If you read the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, it seems that Jesus is always wanting to get to the other shore. Was it a light in the distance? Was it other side of a dark night? Was it the morning after death? Was it Easter after Good Friday? We tell people not to get stuck in the past. We know that people need to know there is a future. Hope is a green light on a far shore. Who likes it when we keep on hitting red lights? We want the vaccine and we want it now? We
want the nurse to open the door and say, “The doctor ….”
“And that taught me you
can’t have anything,you can’t have
anything at all.Because desire just
cheats you.It’s like a sunbeam skipping
here and there about a roomIt stops and
gilds some inconsequential object, and we poor fools try to grasp it – but when
we do the sunbeam moves on to something else, and you’ve got the
inconsequential part, but the glitter that made you want it is gone.”
“It
is in the thirties that we want friends.In the forties we know they won’t save us any more than love did.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Thursday, February 18, 2021
February 18, 2021
INTIMIDATION
OR UPGRADE?
Where does the ugly in us come from? Is it the residue
of lingering put downs – from unhappy others, from family members – from teachers – or rock throwers – or jealous others? Was it spread on us – like slabs of butter – from moments when we longed for some love – or some recognition – and we picked up patterns of criticism – without knowing what was happening? Dare we rise above the intimidation of others to make ourselves feel better that we feel we are. Do we need to know Christ still walks down roads and into crowds for upgrades – never intimidation.
"Mostly, we
authors must repeat ourselves - that's the truth. We have two or three
great and moving experiences in our lives - experiences so great and moving
that it doesn't seem at the time anyone else has been so caught up and so
pounded and dazzled and astonished and beaten and broken and rescued and
illuminated and rewarded and humbled din just that way ever before. Then
we learn our trade, well or less well, and we tell our two or three stories -
each time in a new disguise - maybe ten times, maybe a hundred, as long
as people will listen."
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Wednesday, February 17, 2021
THE
MEANING OF
ASH
WEDNESDAY
I am dust and into dust I shall return.
I am dust and dust is everywhere.
I am floating dust – in the air – in the sunlight and the
shadows - in an empty silent old afternoon room.
I am Genesis 3: 19.
I am dirt, mud, clay,molded into me in my mother’s womb – and the Spirit of God – the Breath
of God – has been breathed into me.
I am earth.
I am squeezed together substance, flesh, called me.
I am a kicker in my mother’s womb.
I am pounds.
I am increase.
I am leakage.
I am skin.
I am body.
I am scars.
I am dandruff.
I am size.
I am wrinkles.
I’m bathroom.
I am pain and aches,
I am hurts.
I am burnt.
I am ashes
I am dust blown around this room called earth.
I am taken up into plants, ground, becoming well grounded.
I become wheat, squash, corn, salad.
I am milk, water.
I am beauty.
I am youth.
I am middle-aged trying by God to make it.
I am aging.
I am slippage slipping.
I’m flash.
I am delight.
I am crumble, crumble little star.
I’m the me that God and my mom and dad have created.
I am bread.
I am wine.
I am cross and I’m nailed to it – more or less – from time
to time.
I am death – hoping in Christ to bring me into Easter
Resurrection.
I am since my conception and birth, a forever in God’s mind.
Today this Wednesday I’m being told I am dust and into dust I shall
return. Amen.
February 17, 2021
ASHWEDNESDAYEXERCISE
Take your finger and rub it on a window ledge or venetian blinds.
If you're ultra neat look for some dust
in a unchecked, unvisited, tiny corner.
Look at your finger and see the dust and say, “This might be part of me.” Shed skin, flaked me, just a tiny bit of little old me – rubbed off me. “Me?” Yes, remember you are dust and into dust you shall return.“Woooo!”
"There is no substitute for will. Sometimes you have to fake will when you don't feel it at all."
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Monday, February 15, 2021
February 15, 2021
LOOKING FOR A CONVERSATION STARTER?
Tell me ten days you remember? September 11,2001.
The day JFK was shot and killed. [Nov. 22, 1963] The day the Beatles landed in New York [Feb 7, 1964]. The day we met the one we married. Seeing our first grandkid.
The day we walked our daughter down the aisle. The day mom or dad died. The big snow storm of 1947 [December 26-27, 1947] The day they picked our poem. The hit we hit that won the game. January 6th, the day they invaded the Capital. Tell me ten days you remember? Oops that’s 11.Well, there are a lot more.
