I Was A Wounded Eagle
Good morning... “How can we picture God’s kingdom?" asks Mark 4:30-32 in the Message translation. "What kind of story can we use?" we wonder within. "It’s like a pine nut," Mark says. "When it lands on the ground it is quite small as seeds go, yet once it is planted it grows into a huge pine tree with thick branches. Eagles nest in it." Yesterday I was a wounded eagle nesting in a tree [...]
The Best Time To Plant
Good morning... I unzip my purse and unfold the church bulletin. I re-read from my Sunday morning scribblings of sermon notes. "When is the best time to plant a tree?" asked the pastor. After being greeted with silence he gave us the answer. "Twenty years ago. Twenty years ago is the best time to plant a tree." "When is the second best time to plant a tree?" he continued. "Today. Today is the [...]
Savor Sabbath: Be At Peace
Good morning... The peace of God, which surpasses human understanding, is ours to enjoy, moment by moment. As I review our posts from this week, I am drawn to the Bible verses tenderly taking our hand and lovingly leading us along. Monday: You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. Tuesday: If this [...]
One Day In The Country
Good morning... "One day in the country is worth a month in the city," whispers the rustic plaque hanging on the farm house wall. Why might this be? When I think of "country," natural words cascade from my mind to water my heart. Unplug. Fresh air. Big sky. Down-to-earth. A slower pace in wide open space. Within me "city" elicits a different list. Easy convenience. Crowded congestion. The cutting edge of progress. A [...]
Why Argue With What Is?
Good morning... I ran across this quote jotted in the margin of my book. "If you argue with what "is" you lose. But only 100% of the time." It strikes me that at the heart of each fear, each worry, each anxiety we are arguing with the Almighty God who is in charge of what "is," "what has been," and "what always will be." It’s better to enjoy what we have than to always [...]
Peace Permeates Us
Good morning... We are invited into deeper trust. God feels every fear, God knows every need, and God offers permeating peace to calm our anxiety. In the privacy of our personal prayers, will we take time to let go and lay down our worries? Fear will not leave us alone, worries naturally well up in each human heart. Our scared soul is prone to wander, LORD, we feel it. We wander and we [...]
We Receive Peace
Good morning... I was not expecting to wake up yesterday to the message below written by my husband, a high school chaplain who takes his monthly turn writing a weekly devotional with their team of chaplains. It is as if he opened up the bag and let out all our scared cats. ****** Morning Devotional for January 7, 2020 - by Rev. Steve Allen My 18 year old asked me a question the [...]
Influence Expands
Good morning... The life-changing influence of my favorite book continues to expand. In the fall of 2007, I met the first edition of The Hidden Life Awakened when Becky Anderson, the beloved scribe of Christian mystic Betty Skinner, spoke at our church on the newly released book chronicling Betty's journey up from the valley of clinical depression to the peak of healed wholeness with God. Betty "was forty-two years old, mother of four, wife of [...]
Living On The Slant
Good morning... In the midst of my prayer time, God is growing in me a fresh thought, a new-to-me idea, the spark of the small, simple diagram pictured above. I am certain that this line of thinking has been explored by other curious brains, as Ecclesiastes 1:9-10 (CEV) reminds us: Everything that happens has happened before; nothing is new, nothing under the sun. Someone might say, “Here is something new!” But it happened before, long before we were born. The difference for [...]
Savor Sabbath: Be Praying
Good morning... "You’ve always given me breathing room, a place to get away from it all, a lifetime pass to your safe-house, an open invitation as your guest," says Psalm 61:3-5 in the Message translation. "You’ve always taken me seriously, God, made me welcome among those who know and love you." Morning by morning, we curl up on the couch of prayer not only to take breathing room for ourselves but also to [...]
Strong At Our Core
Good morning... After being shaped by the diligent joy of writing to you each morning, I often go back into our blog post and edit as the Spirit moves. Yesterday that happened. Making our message more concise and most life-giving, I re-wrote our final sentence to read: "As we stay right in the center of God's endless love, Christ's constant companionship displaces the worry in our heart and at our core we begin [...]
Better Together
Good morning... 2 Corinthians 8:10-20 The Message So here’s what I think: The best thing you can do right now is to finish what you started last year and not let those good intentions grow stale. Your heart’s been in the right place all along. You’ve got what it takes to finish it up, so go to it. Once the commitment is clear, you do what you can, not what you can’t. The [...]