Good morning... "I'm feeling very stretched," a friend texted me yesterday. I could relate. I could totally relate. In a weird way this mid-December week reminds me of the Christmastime I was nearly nine months pregnant. Then and now I feel stretched beyond my comfortable capacity, like I want to jump out of my bursting skin! Romans 8:22-25 [...]
Good morning... Just like the miraculous multiplication which fed 5,000 hungry people (with leftovers to spare), we each shared our own puny fish, our own little loaves. One friend donated a tree skirt and a handful of heart ornaments. Another brought lights - some big, some small, some colored, some white - along with some jingling bells and [...]
Good morning... Like the red, hard blueberry in the plastic pail above, my day began with a bitter mistake, an error in judgement, a disrespectful choice. I did what I could to remedy the situation, but the damage had already been done. Hurt had happened. I was wrong. I felt so bad. I genuinely apologized. Disappointed in myself, [...]
Good morning... The first two emails I receive today whisper to my soul, "Wholeness is happening." One email looks outside; the other looks inside. Over time, I sense the two merging and multiplying. The photo above came from the country of Norway, which for me in Atlanta, Georgia is the far side of the globe. "These days the [...]
Good morning... "Coping is something we do when we are overwhelmed," says the single note I took at our therapeutic community group at PAWkids yesterday. Instead of searching for the words in the puzzle above, I decided to search my heart, pondering the given list of helpful coping skills. Smile. Clean. Exercise. Walk. Water. Sing. Relax. Turtle. Laughing. [...]
Good morning... God set our new semester ablaze as we gathered to study one tiny book, Simple Faith by Margaret Silf. As we have seen the horrific images of the mass graves found in Ukraine this week, I have pondered one long sentence from our class reading. "She will learn to distinguish between those things in life - [...]
Good morning... One of my favorite fall commitments, year after year, is speaking at the kickoff gathering for the Lovett School Moms In Prayer group. Yesterday around 8:00 am, about seventy-five of us collected in the Lovett scout hut to receive an encouraging word as we begin this new school year. I was kindly introduced. Sue Allen. Mom [...]
Good morning... "Downtown ATL," she texted, sharing a cloud-layered photo taken from her porch. "Twenty minutes later!" her camera captured a different view. "I marveled at how the city was shrouded," she explained, "and then seen with clarity soon after." Sometimes shrouded, sometimes seen, the city exists in both pictures above. Yet our ability to enjoy [...]
Good morning... Daily I am fed by writers pouring hard, beautiful words into my inbox. My gut nods in agreement, "This truly is true." The wisdom of Betty Skinner, shared above, mysteriously mingles with words from Kate Bowler this week. Your world has shrunk. Pain or grief or fear has sucked up every bit of oxygen from the [...]
Good morning... At 3:24 am, I finished yesterday's post and pushed send on our message, A Peacemaker Prays. The Henri Nouwen quote highlighted was sent by Ignatius House Retreat Center earlier in the week, along with the calming song and images. Our blog ended: "We actively pray, 'Lord, make me a peacemaker.'" I climbed back into bed for [...]
