Good morning... On different devices, our immediate family Zoomed with my mom and dad in Ohio as part of our Easter celebration. We had a real scare with my 83-year-old mother's health this past month - a broken femur following a fall, a small stroke, a life-threatening infection, organs shutting down, on a ventilator in the ICU. Yet [...]
Good morning... It is sometimes hard to notice God's invisible ways. This morning I caught God undeniably at work. As most of you know, I get up in the middle of the night to write our blog posts whenever God stirs me awake. After getting out of bed and enjoying a few hours of prayerful pondering, I craft [...]
Good morning... Walking our dog past a neighborhood nearby, I snapped the photo above on Friday morning. Bursting with color. Boasting with joyful variety. Blooming with the fabulous fragrance of spring. My whole weekend mirrored the image above, colorful, joyful, fabulously fragrant. A few friends, one new and one old, hopped into my car for a ride to [...]
Good morning... A longtime friend has also had a loved one fighting for life in the ICU this month. We have been exchanging private prayers and texting one another updates most every day. She wrote me an email after this week's blog post My Mom's Bumpy Ride Home, a post which ended with a music video of Willie [...]
Good morning... There are many, many of layers of me. Wife. Mother. Attentive listener. Writer. Teacher. Lifelong learner. Daughter. Middle sister. Midwestern roots. Trusted friend. Dog mama. Lover of the sun, the sea, the sky. Avid prayer-er. Spiritual director. Middle of the night blogger. "Spirit of the living God, please move through the many layers [...]
Good morning... I have continued to think about a random quote shared in our supervision group last week. "There are a lot of people who work for God and very few who actually work with God." Changing just one word makes all the difference. What might it mean for us to work with God rather than working for [...]
Good morning... During our Friday morning class, we wondered together how we ordinary people might actually hear the guiding voice of God. Enlivening our discussion, one of our classmates told us a true story. Lake Blue Ridge is a thin place for this friend, a sacred spot where heaven and earth seem seamlessly bound. On one of her [...]
Good morning... After texted about My Rough Re-entry, my friend responded with life-giving words. "You are carrying the load," she noticed, "yoking with so many." "This morning I read a Kate Bowler devotional (my Lenten practice) from _Good Enough_," my friend explained. "She wrote about this idea: Sometimes there are two selves - a 2:00 am self (the [...]
Good morning... It can be hard to re-enter life's normal rhythm after being swept up into mountaintop moments. Personally, quietly, my re-entry has been rough. Sharing my truth, I found myself texting a friend in the middle of the night. "I am taking my time re-entering the rhythm of life following our ten day trip through Israel," I [...]
Good morning... I have texted with a dear friend whose husband was forced to retire this week due to worsening health concerns. "My heart is heavy," she wrote. "We finished moving him completely out of his office yesterday. 35 years as a lawyer, reduced to a few boxes piled in a closet in the home office we are [...]
