Multiplying Gratitude
Good morning... Extremely grateful, I thanked store owner, Lisa, at The Front Porch of Vining for sharing with us a combination of donated and purchased items from her new fresh market for our recent retreat. Two large flower arrangements with an adorable one thrown in. Local pies and yummy pecans. Gift basket and a "Happy Spring" display. Chocolates and cheese straws. Hand soap and tea towel. Her generosity made our morning extra personal, quite special. [...]
Planting A Plentiful Harvest
Good morning... “I must die like a kernel of wheat that falls into the furrows of the earth,” says our friend Jesus in John 12:24, (TLB). “Unless I die, I will be alone, a single seed. But my death will produce many new wheat kernels - a plentiful harvest of new lives.” Seeking to fend off death, we want badly to cling to the single seed of the life we know and love, to [...]
Leaves Of Julie Green
Good morning... As I sit on my back porch at this time of the year, I see the color of new growth bursting on bare branches. Now and forever, I will call this light, bright color “Julie Green.” One year ago today, 42-year-old Julie Harlan died, a loving wife and mother, a loyal daughter and sister, a long-time friend and spiritual mentor. With her passing away just thirty-seven days after she was diagnosed with [...]
God Moves Our Huge Stone
Good morning... “Hello newly beloved friends of the heart,” wrote soulful pianist and poetry-memorizer Dana Cunningham. “I am attaching the poems I either recited or read during our Awake To Wellness Retreat time, now a week in our past memory but still alive with fire and verve. I wish you all a joyous, glorious Easter weekend, which I will appreciate freshly because of our experience together. I also will ‘resurrect’ an old poem that [...]
God’s Full Moon Light
Good morning... I absolutely love that the brightness of tonight's full moon sky coincides with the seal-off mystery of the dank, dark tomb. For Jesus' dead body wrapped in burial attire, for you and for me wrapped in our own dark cocoons, God lights our hope. We each whisper in awed wonder: "...even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are the same to you" [...]
Dying To Live
Good morning... To commemorate Good Friday, we consider deeply the death of Christ captured in Mark 15:33-39 (NIV). At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And at three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”(which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”). When some of those standing near heard this, they said, “Listen, he’s calling Elijah.” (Jews believed the [...]
Fingers To Feet
Good morning... The Thursday before Easter is called Maundy Thursday. Christ's final "mandate" is commemorated today, with "maundy" being a shortened form of the Latin word "mandatum," which means "command." What command or mandate is so important to Jesus that it is given its own special day in the church year? At Thursday's Last Supper with his disciples, Jesus says: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved [...]
She Shines Brightly
Good morning... Tee Davis, the wise mother of Julie Harlan who died at age 42 from stomach cancer one year ago this week, texted me yesterday after our blog post, Tilting Our True Self. “Hi Sue. I wrote down the last sentence of your message today in my Jesus Calling book. It reminds me of my Julie. Thank you. She is shining brightly. I am sure of it. XoXo.” Julie’s life beautifully reflects the [...]
Tilting Our True Self
Good morning... The night we first met, I sat next to her at dinner. Fragile feeling. Truth-tellers. Something we said sparked her soul to recite for me a poem: "Even if I don't see it again - nor ever feel it," words from her heart came soft and sure. "I know it is - and that if once it hailed me, it ever does. And so it is myself I want to turn in that [...]
Change Your Mind
Good morning... "Unlimited Possibilities" is the phrase that filled my mind as I woke yesterday. Where was "Unlimited Possibilities" hiding? Might I have written those two words in my Awake To Wellness notes? I comb through the scribblings in my retreat journal, and, sure enough, I find "Unlimited Possibilities." What was Dr. Cathy Snapp teaching us when I jotted this two-word phrase? Adding a little flesh to their bones, my sketchy notes read: "Unlimited [...]
Unlimited Possibilities
Good morning... As I stir from sleep, one phrase fills my focus: "Unlimited Possibilities." Though I took tons and tons of notes during our two-day retreat, on the tip of my brain's tongue, this morning after, rest two distinct words: "Unlimited Possibilities." Unlocked by this one two-word phrase, biblical promises begin bubbling up from my gut, through my heart, into my head, before cascading from my fingers, through my pen, and onto my journal [...]
This Is Who We Are
Good morning... "Contemplation is taking a long, loving look at something," softly said pianist Dana Cunningham during yesterday's Awake To Wellness Women's Retreat. This morning, I take a long, loving look at two stick figure people juxtaposed on my page of notes, a drawing etched as author Dr. Cathy Snapp joyfully taught. The skeleton stick figure on the left is bombarded by a list of painful words seventy-five of us "popcorn-ed" aloud, together. Shame. [...]