Good morning... If all goes as planned, James LeBow will experience a successful heart transplant today at Vanderbilt Heart Center in Nashville, Tennessee. For many years, his wife Brooke has been a beloved member of our women's studies at Northside Church. Mission Circle gatherings and Sunday afternoon study each month. Wednesday morning and Friday morning studies each week. [...]
Good morning... Yesterday a faraway friend suggested I explore a poem entitled "I Am There." So I googled the creative expression and found this fascinating gift. ****** "I Am There" by James Dillet Freeman Do you need Me? I am there. You cannot see Me, yet I am the light you see by. You cannot hear Me, yet [...]
Good morning... As we wake on World Gratitude Day 2023, I am totally thankful for unplanned God-moments like the one I experienced yesterday morning. Okay. So we have random books strewn throughout our home. With six people having lived in our family for over the past twenty-eight years, we have remnants of days gone by littering our living [...]
Good morning... I pull out my copy of In the Shelter by Padraig O Tuama and turn to page 25. I read on from the sentence that first captivated me on Sunday. "Good writing, the adage tells us, is when we read something we've always known but never been able to put to words," writes Padraig. "I remember [...]
Good morning... Enjoying our new Monday afternoon time slot, we kicked-off our first PAWkids gathering with an energizing cook-out. Harnessing the power of creative expression, we made a "We Love PAWkids" banner, played tic-tac-toe, traced with stencils/makers/paint sticks, and decorated everything (and everyone) with heart stickers. [...]
Good morning... "Good writing, the adage tells us, is when we read something we've always known but never been able to put into words," explains Padraig O Tuama, the inspiring author of the delightful book we are reading for our Sunday afternoon monthly study, In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World. Beside this profound sentence, I [...]
Good morning... In our blog posts this week, we have been exploring the tangled-up places inside of us, culminating in yesterday's post, In This Chaos, Where Is God? Without skipping a beat one reader wrote: "I just read your morning offering and then opened this..." "I can smooth out all the tangled-up places, including those in your mind [...]
Good morning... From miles and miles away, she emailed me after yesterday's post, "I'm All Tangled Up." Our heart and head, tangled. Our fear and worry, tangled. Our love and control, tangled. Our anxiety and stress, tangled. Our depression and grief, tangled. Our gray skies and hope, tangled. Our belief and our journey, tangled. We wake toward a [...]
Good morning... "Oh I wish I could just fly up and join you to make wordless prayer cards," she wrote yesterday from a few states away. Then she explained: "My heart is tangled with my head, my head is tangled with fear, my fear is tangled with worry, my worry is tangled with love, my love is tangled [...]
Good morning... A friend emailed me the Nouwen devotional below. It serves as a grounding reminder: joy and sadness are born together. ****** DAILY MEDITATION | SEPTEMBER 9, 2023 - by Henri Nouwen - Every Bit of Life is Touched by a Bit of Death Joy and sadness are as close to each other as the splendid colored [...]
