How’s your love life these days? I remember hearing that question as a child, and squirming with the implied romantic involvement. I don’t squirm so much any more! And a marriage filled with love is truly a lovely gift.
Love Month Mash Up
As soon as the Christmas tree was taken down in the gym this year, a new set of decorations appeared gracing our stage and reminding us of the season to come. Hearts and rich red fabric remind us that Valentine’s day is coming. It’s love month! (Many thanks to Maureen and the fellowship committee for beautifying our gym!)
What is Valentine’s day like for you, I wonder?
“Hush!”
We are entering the season of Advent, which is full of anticipation. You might have started counting down the days until Christmas! According to the Christmas carol, “it’s the most wonderful time of the year.” But it can also be the most hectic, stressful and lonely time of the year, as our lives become busier to the point of asking, Why do I even bother with all this?
Re-structuring our National Church
Last night Bruce Eidick, our head elder, and Pastor Larry and I flew back into Edmonton International Airport. We had been in Kitchener Ontario, for the 11th convention of Lutheran Church Canada since Friday morning. Walking through the sanctuary of Grace Lutheran Church this morning, I was thinking about what has changed and what will stay the same.
Gratitude
I went for a run this morning in the fog. It was still dark when I left the house, and the street lights were shining through the leaves on the full grown trees on our street, making fingers of light that grasped toward me while I gathered the strength in my body and set off into the day. It was a brief moment, but it was so beautiful that I have been thinking about that sight all morning.
Look out the window, wherever you are right now. What signs of growth do you see? From my vantage point, a very large tree is waving it's full dark green branches in the June breeze and the grass underneath shows the stripes left by the lawn mower yesterday.
Signs of growth are more easily visible in the summer. But growth in living things continues through the year. Just as trees put out leaves to absorb the energy of the sun during the summer months, you might have summer habits that replenish the stores and strengthen the roots of your life. How will God nurture you and grow you during this season?
“Where there is no vision, the people perish.”
-Proverbs 29:18 KJV
This old-language translation of proverbs 29:18 is snappy and memorable. A closer study of the verse in it's context will reveal a fuller picture: God’s people need prophets to guide them in the truth, and in times when those prophets are absent or silent, the people go astray or become discouraged. But I like the old language. “Where there is no vision, the people perish.”
Recently we have been talking about vision at Grace Lutheran Church. What does it mean to have vision? And what might happen to our family of faith if we were to establish a clear vision for our ministry together?
“Spring Back to Life!”
If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead...
1 Corinthians 15: 19-20
It’s April, and the landscape will soon start waking up after it’s long winter sleep. Frozen trees will warm up and the sap inside them will begin to flow. Buds will appear and eventually burst out into leaves. What signs of life do you look forward to in spring? There can be a sadness that accompanies the fall of the year (some people think of autumn as the season of death) and it can be difficult in the frozen months to “rejoice in all circumstances.” But spring always comes.
The other day when I was feeling particularly tired and needed to remember this truth, I wrote on the little reminder board that I keep in my office, “Spring is coming...Jesus is alive in me!”
One Christmas a while back Andrea took on a project making framed embroidered art that said “Live Simply.” That phrase has been in my mind lately as we turn the corner into Lent.
It is so hard to live simply. Especially for people who have a hard time saying “no.” (me) Living simply requires that we must pare away the activities which are not of utmost importance, stop overextending ourselves, and remember our primary calling as people of God.
As we begin our Lenten journey again, I invite you to consider the simple invitation to live simply. What might that mean for you? What might it mean for your calendar? What might it mean for your relationships?