed the words into this world, we fine-tooth-combed her full head of hair and took gorgeous black and white [...]
Good morning... On our behalf, Jesus continues praying to his Father. "I gave them your word. The godless world hated them because of it, because they didn’t join the world’s ways, just as I didn’t join the world’s ways. I’m not asking that you take them out of the world but that you guard them from the Evil One. They are no [...]
Good morning... "Breathe into the glory of this day," her voice set the table for our verbal feast. "Cold is coming. Thanksgiving is approaching. At harvest we gather love to share." Then she read aloud a blessing to begin our sacred hour. "Today we have gathered and we see that the cycles of life continue," her voice soothed [...]
Good morning... "Life is all about practicing for heaven," says Richard Rohr (Falling Upward, 101). "We practice by choosing union freely - ahead of time - and now. Heaven is the state of union both here and later. As now, so will it be then." In my mind God translates this quote into a three word directive: "BE ONE [...]
Good morning... When I drive solo I drive in silence. No radio. No podcasts. No books on tape. I look around. I think my thoughts. I take in beauty, town to town. I notice. I wonder. I process life. While driving through the colorful hills of North Carolina this weekend, a bumpersticker smiled at me, "Life is good." [...]
Good morning... I hate it when I spend early morning hours crafting a blog post, and then a misguided mistake makes it vanish, disappear, blip away in an instant. Of course it's me. I swipe wrong. I touch something I shouldn't. My non-technical mind makes some errant error. I hate it when I spend early morning hours crafting [...]
