I love Christmas Eve. Although that’s not always been the case. Here’s a line from a journal, years back now, thankfully. “I hate Christmas Eve. It’s too hard. Too rushed. Too many people with too many expectations. Too much stuff to juggle. God, I hate it!” That from a pastor… Thankfully after that confession, I…
Category: follow
Stop the Madness
Those weeks — there are too many things to do, too many directions to go, emails flow in, text messages arrive, phone calls pull at us, needs hit like Dorian hit the East Coast — you know those weeks and those days. So do I. Distraction in those times is like a masked intruder…
The Next Step
Many of you know, I took a sabbatical in 2016. It was time for me to slow down, to walk more than 1,000,000 steps on the Camino de Santiago, and get in touch with my own heart. What happened was I discovered emotions I had not felt, and learned how much I valued silence, and…
Just Plain Lost…
“Just plain lost.” That’s what this guest in worship had written on his prayer request card. Life was tough with surgeries, with financial issues, with housing, then he wrote those three telling words which caught my heart. I had never read a clearer lament. Lost. That pervasive sense of hopelessness and despair. I reached out…
Cancer, Control and Freedom
I have many partial blog posts that I’ve written but haven’t published any for a month. This has been for multiple reasons — the heart, the mind, the stress, the feeling of inadequacy, the dealing with shame, or more likely, shame dealing with me. When I read this post by brother David Beck, a man…
Declassified
On Tuesday, February 26th, the UMC made a decision to go with what was titled the “Traditional Plan” in regards to the ongoing conversation regarding the church’s approach to those among us who are LGBTQ+. The challenge has been for us, as an international denomination, to approach this question of ministry and ordination in a…
God’s “no one knew was there” Path
(Reprinted from David Beck’s blog)– I’ve shared thoughts from David previously. This dear brother and pastor from Bellevue battling pancreatic cancer is a witness to the faith from the “valley of the shadow.” His words struck home to me today. Sometimes when we are hitting tough situations it helps to hear from a fellow traveler…
Thank You, Cheryl
Some weeks just create a pile up. I suppose it depends on how a person responds. But sometimes things just get tough. That’s what last week was like for me. I was scheduled to be out of town three Sundays; I still had details to complete for each of those weeks. I’m in charge of…
David Beck
When I first heard his story, I was incredulous. A well-loved pastor, David Beck, takes another pastoral position at a church hundreds of miles from his current home. Within a month of arriving, he’s diagnosed with the worst form of pancreatic cancer. Most patients die within months, few live a year. Now a year since…
Mary Poppins
So, I don’t know all that was involved. But here is what I do know. The movie Mary Poppins which might have simply been some kind of fun adventure, the placing of the book on the screen by Disney, God used in my life. That’s what I know. I cannot tell you HOW that is possible….
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