advent journal
I was probably seven or eight when I started by records--forty-fives, singles. I’m talking 1963 or 1964. Every Sunday after church in Lusaka, we listened to Top of the Pops that was broadcast from the UK on Radio Zambia. I should say I listened. The rest of my family
advent journal
It’s late. It’s been a long day. I am looking for words to offer. Part of my day was looking at the lectionary passages for this coming Sunday, since I am preaching. Maybe I am just tired enough for this to make sense, but I found myself paraphrasing
advent journal
One of the annual events Ginger and I have been a part of in Guilford is a service of remembrance for parents who have lost children. It is an astounding time of both grief and healing. Ginger usually speaks or prays and I sing. This year, the service was live
advent journal
I preached from both Isaiah 40:1-8 and Mark 1:1-8 because the latter echoes the former. ________________________ Friday morning I got a text from my cousin who is still in ICU with COVID pneumonia. “Today is the first day I don’t feel like doing this,” she wrote. “I’m
advent journal
“Being unappreciative might mean we are simply not paying attention.” --David Whyte, Consolations accounting for non-business majors we never pay inattention the cost of ignoring (ignorance?) requires a different accounting but I never could balance my checkbook, so I’m not the one to keep the ledger other than to
advent journal
Somedays I come to this page with something to say already in mind, as if to make an offering. Sometimes I come with nothing but raw feelings, almost like a confession or simply a statement of how things are. Tonight is the latter. Thanks for meeting me here. tired the
advent journal
winded it’s not just stacking the wood you have to cover it--I know that it doesn’t sound hard, does it I walked down to Page’s and bought a tarp, blue and brown and a pack of bungee cords the first time I centered the tarp and folded
advent journal
I don’t know why the thought crossed my mind the other day, other than I had given myself time to do nothing and let my thoughts run unleashed for a bit. What struck me is not original, I’m sure, but it felt significant; it was this: any technological
advent journal
insulatus I don’t have time to tell you the whole story, but I spent a week in St. Petersburg it was Leningrad then a perfect graduation gift for a Russian history major the center of the city was a collection of islands connected by drawbridges we didn’t really
advent journal
For all but the last few days of Advent the days keep growing shorter. I find myself getting up early so I don’t miss any daylight. Our schnauzers have learned to come find me around four o’clock so we can walk the green as the sun sets; if
advent journal
For many years I have written daily during Advent. For the first time in a long time I will be preaching through Advent as well. My sermon for this first Sunday is “We Will Get Through This,” drawing from Isaiah 64:1-9. ______________________________ Somehow it is the first Sunday in Advent
poetry
My cousin Sloane is in the hospital tonight in Houston with COVID pneumonia. Though we are cousins, we have never had the luxury of living near each other but, particularly in our adult lives, have found ways to feel like family. She sent me a text tonight to let me