Good morning... Amid the high winds of mixed emotions, I invite you to join me in prayer, between 8:00 am and 5:00 pm, from the comfort of your home or in the quiet of our open Northside sanctuary. I, personally, will be welcoming people into the church from 12:00 to 1:00 pm, masked and social distanced, for the [...]
Good morning... The morning after the U.S. 2020 election results were confirmed by blending the voices from red and blue states, I woke up to a text. "Good morning!" wrote a forever friend. "This story made me think of you! We all need some violets in our world right now!!!" Then I read aloud to myself the pages [...]
Good morning... As the sun sets on 2020, we see more clearly the single purpose for which we are born. With all of this year's chaos and clashing, death and disconnection, unrest and uncertainty, our single purpose rests firmly in focus. Henri Nouwen said it well in a post from this week. ****** Henri Nouwen DAILY MEDITATION | [...]
Good morning... I happened upon this YouTube retelling of a story I remember from childhood. When Paul Harvey recorded these words in 1965, I was just two years old. Now listening again, I understand more deeply why Jesus was born into our world as a baby, just like you and me. It’s in Christ that we find out [...]
Good morning... "Good morning Sue," she wrote last week. "I want to highly recommend this book by Scott Sauls, The Gentle Answer. He writes: 'Jesus and Christianity do not discriminate between good people and bad people. Instead, Jesus and Christianity discriminate between humble people and proud people. God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble (James [...]
Good morning... Sipping our morning coffee, we taste our half and half. Half sad. Half happy. Half mad. Half relieved. Half scared. Half excited. Only our Three-in-One God can embrace each half and make us whole. Now may the Lord Jesus Christ and our Father God, who loved us and in his wonderful grace gave us eternal comfort [...]
Good morning... I usually think of the word "branch" as a noun. A natural subdivision of a plant stem. A secondary shoot arising from the main axis of a tree. A part of complex body, like a division of a family descending from a particular ancestor. As I marveled [...]
Good morning... "Oh my gosh," I emailed the Creative Director collaborating with God and me to write from scratch our Gift from the Sea interactive study. "We simply MUST finish this powerful Week Four material with one awe-inspiring song!" (See the music video below.) After being captivated by this video, I thought, "No wonder I feel like I am [...]
Good morning... Experiencing constant transformation, we are rooted where we are planted, we are undeniably interconnected, and we each grow up into God at our own rate over time. I love this photo which provides a visual expression of our individual lives extending up into the light of the Giver of life. At the time God made Earth [...]
Good morning... "I have been drawn to spend less structured time with God during this pandemic," she admits, "but somehow I am sensing God's presence more and more. Quotes from yesterday's post put words to my experience: 'There is no place that Jesus is not.' Jesus is in our hearts, our homes, our world. 'Bidden or not bidden, [...]
