Good morning... Okay, friends. So we are about one third of the way through December. Amazing how time flies. As I look back over the past ten calendar days, this is what I see. One impromptu lunch. Two holiday performances. Three happy hour gatherings. Four special worship services. Five Christmas parties. Six celebratory dinners. Tonight is the Secret [...]
Good morning... Having journeyed together through Learning to Walk in the Dark by Barbara Brown Taylor, we arrive at the final poem. Might all of our learning culminate here? My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going . . . and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. [...]
Good morning... Each time I walk our dogs, I pass by these two trees. One tree bears a sign with the name and the face of a three year old Israeli girl who was kidnapped by Hamas. Another tree shares the name and the face of a seventy-seven year old hostage. I am grateful for a compassionate neighbor [...]
Good morning... As the full harvest moon slowly begins to empty and September breathes its last, I experience a strange occurrence. After taking our dogs out to relieve themselves in the middle of this night, I sit down on the couch to write. A few minutes later I hear a slow and quiet "creeeeeeeeeeeek." Moving cautiously toward the [...]
Good morning... On September 3rd, as we celebrated the new life born from the wedded union of our oldest son and his wife, one of Kyler's Lovett School classmates died of cancer. In my memory, Pearce Howell and his twin sister Laura were gently kindhearted and quite talented athletically. He played baseball; she played soccer. The twins would [...]
Good morning... In honor of a few friends facing immense transition, this weekend I created the wordless prayer card above. "Thinking of you as you cross today's bridge into the holy, hazy unknown," I texted the image to each of these soul friends. As this new morning dawns, I expand the reach of my wordless prayer to gently [...]
Good morning... She also loved the same profound sentence from yesterday's post, The Mathematics of Love. "Your love has a math that compounds according to the mystical science of the cross." Opening wide the blessing, she read aloud to me a poem about God's compounding love. Now it's our turn to embody these words, to read slowly and [...]
Good morning... "Hi Sue," she wrote yesterday, "I received this devotional sometime early in the pandemic and have saved it. It reminds me of your post this morning, Trusting Without Seeing." ****** Excerpt from The Moon Is Round by Sylvia Gunter In times of crisis trust is a powerful weapon. I define trust as assured reliance on the character, [...]
Good morning... In the midst of my deep prayer time, the Spirit invites me to step outside, onto our back porch. Serenaded by cicadas, I snap a picture of the full moon hiding behind layers of lush tree limbs. Strangely, the tone of light in the dark of this night makes the setting feel surreal. Weird. Unusual. Kinda [...]
Good morning... "Sue, you might want to check the list of people on your blog," Jennifer DeShetler texted after yesterday's heartbreaking post, Audrey Relapsed Again. "There have to be real angels of God reading. Dr. Kushner called Ben this morning." "Wow," I replied. "I have chills, Jennifer. God is at work in ways we cannot see or understand. [...]
