Making Mashed Potatoes
Good morning... Yesterday was the first Thanksgiving their loved one was not physically present at their earthly feast, having crossed over to heaven last spring. In a brand new way, this grieving family is making mashed potatoes. As I listened to his mourning mom talk about the conversations around their dinner table this fall, she said, "I have grown tired of the same old surface interchange with the people I love most in this [...]
Blanketed By God
Happy Thanksgiving morn... You simply must give yourself at least a few-second-gift of this peaceful video passed along to me by a dear, wise friend. https://www.google.com/search?q=hamster+eating+carrot+in+blanket&rlz=1CDGOYI_ enUS711US711&oq=hamster+eating+carrot+in+blanket&aqs=chrome..69i57.15735j0j9&hl=en-US&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8 If this hamster could speak english, she might encourage us this day, "Hold with your two bare hands the slice of life given to you today. Remember you are blanketed in God's unconditional love, fully accepted just as you are, nourished by the Spirit, bite by bite. [...]
God Visits Us Today
Good morning... Have you ever read the following Bible story? Until yesterday, I had not. Listen with me to this incredible account, and let's ponder together what God is saying to us today. ...Jesus went with his disciples to the village of Nain, and a large crowd followed him. A funeral procession was coming out as he approached the village gate. The young man who had died was a widow’s only son, and a [...]
Be A Helper In God’s Healing Harvest
Good morning... My daughter said, "Mom, you have to read the article I just sent you. It's about the boy I know from Ole Miss who took his life." Opening her email, I read these heartbreaking words from the Clarion-Ledger newspaper article. "Rivers sent a text moments before pulling the trigger. He wrote: 'Mom, I love you, and I hate to do this to you. I’m so sorry I failed you and embarrassed our [...]
At Peace In Imperfect Families
Good morning... “The accumulated sorrows of your exile (your being barred from comfort, your being kept from closeness, your inability to feel completely at home) will dissipate,” whispers the LORD through the pen of an Old Testament prophet. Zephaniah 3:19-20 in the Message translation continues: “I, your God, will get rid of them, your sorrows, for you. You’ve carried those burdens long enough. At the same time, I’ll get rid of all those who’ve [...]
We Stand At A Threshold
Good morning... When I meet a new word, I am exceedingly grateful for Wikipedia, the free, online encyclopedia. Yesterday I was introduced for the first time to the noun "liminality." Wikipedia teaches me, "In anthropology, liminality (from the Latin word līmen, meaning 'a threshold') is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of rituals, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition [...]
Bumper Sticker Exchange
Good morning... I sit at a red light behind this bumper sticker: "Neither one 2016." My mind yearns to exchange this old sticker with a new one: "All of us 2016." I want you to think about how all this makes you more significant, not less. A body isn’t just a single part blown up into something huge. It’s all the different-but-similar parts arranged and functioning together. If Foot said, “I’m not elegant like [...]
God Lives In Us
Good morning... Often the truth God teaches me daily, personally is echoed in the online meditation I receive from the Henri Nouwen Society at 5:05 am each morning. Yesterday was no different. I put a microphone to God's whisper, "Blend your 'being' with your 'doing' so all becomes an energizing prayer." Then I opened Nouwen's 11.17.16 devotional: "All Jesus' words and actions emerge from his intimate relationships with his Father. 'Do you not believe,' [...]
Blend “Being” and “Doing”
Good morning... Usually I am not a list maker. But yesterday when I happened upon a few open hours, I prayerfully doodled a list and happily discerned my most pressing "have to's." Bank. Grocery. Flower shop. Goodwill. UPS. Gas station. Check. Check. Check. Tons of important tasks delightfully accomplished. As a person who focuses much of my energy on the "art of being," it felt really good to feed my "need for doing." For [...]
Darkness Can Never Extinguish
Good morning... I pre-programmed my past two posts before I went on our weekend Writers' Retreat at a friend's mountain home near Lake Rabun. As I crafted the words about trees on my street changing at different rates and the painful-looking experience of naked, barren limbs, I had no idea how real these words would become over the next few hours. Vulnerable. Unprotected. Emptied to the core. "Life has stripped me naked." Vulnerable. Unprotected. [...]
The Soul Is A Bucket
Good morning... "When we sit in silence, it’s true, we may not be doing anything. But we are un-doing so much," says blogger Emily P. Freeman. Emily continues: "The soul is made to receive. In the presence of God, we experience a right full-ness. But like a bucket left out in the yard, it will hold anything that comes along to fill it - rain, pollen, a leaf, a bug. The soul receives input [...]
Time To ROUND DOWN
Good morning... As we learned about the chaos of transition in our class last week, the letting go of what was, the discomfort of living in uncertainty, and the waiting in trust for God to rebuild a new life around us, she suddenly said, "That reminds me of when I was a kid." She went on to explain, "My brothers and I loved making sandcastles at the beach. After working together to build one [...]