Justin Bieber Acting His Age?

Just when you thought you had heard enough, here I go with my comments prompted by a CNN commentator:

"Boys will be boys and that's all he is doing....it's a phase and he will grow out of it."

Really?

Hitting your limo driver?  Egging a house for $20K damages? DUI in a sports car I cannot even spell!  C'mon!  Pitty perhaps...  I did hear another commentator wondering just how long he would live. Prayers needed here instead of pity for a kid with an undisciplined life in search of what he therefore will not be able to find.

Richard Foster, author of Celebration of Disciple, is clear that we need boundaries and a life in which we are accountable with consequences.  That goes for any of us at any age.  There is no such thing as an EZPASS for life.  The bill comes due unless we first run ourselves into the ground.  The gift and fruits of the disciplined life is living into the image of God--recognizing your life as a gift and offering it to God and others as a gift.

Atlanta's Snow Bowl

This picture was about the same one that drivers all over Atlanta and its suburbs encountered with their recent snow storm which crippled the city with--what?  Did you really say 2-3 inches of snow?  The incredible mayhem was unleashed less by the snow and more by those officials from the governor on down who knew it was coming and then chose to ignore it--sending kids to school just before the known storm arrived.  Makeshift shelters were set up in schools, private homes--even grocery stores and--that's right, Home Depot. 

Now I was there when there was a real blizzard with +12 inches of snow, temps in the teens, and winds 30-40 miles an hour.  People knew it was coming, bought every roll of TP and bottle of water and hunkered down.  Nothing like this snow bowl mayhem emerged.  We all went nuts with the kids home for more than week, the power flickered on and off, but we saw the signs and we heeded them. 

Over and over, Jesus asks us to read the signs--know what skies bring what weather and then prepare for it.  But can we read the forecast of our own lives right down to their souls?  Do we recognize when life unfolds in a journey for us--and when life seems to drive us into the ground?  If there was one distinguishing mark about Jesus, first and foremost, he knew that he was on a journey for the Father--and that made him the Son, giving his life for the Father.  What makes us Christians is reading the signs of the world falling on us (aka Chicken Little) and knowing where the Pole Star, true north is to be found on our journey.  There are those times when we read the signs of our times and know when to seek shelter and when to climb the highest mountain. 

State of YOUR Union

The President's State of the Union Address is the most analyzed and quickly forgotten of all executive actions--it simply has not been the effective platform to set policy agenda or to unify the nation.  My opinion--but the memorable speeches are those that come in the wake of disaster in any form--and politicians with a nation ready to listen and work together unite for a short time. 

Yet, what would you say to the question--what is the state of YOUR union--how are things with your soul?  Do you know the sound of your heart beat? Or, peace that settles within?  Your mind at rest?  Of feeling centered? 

It is said that the most valuable 5 mins that we spend is with ourselves in some quiet place--where for a millisecond, the door opens inside and the Spirit touches the soul.  That is THE state of union--when Holy Spirit touches and draws out human spirit -- and we know that we are not only made for that moment--but for eternity in that Presence. 

Captain Phillips Gems

Tom Hanks as Captain Philips (left) The real Capt (right)

The movie saga is a +12 on a scale of 1-10 for suspense. However, I am going to avoid that high drama plot for two gems that I found in the movie.

The first gem was just watching Philips' eye contact with the pirates, and their leader called "Muse"--as you can see above, he showed no outward fear in his connecting with his eye contact before engaging them with his ongoing bargain--"take the $30K and call it a day."  He also used his eye contact to convey what came across as genuine concern for the pirate who had his foot slashed with glass and the other who had a deep gouge from a knife wound.  Retaining humanity in that saga is truly a gem.

Which leads to the second gem--when Tom Hanks just does not understand what makes a pirate.  "What are you doing out here as a fisherman with a gun in your hand," says Philips to their leader, Muse.  "You're supposed to be a fisherman."  Muse responds:  "This is not America."  Needless to say, we have our own brand of pirates, some of them driven by financial necessity, war lords of our version, and gangs who prey on others.  All of this Hanks as Philips fails to connect the dots in these guys who take his vessel.

The Jesus I see in scripture helps the down and out--the lawless, mentally ill, all of the marginalized to regain some vestige of their humanity.  The best we can muster on the high seas is the careful execution of the US Navy and 3 sharpshooters to save the life of Captain Philips.  I suppose that in "the real" world that's what matters.  In God's Kingdom, there is room for all -- but the way is narrow, very narrow indeed. 

 Muse: It was supposed to be easy. I take ship... ransom... nobody get hurt.
Captain Richard Phillips: You had thirty thousand dollars. And a way to Somalia. It wasn't enough?
Muse: I got bosses. They got rules.
Captain Richard Phillips: We all got bosses.

Coumbia Mall Sooting

Darion Marcus Aguiliar

None of us would know Darion except for his tragic shooting in the Columbia Mall which took two lives before turning the gun on himself.   The 19yr. recorded a life of unhappiness -- which resulted in his taking a taxi with a 12 gauge shotgun to the mall -- please tell me how somebody can do that without being reported?  Then an hour after arriving at the mall, the event happened without any yet apparent connection between him and those he shot.  How many more times must we watch another "unhappy" albeit emotionally disturbed person get loose with a gun and take the lives of others?  It seems even more compounded in tragedy to recognize that nothing will be done to prevent the next incident. 

Please excuse this inane comparison--of all things, I do not wish to gloss over the deceased and their families with this comparison to a Star Trek episode.  The Clingons and the Federation have two small bands in a shootout on a planet.  The residents get so sick of "your violence and primitive lives--they are too painful to observe" that they immobilize all weapons between them. Nobody can kill anyone anymore.  Kirk and the Clingon Capt shout at the residents that they have a right to their violence. They are told--"then go elsewhere."  Where is the button we all long to push to immobilize weapons?  Or, is that degree of science fiction reduce us to muzzled animals who cannot bite each other.  Is the price of our freedom to give it up entirely? How do we grow and advance into a civilization that does not murder? 

The only possible answer lies in a society that will finally have no use for guns and will give them up because live will seem too priceless, the great pearl of great price, and we will tire of such a primitive way of life./ 

Harry Potter & Snowy Owls

The sudden appearance of the snowy owl for Harry Potter was the sign of revelation--of things to come from another world.  The wise old owl with a new truth for Harry and the reality of the journey ahead.

Fact is that these owls do just drop in on occasion where they are not supposed to be.  Nobody knows why they suddenly take flight and end up on light poles at Dulles Airport--to name just one incident. 

We only know that they are free spirits beyond just a food source. Something sets their sights outside of their normal domain and off they go. 

This is the season of Epiphany--the shining forth of God's Light in Jesus.  All we know is that the Spirit took him beyond where he was expected to go, to people who never expected to see him, and with words that revealed him as the Word itself.  Those who follow after him find themselves in flight beyond where they ever dreamed--as no mind could conceive, eye see or ear hear what was in store for those who love him. 

Lines Composed for Winter

Lines for Winter

Tell yourself
as it gets cold and gray falls from the air
that you will go on
walking, hearing
the same tune no matter where
you find yourself—
inside the dome of dark
or under the cracking white
of the moon's gaze in a valley of snow.
Tonight as it gets cold
tell yourself
what you know which is nothing
but the tune your bones play
as you keep going. And you will be able
for once to lie down under the small fire
of winter stars.
And if it happens that you cannot
go on or turn back
and you find yourself
where you will be at the end,
tell yourself
in that final flowing of cold through your limbs
that you love what you are.

 

by:Mark Strand

Will Smith Wisdom

Are you trying to tell me, Mr. Junah, that the soul is born with all that it can be just to die alone into nothing.  Now that's just about the stupidest thing I ever heard of.  

Bagger Vance (Will Smith) to Junah (Matt Damon)
The Legend of Bagger Vance


It is stupid...and worse....a tragedy when any person dies into nothingness having never touched potential.  Now we can debate for some time just exactly what "potential" for a person is.  Some say that the one who dies with all of the toys reaches potential.  Maybe the right word is "fulfillment"--namely that we reach our potential by seeking fulfillment.  Okay, but we cannot stop there, can we?  What is fulfillment but attaining that which reaches beyond us for the betterment of somebody beyond us?

In the movie, Junah accidentalkly moves his golf ball.  He is in a quandary about what to do.  Those around him encourage him to overlook it--when finally he decides to penalize himself.  That's when Bagger Vance, the caddy who came out of nowhere, leaves just as mysteriously.  The game is not over--but Junah has made the decision for others and saves himself in the process.  The real game has challenged him and he has won. 

8 Year Old Dies Saving Family

Tyler Doohan

"No greater gift than to give your life for others..."

Tyler Doohan awoke to a fire in a crowded family trailer...ran to get 6 family members out.  He returned to his disabled grandfather and died trying to save him.  Those in Penfiled, NY call him the hero of heroes--giving his life for the others. 

I do not want to oversimplify this tragedy with my thoughts.  All lives are unique and priceless. 

My mind imagines Tyler awaking in heaven with his grandfather and hearing from some place--
"My son," you just lived several lifetimes, so that now, you can know what heaven really is all about." 

CS Lewis in his book, The Great Divorce, thought that there was such a division between earth and heaven that we had to spend time in heaven  just learning exactly WHY it was heaven...unless that is, you learned and lived heaven on earth. 

God bless you, Tyler...rest in peace.

Washington Caps Prayer

The snow was really coming down as was the temperature--and I grabbed the warmest hat I had--a Washington Caps wool beanie--and went out the door to the grocery.  I saw the lady checking folks out and I always speak to her. Her face told me something was very wrong before she told me that her daughter was in the hospital carrying a baby at 6 mos.  High blood pressure that would not come down.  A mother worries as much for a daughter who is worrying about her baby.  Please Pray....

I apologized to the man who was checking out because the conversation had held him up. But he must have heard...and looked very worried.  I said I would pray, by all means, and then I put my beanie on her (other checkers had hats also!) and told her she was "covered in prayer."  She was touched, looked relieved...and I think that prayer is just that tangible in how it covers us..."as a mother eagle covers young with her pinions" as the psalms say.  Roman Catholics use Rosary Beads, many denominations light candles--something tangible that says what the soul believes--that prayer embraces us, fully, and that when we ask--God IS there. 

Terrorist Threat!

Putin has announced that he will have 150,000 security officers in place for the Olympics.  Yet how much will ever be enough security for the terrorist threat that only needs one moment? 

As we pass by MLK Day, it seems to remind us that security only comes when we realize that we will never ever have sufficient forces to make us safe.  Each person takes a risk to live each day--and that includes outside the terror zone--which for some can be anywhere.

"Be wise as serpents but innocent as dove," Jesus says--don't be foolhardy, but don't turn into a serpent yourself by daring someone to break through your security.  There is also the Christian Ethic that real security is not what we ultimately can prevent, but recognizing who and whose we are.  We need not live with a bunker mentality.  We can still drive on the roads knowing that at anytime, we are walking a very fine line which can become an accident waiting to happen.,  We walk toward Jerusalem, knowing that Jerusalem is always there--knowing, believing and having faith that the road leads past Jerusalem and the Cross to the Garden of the Resurrection. 

The 10,000 Steps

Who started this business about walking 10,000 steps every day?  When I dug into it--guess what I found out? It is purely arbitrary, just a goal.  Most of us with sedentary lives--God bless the Couch Potatoes!"--and take about 3K steps a day.  So it is a push to find where those extra 7K steps will come from.  Runners make them up quickly.  Walkers park at the rear of lots, mall walk and need to be very conscientious to make the total.  I know full well because I have been in this club.  It requires intentional living...which just happens to lie at the base of major world religions.  To be awake, is to be alive.  To notice, is to become "response--able"--or responsible for your life.  Bottom line is to get and move--and without some goal, no matter how arbitrary--it takes intentional living to get there.

 There is one important matter.  To take the first step of the 10K, you have to know WHY and be MOTIVATED to do it.  Jesus was constantly inviting the first step--"what is it that you want me to do for you?"  It was that first step that leads to the next and so on--a conscious choice to follow Jesus into the journey of a lifetime--and some would say, for an eternity. 

Got to go walk! 

Flashdance!

Whoever has seen the movie--and enjoyed the songs--imagine it sung out in the musical!  Let me step out farther and say--it is far more than a movie when seen on the stage.  From the moment the curtain opened, the dancers hit the stage--and from that time on, the dance was in me.  I experienced it on the stage of the Kennedy Center--I did not just go to see it--it danced right into my spirit and I was moving wit it.

It has been said that those who experienced Jesus felt his call in the same way--the call was in them, danced in their souls, and they followed after him.  By the way, the word "follow" in Greek means more than to get in line and go after.  It means to imitate, act like him--DANCE!  That was surely the presence of the same Spirit that dances within us. 

Letting Love Lead

I was out to make my 10,000 steps today...and let Jezebel my dog take me for a long 90 min walk. As we passed out of her familiar haunts and trails, she began getting agitated, trying to get her bearings--"this is not where we usually go!" She walked side to side, her nose went down and up with eyes going side to side.  "Where am I," she said as she glanced back. Eventually, she just fell into the walk and moved ahead. Once we hit the familiar park, she was right at home and knew her way home. 

There's an internal compass in all of us that alerts us to unfamiliar turf, to uncertainty and the anxiety that comes from disorientation.  We know it as we walk into the daily morass of relationships--where is the compass for the internal landscape?  How do you find your way--feel at home and know your way home?  My lesson from Jezebel, aka "J-Bell," is trust; there is the settling down and allowing trust to lead.  It is that trust in ourselves that takes us in and out of the morass, that we can walk through unknown territory if we do so with trust--which we can even call love. 

I have never been in the school that Jesus was the incarnate ESP knowing everything along the way.  Rather, as the incarnate Son of God--he lived his life toward God as Father (which made him the Son).  That trust enfleshed the love to let the Father lead.  Every day, we only know that sun will come up and go down.  We have our chartered territory to travel--but the spiritual life begins when we allow our willingness to trust God to lead us with love through God only knows what! 

Multi-Taskingi Trap!

MORE = LESS!  

That's the formula that corporate trainer and management expert has put out there.  Toss out the multi-tasking and replace it with a single minded focus.  That's right, Schwartz says--multi-tasking traps us into thinking that more is more and MORE is EVEN MORE. Schwartz cites a mountain of evidence to suggest that we concentrate far better and therefore with more productivity when we can keep our eye on the ball, ONE ball that is!  Divide your attention and you divide effectiveness.  Schwartz counsels to focus and concentrate fully on one thing only.  You will not only do it better but there will be far less of a brain drain and energy depletion. 

I have always noticed about Jesus that he moves at the speed of the heart--full engagement followed by full withdrawal and recovery.  The intensity of his public ministry, in which he could easily have become distracted, is rather an example of focus and concentration on the person he is with---and that includes his relationship to his Father.  His was a single minded devotion to God the Father which translated into his ministry for others. 

Bottom line?

• Slow down to speed up...

• Do less to accomplish more...

• Step out to re-engage and concentrate more.  

• Above all--concentrate and be present to what you are doing in the present.  

Southwest lands at Wrong Airport!

 Sit back and relax. 
Leave the flying to us!
Don't worry--be happy! 
Drift away into the peace of the sunset.....

And when you wake up,
Never mind that we landed you at the wrong airport,
After all...
There's only a 7 mile difference from the airport you booked...
We can bus you there!


That's right... we now know that Southwest Airlines landed a jet at the wrong airport in Missouri--just 7 miles away. Apparently, it now appears that the pilot switched off the automatic and was flying manually. The surprise was more than the wrong airport. It was an airport that was closed and with a runway one half of the size they were expecting.  Talk about the brake factor!    Passengers got the flight free and a free flight voucher for the mishap.

Most of us go through the day on automatic--through the motions of what we expect.  The question is this:  can we fly by manual?  That is-- be authentic, live into the moment, be who we really are?  Or do we respond to those around us by default settings that listen but do not really hear, that respond but without feeling, as if we go through life untouched. Guarantee you this much--nobody on that flight will forget the mishap!  Of course, that's a risky way to live by putting away default settings and going to manual.  But it is living!

What upset a lot of folks about Jesus was his way to go off the default settings of tradition--what everybody thought he would and should say. Not so.  He came to teach a whole different way of Kingdom living--with a new vocabulary, skills and a heart of flesh. 

Lone Survivor

I think they got it wrong.  There are commentators on the left that say this a military propaganda movie. Others from the right may think this is justification for what we are trying to salvage from the involvement in Afghanistan.  Somewhere in the middle has got to be room for the villagers who rescued that lone survivor because in the end they were all human beings trying to survive.  Yet the message of the movie may well be, my view, that none outlives war--even to promote and protect one's way of life. 

It has been said that if we could pull out the heart of evil--when then, we would pull out our own hearts. Alexander Solzhenitsyn said that from the gulags of the Soviet Union, the quiet war on humanity.  Yet the lesson as profound as it was--still it was for him.  Who are the villagers who stepped out to rescue one life while endangering their own?  I saw the hope that lies deeper in each of us than the evil.  It is hope for survival and more.  That what is essentially good in us will remain once the war ceases--until that is--we go at it again.

Elk River--Will It Live?

Living Waters 
Or
4-methylcyclohexane methanol

That's what leaked into the Elk River in West Virginia, contaminating water for an estimated 300,000 people--the chemical is used to wash coal, can be an irritant to the eyes and skin and harmful if swallowed. The spill came from a leaking tower, which despite provisions to prevent further leakage--still leaked and ran into the Elk River.  The saving grace is that the amount was small and the water sufficient to dilute it.  Nevertheless, the environment and these residents take it on the chin for what was supposed to further the coal industry.  Barbara Tuchman, 2x Pulitzer Prize Winner, wrote in The March of Folly that there is no extent to which modern people will not pursue courses of action that work against their own best interests.  

Fishing the Elk River

Jesus answered her, 

‘If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, 

“Give me a drink,” you would have asked him, 

and he would have given you living water.’ 

John 4:10

Golden Globes

And the Golden Globe goes to....

The Golden Globes don't need much persuading for us to plop down and watch. All the nominees are winners of recognition and have a leg up on the competition for future contracts. We get to enjoy all the pretty people who dress to the nines, while they are just as human as the rest of us trying to hold the insides together.  So what the Golden Globes about, the recognition of the judges for attaining a certain level of achievement in action--with the luck of the right script and supporting cast.

Real life should give out awards also.  For all those who are scrapping by day in and out on very little....  For all those who tend the beds for hospice, hospitals and nursing homes.  For those in agencies who tend to the homeless and mentally ill ...   Whoever you would put on the list, these are the people who give others hope.  There is absolutely no script for their lines as they give hope to others. Theirs is the character of the heart that keeps on giving when others give up.  Where is the award for these people?  Jesus called it the Kingdom of God where all the above enter first for they must trust in God. 

Best Quotation of the Night

"My mother kicked me outside to learn what I could do for myself 

instead of watching what others could do on the TV."  

Matthew McConnahey

Different Faces of January

I can travel this road and feel like I am in January...and it is so not only in its literal impact but in its subjective feel--the press of the January days is not to be denied. Or as one New Englander said,  
               "Damn damp to the bones!" 

And it often colors the terrain in the heart, our inner landscape becomes frozen over and lifeless.  The pathway through it looks and feels weatherbeaten. 

Now the contrast with this other painting called "January." Life radiates so that even lifeless snow reflects jubilant colors.  The interior world of the soul pulsates life and warmth.  The "road" or pathway, in contrast to the above road, reflects a golden gateway.  The picture invites! 

Albert Camus wrote that "in the midst of winter, I found an invincible summer."  That's the contract between these paintings.  The irony is that the same Camus felt and lived in the world depicted in the top painting, and his "invincible summer" then bloomed and transformed his life.  The gift of the second picture is always available for those seeking this doorway. 

Chris Christie Scandal

The recent scandal in Gov. Chris Christie's office exemplifies just far amuck a staff can go--and worse, what happens if (and this is a big "if") the politico in chief becomes vindictive. I listened to the press conference. I was impressed by the Gov's candor, forthcoming statements and his degree of accountability.  Frankly, I never thought that his apologies would end so that he could get into his explanation.  But I will say this much--no matter how far short we fall as imperfect creatures, we may just make up the difference by how we handle it.  If he truly did not know what was happening, then he his response of contrition and action to replace those at fault is a good example for how far we can come back having fallen so very short. 

There is a Gospel message in all of this.  Throughout the public ministry of Jesus, he was the agent which encouraged, supported and then welcomed people back.  Just look at the difference between Peter and Judas--how one was broken into an apostle and the other ended at rope's end.

The story has yet to be told for Christie.  This is a good beginning if what he said is true. 

Greg Maddux Makes Hall of Fame

Maddux goes to Work

The selection of Hall of Famers Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and Frank Thomas surprised nobody--the shocker for me was that 15 people did not vote for him.  Something about the first round and the taboo of unanimous selection.  The stats speak for all three. The Maddux story for me could be the 2 hitter he tossed against the Indians in game 1 of the World Series. But, the unreported story as he made the Hall of Fame is the 7th inning in Atlanta with 2 outs, 2 strikes, and Maddux just steps off the mound!
The trainer came out, spoke for a while, out came Bobby Cox (Hall of Fame Coach '14) --and out of the game went Maddux.  Just like that.  He knew when to take himself out of the game.  How many people know when to get out of the game?  The report in the papers was that his arm did not "feel right to him" --and given that he was making about 3K+ per pitch--probably a good idea, and the Braves valued that investment as well. But how do we override our egos and pride to get off the mound? 

There is no getting around the fact that Jesus took himself out of his public ministry precisely at the times when the crowd "wanted to make him a king; he went off into the hills to pray."  He was known for getting up long before dawn and going out to a very isolated place to pray.  Maybe we should not say--took himself out of the game--but rather, reassessed himself, recentered and then, only then got back into the game. 

Polar Vrotex Deep Freeze....

Some new words just entered our vocabulary--"the polar vortex."  Deep freeze temperatures have chilled the nation and our climatologists gave it this name to describe what happens when Arctic air comes south.  Enjoy the hype to fill the 24 hour second by second news slots! 

There is a sense, however, in which walking on the frozen ground in such intense cold awakens the deeper sense of life lying dormant for spring.  The trees store their energy underground to rise with the temperatures with the new life that lies under our feet.  It's there, alright, just as it lies in deep sometimes dormant places in us. 

I love the lines from CSLewis' The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe--that Narnia was the place where it was winter all year long and Christmas never came.  It is quite one thing to expect the spring to come in its routine, predictable cycle--just like the polar vortex, and quite another to say that Christmas does not come.  More than the life of the spring, Christmas brings the life of incarnation, "Emanuel--God with us," with life eternal --not just the world of nature, but the Kingdom of God.  It is not the landscape of the north and weather system of the Arctic --this is the Kingdom of God and the landscape, weather of the soul. 

Auburn Beats FLA State...

It is said that winners write history.  That's not quite true.  Sure, the trophy was awarded to FLA St and the press will report that FLA State won the BCS National Championship.  But for those of us who watched the game, well now, that's entirely different!  From the starting kick-off, the announcers--especially veteran Brent Musberger--were declaring Auburn the winner, the team of destiny, and the SEC still the best, the likes of which FLA St never saw in the ACC.  Finally the announcer' partisanship came back to bite them.  Their oft repeated, ":Auburn just has to get FLA St into the 4th quarter," proved one quarter too many for Auburn---dying with the FLA St TD and 13 seconds to go.  What's the point of my rant?  Let the teams play.  Call them as you see them., Leave your own preference outside the press box. 

How terribly often do we ourselves enter any conversation with such bias of self-reporting that we fail to see the heart of reality itself?  The problem is that with such bias we miss out on the heart of reality--as if we just broadcasted a game and missed it because of what we wanted, not what we saw.

FLA STATE WALKS OFF THE FIELD AS NATIONAL CHAMPS

Stronger than Death...

Poet Pablo Neruda

If I die.
survive me with such force 
to waken the furies and cold. 

Pablo Neurda the Latin poet was so distraught when dictator Pinochet took over that he died of a heart attack in a Chilean Hospital.  Was the man too fragile for life, or did he feel and believe so strongly about the gift of life that it was just too much for him?

We do have his poem, "if i die," which implores the survivor to live with such ferocity to set the furies loose and stir life from the cold.  I do not wish to judge the psyche of a man who has passed from us.  I can only wonder what happens when we become too invested in the transitory, so that when it goes, so do we. 

Surely Jesus died for what he believed in--and once back from the tomb in resurrection, he called his followers to live with him.  Paul called it the "power of the resurrection."  That alone wakens more than the furies and life from the cold.  It set loose the Holy Spirit...and none of us have been the same ever since. 

Greeting the New Year....

There are many ways to greet the new year...party through it, sleep through it, philosophize about it--or there is the grim reaper moving the hands of time, namely our mortality.  Recently I came across a splendid poem by WS Merwin, wonderful in the very deft way that he evokes the coming of the morning for new year's.  No big ball to drop (which gets tackier every year!)....rather, the new year sneaks in on cat's feet, like sunlight that gradually fills the landscape around us--and suddenly, it is just light out. 

Read MS Merwin and see how he evokes the feeling of New Years in a way the world misses out on by sheer distraction. 

To the New Year

By W. S. Merwin
 

With what stillness at last

you appear in the valley

your first sunlight reaching down

to touch the tips of a few

high leaves that do not stir

as though they had not noticed

and did not know you at all

then the voice of a dove calls

from far away in itself

to the hush of the morning

so this is the sound of you

here and now whether or not

anyone hears it this is

where we have come with our age

our knowledge such as it is

and our hopes such as they are

invisible before us

untouched and still possible

One Actor Show

I just watched an actor put on a one-person play--in which he played all seven actors in the movie. Does it matter that it was Jacob Marley's Christmas Carol by Tom Muhla adapted for the stage?  Or, that one person was able to fit into all those characters and move between them?  I sat on the front row and marveled as the actor "got into each character," changing position, voice and facial expression.  To my count--he misspoke twice and that happened on back to back lines so that he was out of sync in the dialogue.  Good thing, because I was beginning to think this actor was perfect!  Oh, I have seen one actor recitations--one did Mark's Gospel and Ernest Borgnine (of all people!) did the other that I can't recall.

I just had to wonder...

How well do we know other people so that we can get into their character?  Is it a stretch to see that the man Jesus knew his sheep so well that he could call them by name?  In other words, he knew his followers and I suspect that attraction was the foundation of discipleship. At least we are not called to be everyone else--just ourselves!  In relationship to Jesus, we become who we are called to be.  

There's the story of the man who dies after trying all his life to be just like Moses.  In fact, he would ask himself WWMD--what would Moses do?  In heaven, he is told by Moses--"What on earth told you to be like me instead of yourself?" 

New Year Resolutions!

 Greetings for 
New Years 2014!

Remember to add the Wheat

I heard an engineer talk about how some cultures add wheat to their mortar for buildings.  It adds flexibility so that it does not crumble from most earthquakes and after-shocks. Not a bad ingredient for all New Year’s resolutions.  The living of our years goes through constant shocks—those slings and arrows of outrageous fortune—and flexibility can help us cope without crumbling.  In my opinion, I think the New Year bodes much uncertainty from the rollout of a new healthcare system, redefining the use of the NSA, and talks with Iran. 

Our resolutions as Christians are far more than trying harder to do something in a new way.  May our New Year resolutions remember the importance of wheat in the New Testament.  More than just a staple, wheat symbolized God’s harvest and Kingdom.  The element of flexibility, cited by the foregoing engineer, is the gift of grace.  Standing alone against the shocks of life, we eventually crumble. Upheld by grace, the assurance of God’s acceptance and love, the chaff crumbles, but the wheat remains.  (Matthew 13:24ff)

Roman God Janus

The month of January was always depicted from the Roman two-headed god Janus.  One face looked to the past for hope before the winter came.  The other face looked toward the spring for new life.  In the midst of winter, let us resolve to make the living God the foundation for building new life—now—without waiting for the spring to come.  And, remember the wheat!