Longing To Be Free

ONE MORNING on the national news, there was a story about a young African American police officer whose associates at the department met him, as he reported for duty, dressed in the hooded garb of the Ku Klux Klan. Even women on the office staff and other department employees joined to taunt and frighten him. The prank went on a long time before they told him it was a joke and had him pose for pictures with them all in their costumes of discrimination.

On the news, this handsome young father was being interviewed by a reporter about the incident. "How did you react?" the reporter asked. "I was terrified on the inside, but all I could think to do was smile; he answered. "When I got home, I sobbed like a child."

Later the offenders, fearing reprisals and wanting to take back the photos they gave him, threatened the officer.

As I watched this young man trying to process such a deep and ugly violation by those he thought he knew and trusted, by those who served with him day by day under an oath to uphold justice, I felt powerful emotions rise within me. I felt anger at the indignity and at the violation of so many of the codes that hold any decent society together. I felt deep sadness at the breaking of the human spirit and the robbery of the self-respect of a fellow human being. I felt brokenness in my soul as I saw his pain and realized that all of us are capable of hurting each other deeply.

I left my house to go to the village for breakfast. As I sipped hot coffee, I watched a toddler across the room struggle to escape his mother's arms. He wanted to explore the café and then, perhaps, get close enough to slip through the screen door into the morning sunshine.

Every person innately longs to be free. This toddler knew it even in the womb. The time clock kicked in one day and the same little body that had been content to grow in the security of that liquid environment began to make its way—force its way—through the narrow confines of the birth canal to a place where it could be free.

The passion to be free is built into the very fiber of creation: the seedling pushing against and bursting from the protective casing that carried it to its resting place; the gazelle racing from a predator; the squirrel, high above the ground, leaping to a distant limb to escape the competition.

Since the fall of mankind, people have used others to achieve their objectives. From the building of the kingdoms of Egypt and Rome to the present conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the strong have taken advantage of the weak. But the dream of freedom cannot be snuffed out by force or manipulation. Sooner or later, people will have their freedom— sometimes at any cost.

Down through history, dictators and philosophies have attempted to enslave the human spirit. Blood has flowed like rivers in the fight to regain human dignity. The Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Emancipation Proclamation have taken their places with other great instruments of liberation to testify to the human passion for freedom. The official seals of governments were burned onto these documents that have deeply affected our own way of life.

But never has a document of freedom had the power to alter the course of history and change human lives like the declaration bearing the blood-stained brand of the Cross. And this seal is burned not on a piece of paper but on the very souls of all who were enslaved by sin. The document is a simple invitation: "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." (Matt. 11:28).

Prison bars, heavy chains, dungeons, concentration camps, and shackles: none of these can hold a candle to the bondage of the human soul devised by the father of lies. But no release, no emancipation, no pardon can bring freedom like that bought at Calvary. That is freedom indeed!

Let freedom ring!

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Art - The Language of the Soul

There are some things we cannot communicate to others or articulate for ourselves by using statements, spread sheets, or ledgers.  Words hammered into manuals, mission statements, and creeds fall far short.  There are thoughts so much higher than our thoughts that they must come to us in inklings (they are all our finite minds can hold at one time), and even these droplets from the ocean of truth must come by revelation.

God used art.  He used it way before He carved simple rules on tablets of stone on Mt. Sinai-–these were only emergency rescue measures, concessions to the destructive dictates of our small perceptions and fallen inclinations.

But in the beginning was a love song breathed into the formless void so moving that the building blocks of all things filled the void, and from these vibrating sound waves all things began to “live and move and have their being”.  He flung heat and warmth, color and light on the canvas of utter darkness, and, as James Weldon Johnson tried to put into words, He “spangled the night with a thousand stars”.  But, oh, it was much more than that.

With humor, with delicate detail, with intricate precision, He created, not just for the moment but for limitless generations of life to come with built-in safeguards and adaptive potential we are even now only beginning to recognize and appreciate. Yet all of creation was but a postcard, inviting us to something beyond.  We can only imagine.

There has to be a song.  There has to be inspiration.  There has to be revelation for which we then need metaphors and pictures, drama and music and dance, to hint at what we have perceived. 

Some things are eternal not temporal, transcendent not immediate.  Some truths are so immense that they escape even the most sophisticated of measuring sticks and weighing scales the human mind has developed. 

Glimpses of these truths overpower our systems.

And so we sing.  We tell stories and write poetry.  We employ the language of symbol.  We dance.  We dramatize for each other the insights too big for our formulas or explanations.  And we believe.  Yes, we believe.

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I Remember Daddy

Rev. W. Lee Sickal, my daddy

Daddy was a Pastor, and he was perfect for that work.  Like the father I knew at home, Daddy was caring, steady, dependable, responsible, and righteous.  I say righteous in the best sense of that word, for he had a passion for right, and right guided his decisions, whether those were spiritual, social, domestic, or financial.  He tried in our family, in the church, and in the community to “do the right thing”.

My parents’ wedding picture

Daddy loved my mother and was extravagant in appreciating her.  He always said God ordained for them to be together because she had all of the gifts that he lacked and together they were an effective and formidable team.  He was thorough and loved research and study; she was instinctive and creative.  He was social and loved to experience fellowship; she knew how to do everything—and I mean everything—with beauty and flair.  She could pull off a happening!  Both of them loved people and were generous with their time, our home, and what finances they had.  They both loved deep philosophical concepts, were thrilled with new insights, and enjoyed nothing better than a challenging discussion.  Our dining room table was the place to be if you wanted to learn, be challenged, or hear some great stories.

Daddy and Mother in front of the parsonage

To this day, I think of going to the phone to call them to come across the creek to our family room to hear the newest song we have written, especially if it contains a deep theological truth.  If I had one wish, it would be that they could be in our life for a day or two to experience what God has done with our songs and to hear what our children have created, since they left us when the kids were young.  Maybe God has made provision for them to at least hear some of the praise and rejoicing that has been sent heavenward from concerts and from the private hearts of believers as they worshipped through the music.

Daddy walking me down the wedding aisle

I always thought my dad was the strongest person I ever knew, that nothing could get him down.  But one time in his life I saw him almost lose his faith and his joy.  He was in a very discouraging pastorate fraught with problems.  He couldn’t seem to see any change taking place in the lives of people he poured his heart out to teach and lead.  It was a real wake-up call to me to learn that good and Godly men were vulnerable to discouragement and even despair.  I knew I had been one of many in my father’s life that just assumed he was impervious to defeat.  I realized after I was more mature, that everyone needs encouragement and soul support.  

Out of that experience came a lyric to which Benjy wrote music and Amy recorded on the CD Some Things Never Change.  The song was titled “My Disheartened Old Hero” and maybe it is a good song for Father’s Day—to remind all of us who are fortunate enough to have had a great dad to say so!  And to be specific about all of the things we appreciate about our “righteous” fathers.

 This Father’s Day and all days, I will give thanks for a strong and Godly father.  Because of him, it has always been easy for me to believe in God.

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A Morning Prayer

Thank you, Lord, for morning.
Each morning is a baby born,
a seedling sprouting,
a clean sheet of paper.
Each morning is a fresh start and a mystery to explore.
Today, Lord, I explored a small dirt lane
       that led through a stand of virgin pine
              where no logger’s saw,
       in the pursuit of progress,
                            has ever toppled
                               these proud conifers.
Their straight, black trunks were contrasted
against the unspoiled white bark of paper birches.
The lake they surround was still and veiled in morning mist.

Loon with chick on her back

There, far from the madding crowd
was just the private performance of loons
calling to the wood ducks and
Canadian geese.
Wherever geese and whistler swan exchange
morning secrets, I am at home.
Do these timid and magnificent creatures
nestle in the reeds on eternal shores?
This new page of morning,
I will fill with praise and thanksgiving.
Thank You, Lord, that I can hold this pen—
this is Your sweet gift to me.
May the love letter I write on the page of this day
make Your great heart glad.

Sun-bleached sheets ready for the beds

My grandmother was legally blind.  I remember her running her hands over the kitchen floor to see if there was anything gritty or sticky that she couldn’t see.  She felt the sheets as she spread them, fresh from the sun-bleached clothesline, over the bed and tucked them into the corners of the mattress.

I see her hands making yeast rolls or egg noodles, her hands far more accurate than other bakers about the elastic texture of the dough because she saw with her hands.

Grandma’s hands sensed the texture of dough

She could read the words in her large-print Bible by holding a magnifying glass over the page while wearing her thick glasses.  How she loved the scriptures, because she read the verses word by word.

As a child in the summer I sat with her on the fieldstone porch while she peeled peaches or apples or tomatoes to can for the winter.  She always let me take a turn, too, at dashing the plunger into the churn when she was turning the rich cream from their two jersey cows into butter.  She would tell me stories of growing up in Missouri and of her Irish Mahoney siblings on the farm. 

Purple iris glistening with raindrop diamonds

 It was when I got to spend the night with my grandparents that I learned how wonderful it was to see the morning.  Sunrise was not to be missed!  The sunbeams on the morning glory blossoms and the raindrop diamonds on the irises and gladiolas were rare and priceless gifts.  Grandma would tenderly hold the blooms close to her eyes to see the shades of color and talk about the amazing gift of morning.

Morning.  I still love morning best of all the times of the day.  To see morning.  To inhale morning fresh with dew.  To smell the newness and hear the birds’ first songs at break of day and touch a new bud or hold the wonder of a purple or yellow iris bloom in my hand, still wet with last night’s rain—this is the gift of morning. 

Morning at Gaither’s Pond

 After my grandmother died, we found her incredibly worn large-print Bible. In its pages, was a folded paper with a poem on it in her handwriting.  Where she had seen it or heard it, we never knew. I only know that years later two song writers set the poem to music. I attach it here, sung by Terry Blackwood and the Imperials. It’s called “The Secret”. 

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Free To Be Grateful

I was born three months after Pearl Harbor was bombed.  I remember (barely) rationing of certain materials and food stuffs, gas, and metals.  I can recall my mother’s friends talking about “the war effort” and “rolling bandages”.

My uncle Ken Lynn Sickal who earned the Purple Heart

I grew up with a cousin (born in the same month as I) whose father, my father’s only brother, was wounded in action in New Guinea and was given a “purple heart.”  At four years old I wasn’t sure why the real heart he had wasn’t good enough, but my family spoke about it like it was an honor to have the purple one.  When he came home to claim his little daughter from my grandmother and grandfather who were caring for her, he brought a new wife who was the army nurse that had tended to his wounds in the army hospital.  As it turned out, she was from Mississippi and had the only real southern accent in our family.

My uncle finished his education in literature and theater with a civil defense loan and taught in the Chicago area until he retired.  He and his army nurse wife Louise had four more children.   Phoebe, the eldest cousin who was like a sister, kept in touch, and Jeannie, one of the other four children, came to spend the day with me when we were singing at Willow Creek Church. 

Pastor Lee Sickal, my father

My father never served in the military but became a wonderful pastor who, with my artist/writer mother, built strong congregations in Michigan.  Both of them had a passion for people and instilled in my sister and me a love for God’s kingdom the world over. Faithful service in pastoral ministry is not for the faint of heart, and often requires a rededication to love as Jesus loves, serve as Jesus served, and sometimes quite literally wash feet as Jesus did those of the disciples who He knew would later betray and deny Him. Years later, after my father passed into eternity, letters, calls, and visits came from former parishioners who expressed to my mother their stories of gratitude for his consistent service in the army of the Lord. Their faith and often that of their children were some of the results of my parents’ commitment to their calling.

Aunt Lillie saying goodbye to her son Glen

One of Bill’s earliest memories is of his sixth Christmas Eve, when, at his family’s Christmas gathering, word came that his Aunt Lillie’s handsome son Glen had been killed in Germany only a few weeks after he had been deployed.  This bright young man was engaged to a lovely girl and had hoped to go into the ministry of the Nazarene Church where he had been active in the youth group.  From then on for years, there was a certain sadness for Bill about Christmas Eve, and the Gaither family celebration. Maybe that is why we tried to make new memories with our children on Christmas morning.

 Like most families, ours has been affected by the loss or injury of one of our own who served in the defense of our country.  For Aunt Lillie, the fracture to her soul caused by losing a son never fully healed, though she lived to be in her nineties.  And my family was changed forever by “the war”.  Many men and women who have experienced the horror of war carry deep wounds.  Scar tissue of the spirit finally forms, and life goes on.  But nothing is ever quite the same.  There are emotional sacrifices that go on long after “Johnny comes marching home”.

The freedom that we treasure in America is unique in all the world.   As we begin the summer season traveling, gathering, worshipping, and celebrating with our families, let us take time to savor our freedoms.  Let’s use these freedoms—rare in the world—to do good things.

We are free to help others,
free to assemble,
free to be generous,
free to pray,
free to learn,
free to criticize and question.

Let us always be aware that freedom is not free.  It has come at great cost, a price that should cause us to live aware and grateful.  And may we never misuse this precious freedom or use it as a license to take away someone else’s freedom.

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Footwashing

I grew up with yearly foot washing as a part of the Easter week.  It was considered an important ordinance of the church.  

For me, my first time to be a part of it was memorable. 

There was a dear Saint in our congregation that we often gave a ride to church, so she and I had a special relationship.  She always had pink wintergreen mints in her purse for me, and with them came the assurance of how much she and Jesus loved me. 

My mother prepared me for my first foot washing, telling me about Jesus washing his disciples’ feet and how the actual service would be, including that there would be a curtain across the fellowship hall separating the men from the women, and someone dipping clean warm water into a basin.  A long linen towel would be wrapped around my waist and then I would kneel down and dip water with my hand up over the person’s feet I would be washing. Then, she said, I would dry their feet, set the basin aside, and stand to give that person a hug.

We would all be singing some of the hymns about surrender, commitment, and the love of Jesus. 

When the Thursday night before Easter came, we gathered in the fellowship hall, our chairs in a circle, and a basin for warm water placed at each seat.  I sat between my mother and Lilly Moser so I would not be apprehensive.

All went as mother had explained.  I was 4 years old and in the company of sincerely committed women of the church.  I took this ordinance very seriously. 

All went well. I washed Lilly Moser’s old and swollen feet, dried them with the very long towel tied around my tiny self, then stood to hug her. She smelled of lavender as she wrapped her arms around me.

Then came the moment for which I was not prepared… Lilly got down on her swollen, arthritic knees and began to wash my feet. Everything in my young heart was silently crying, “Oh, no! You are not supposed to wash my feet!!”   I had heard the Peter part of the story and suddenly knew why he so objected to Jesus’s act of servanthood.  I never forgot how difficult and cheerfully Lilly got up from the hard floor and enveloped me with her genuine love for me. 

“Where He leads me, I will follow…” the women around me sang, “…follow all the way.”

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Mothering

Much has been written about mothers.  Greeting cards, books, and songs have celebrated the virtues and influence of mothers.  Sadly, much has been said, too, blaming mothers for desertion, wrong teaching, negligence, and damaging modeling.

I, too, have written to honor one of the best mothers a child could have who taught my sister and me to love people, notice and embrace life, and walk uprightly before God.

But here, I would like to celebrate the joy of being a mother.

When Bill and I were in the first two years of our marriage, we had several conversations about how good our life together was and how having children might challenge or ruin our insulated joy.  We lived in a sweet little house Bill’s parents rented to us just across the driveway from their family home.  I was finishing college, doing my student teaching, and taking the last classes in literature, French, and sociology.

Bill was teaching English at our local high school. We had begun writing songs together, and he was also directing the choir and leading worship at a nearby church.  By the second year of our marriage, I was also teaching French and English at the same high school.  What could be better?  Would a baby interrupt this bliss?

Then in December at the end of our second year, Suzanne entered our world.  And, yes, she interrupted everything!  As I have said many times since, we can make our plans, but God is in the interruptions.

To know that I held a piece of eternity in my arms was life-altering.  And to realize that what this baby thought and felt and believed about life and God was largely my responsibility, was both sobering and exhilarating.  That this tiny wonder was totally dependent on us for everything brought an abrupt halt to self-absorption!  We would now be on call 24/7.  Her cries were a call to read her signals and to find the wisdom to interpret them.

And then there were three. No matter how I tried to be prepared for motherhood, I found my capacity to know what our children needed was insufficient—and would get more so the older they got. This made me seek wisdom from others who had more experience.  Motherhood was a call to humility:  to admit what I did not know, to listen to wiser input, to consistently ask God to give me what I lacked.

I remember thinking that my quiet meditation time was over.  I wouldn’t have time to enrich my life with devotional study and prayer.  Oh, but what I didn’t know was that with our babies’ first words came wisdom that punctuated everything I’d ever learned from my devotional life. From the mouths of babes and sucklings...

Comments like, “Mommy did you know that rainbows live at Easter?”  Or when finally giving up a pacifier, “Here, mommy.  Take this thing.  It’s empty.”  As our children grew so did their questions, questions if I was honest, I’d asked myself.  And their insights sometimes took my breath away.

Now that they are adults with children of their own, they are my peers and many times my advisors.  How motherhood has stretched me, blessed me, challenged me, changed me would take not just this short essay, but books.

I can only say this Mother’s Day that next to serving the Lord and walking life’s journey with the man who loves me, being a mother has been my life’s greatest gift from God.  The three children that made me a mother have also made me pray more, laugh more, cry more, learn more, and grow more than all of the rest of my experiences put together.  And of all the honors or titles I could ever be given in a lifetime, the greatest by far is the stand-tall-title—Mother.

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Expressing the Inexpressible

Of all the cardinal claims of the Christian Faith, the Incarnation, from start to finish, is the most immense for believers to wrap our minds around. That God himself would choose to actually come to be born as one of us, to live and walk and die with us, takes indeed, a leap of faith.

The rough-sawn wooden bookends of this carpenter’s life—from manger to the cross—redefine symbol and icon.  Just wood—not gold or silver or jewels or fine, rare fabrics—but just wood, becomes the symbol of an invitation that would exclude no one.  That we could know God came to embrace us all.  And this Son-of-God Christ debunked so many centuries-old conceptions of who this God is and what were His actual characteristics.

No longer haunted by a fear-based faith, we are invited to move in closer, trust deeper, and accept a new revelation: while we thought we had to do outlandish things to approach this God, He had instead been pursuing us all along.  Instead of wrath and anger being his earmarks, this God has all along been wanting to transform us by love, a love that has the power to pull us in, allow us to be honest, give us the energy of an on-going resurrection. Yes!  Easter everywhere!  New us!  New way of seeing! New joy beyond common human perception!  New revelation—Life is everywhere!  The death-pull is broken.

 Fortunately, and maybe miraculously, those who knew this Jesus, wrote down what He said and did. In letters, in conversation, in hindsight and foresight, they wrote it down.  From wildly different viewpoints, they told the story.  A doctor and a teen-ager, a conniving tax collector and some common commercial fishermen--they told of everyday friendship with this new definition of God.

Yet there was so much to the story that in the end, they threw up their hands in despair at their limited ability to tell it all. “It would take a library of books to tell it!”  they said.

And writers and witnesses have tried ever since to tell their own personal resurrection stories.  I, myself, have tried.  But words are inadequate.  How does one “bear witness” to an internal Easter, a discovery that there is eternity in every moment, an ongoing resurrection?

I have tried in speech and in prose.  But perhaps the story—the big story of God-with-us—can best be told in poetry, because in poetry more of the story is between the lines than on the lines.  Poetry is about the something else, the something that can only be an inkling of something eternal, something transcendent.

Marry that poetry to the right music, and the something else of a story can by-pass our temptation to analyze, and go straight to the eternity of our souls. 

This song lyric I wrote twice.  After the first version, Bill decided on a totally different musical direction.  So, I wrote this story again.  Here are both attempts to tell a story beyond words. Yet, I will try again...and again...and again.

THEN CAME THE MORNING (original lyric)

They had sealed His broken body in a half-way finished tomb,
And even that was loaned them by a friend.  
Then they spent the endless hours wondering
who would be the next
And why things so perfect had to end. 
And if it weren’t enough to haunt them that their hopes
and dreams were gone, 
Shattered by the hammer and some nails, 
The silent accusation of the fear that gripped their hearts 
Made a farce of everything He’d told them from the start. 

They said now that it was over she should go and get some rest. 
She was sure they all had meant well with their words, 
But for her it wasn’t over; it would never, never be! 
Her child would always be alive to her. 
The things that she had stored away there deep within her breast
Paraded back and forth across her mind-- 
From the moment she had felt this baby leap within her womb 
She’d known somehow that life could not be sealed up in a tomb. 

It seemed I’d gone forever without a ray of hope, 
My prayers just echoed empty down the hall. 
The statements that I made returned at night to question me, 
And no one seemed to answer when I called. 
Music, the joy, and all the friends I had were gone, 
And all I had to hold to were His words 
That promised to be with me and never let me go,
So that is what I held to;
It was all that I could know.

Sometimes we meet together in our cloistered upper rooms; 
We drink the wine and share the broken bread, 
And promise one another to be true unto the end 
To all the things our Lord and Master said. 
And yet, when we are facing the dark times of our lives, 
Those “Hallelujahs” seem so far away. 
Our failures and our humanness is all we see or hear, 
And all our best intentions seem to melt and disappear.  

But when the final word is spoken, and the last farewell is said,
And gone is all our chance to sell or buy. 
When the last child is delivered and the last soul laid to rest, 
And all the tears are shed we’ll ever have to cry. 
When the sands of time have sifted through the minutes and the days,
What’s done is done and what is said is said, 
Just before the music fades from all our songs of faith and hope, 
A trumpet blast will bring the shout of victory, and we’ll know – 
Death has lost! Life has won!
And morning, morning has come!

Lyric: Gloria Gaither
Copyright ©2019 Hannah Street Music


THEN CAME THE MORNING (Version 2)

They all walked away, there was nothin' to say--
They'd just lost their dearest Friend;
All that He’d said, now He was dead--
So this was the way it would end.
The dreams they had dreamed
Were not what they'd seemed
Now that He was dead and gone;
The garden, the jail, the hammer, the nail--
How could a night be so long?

The angel, the star, the kings from afar,
The wedding, the water, the wine--
Now it was done; they'd taken her Son,
Wasted before His time.
She knew it was true;
She'd watched Him die, too;
She'd heard them call Him just a man,
But deep in her heart she knew from the start
Somehow her Son would live again....

 CHORUS
Then came the morning!
Night turned into day,
The stone was rolled away;
Hope rose with the dawn!
Then came the morning!
Shadows vanished before the sun--
Death had lost and life had won,
For morning had come!

Lyric: Gloria Gaither
Music: William J. Gaither and Chris Christian
Copyright © 1982 Gaither Music Company ASCAP,
HomeSweetHome Music

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Pomp, Procession, and Palms

The children come down the aisle of the church, waving palm branches then gathering to hear the story of another time, another place when children and their families lined the streets of Jerusalem, laying palm branches along the way or waving them in the air as Jesus passes before them riding on a donkey.

Parents smile from their church pews, snapping shots with their cell phones to send to grandparents in Florida.  Neither the children nor the parents realize the depth of the story they are recreating.

 So, what’s it all about, Alphie?

Finally, it was time. Unlike the day of water-into-wine, Jesus was ready to admit that He actually was the prophesied King of the Jews.  He planned His own announcement in response to the crowds that had followed him for the last three years.  Unlike other kings and royalty who made their triumphal entries riding on the backs of the finest-bred and highly trained steeds, seated on the tooled and jeweled leather saddles, Jesus sent his disciples to borrow a donkey.  And it wasn’t a donkey trained to carry burdens, but a young foal never before ridden.  He would announce His royal reign in the language of the poor, using the transportation of the powerless.

Like his entrance into the world, He would once again confuse every expectation of how a king should come.  Without fanfare, this king had been born to a peasant girl in a borrowed stable, bedded down in a feeding trough for, yes, donkeys.  And unlike the lineage of kings or even the carefully kept lineage of male Jewish ancestry, His father would not be Joseph of the lineage of David, but God Himself, and his human lineage would be that of His mother Mary.

Yes, once again breaking all expectations of how a king should come, Jesus rode into Jerusalem when the city was crowded with people in town for the festivities of Passover, and not only Jews, but people from many other cultures, as well.  Admirers of this man who healed leppers, fed thousands with a boy’s fish lunch, and opened blind eyes, lined the street to get a glimpse of Him. Some even took off their coats and laid them in his path. Like a selfie, they would have their coats marked by his donkey’s footprints to prove they had been there.

And they waved palm branches.  To all cultures gathered that festival day, palm branches had meaning.  To the Greeks, palms meant the winner of a race or another athletic contest. Palms meant Winner!

To the Romans, palms echoed victorious gladiators or reigning emperors. Palm leaves were woven into the crowns of conquerors.

To Egyptians, palms proclaimed immortality.  Ironically, palms lined funeral processions and were laid across the bodies of the deceased.

And to the Jews who sang “Hosanna!” their song and their palms harkened back to the deliverance from slavery, and their commitment to return to Jerusalem in holy pilgrimage.  “Hosanna!” meant “Save us now!” Palms of deliverance! Songs of Salvation!

 Did the by-standers that day have a clue that this Savior who came to them on the vehicle of “the least of these” would be, indeed, the victor over sin and all kinds of bondage?  Did anyone on this celebrative day know that this “triumphal entry” would also be his funeral prelude?  Did they know that this irregular monarch would not make laws but fulfill them?

 Did they have an inkling that this “conqueror” would be the conqueror over sin, death, and the grave?  That, indeed, their palm branches would symbolize an immortality not just after death, but one that would infuse their days with the power of the eternal.

 Winner of a race?  Little did they know that they were watching, then and in the days to come, the final victory lap of a race whose end would be declared by the runner himself with the pronouncement, “It is finished.”  Did they have any insight into how immortal his reign would be?

And do we, who place palm branches in the palms of our children and pull out our cell phones to capture and mark this moment, have a clue to the eternal promise of singing “Hosanna!  Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord”?

 Triumphal, indeed! 

Unshakable Kingdom

They came to follow Him,
Drawn by what His promised them
If they would sell all that they had;
He said that God would send
A kingdom that would never end
Where all the poor would be rich.
And in their discontent
They heard what they thought He meant—
Heard that the weak would be strong,
Bread would be multiplied,
Hunger be satisfied
And every servant a king.

But He went His quiet way,
Giving Himself away,
Building what eyes could never see.
While men looked for crowns and thrones,
He walked with crowds, alone,
Planting a seed in you and me—
Crying for those who cried,
Dying for those who died,
Bursting forth, glorified! Alive!
Yet some of them looked for Him,
Sad that it had to end,
But some dared to look within and see
The kingdom of God, a kingdom that would never end…
The living, unshakable kingdom of God!

Lyric: Gloria Gaither
Music: William J. Gaither and Michael W. Smith
©1985 Gaither Music Company and Meadowgreen Music Company
(admin. by EMI Christian Music Group). All rights reserved.

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Christ Walks the City

Bethlehem, Galilee, Gethsemane--he walked there. But today Christ walks the concrete sidewalks of Times Square, 47th Street, and Broadway, and as he walks his feet are soiled, not with the sand of the seashore or the reddish dust of the Emmaus Road, but with the soot and filth of the city.

He walks the "great white way", and his face is lit by the gaudy neon signboards of materialism. He walks in the shadows of the dark alleyways, where faces are not lit at all.

He walks with children and goes where they are taken, when they are enticed and bartered, to gratify some sick perversion. He walks the steaming hallways of welfare hotels where mothers cry themselves to sleep in worry and despair.

He does not sleep but lies beside the broken in their vermin-infested shelters and hears the homeless groan in their delirium; he walks between the bodies as they wake, touching heads of matted hair, offering a hand to lift the men and women who are stiff from lying on the drafty floor.

He walks the streets of Harlem and Chinatown, Brooklyn, and the Bronx and stops to stand with those whose buildings smolder, whose sons are lost to drugs, whose mothers are evicted, whose daughters sell their bodies for a meal.

He walks the subway aisles offering his seat to the old, the weary, the pregnant. He is jostled with the throngs at rush hour and reads the signs that offer satisfaction from Jack Daniels or a hot line to call to rid one's body of a growing life.

He is pushed and shoved through Grand Central Station, elbowed and ignored, yet in the crowd he feels a measure of virtue flow from his being and searches through the faces for an honest seeker passing by.

Christ walks the city. I've seen him there. I've seen his blistered, broken feet, galled by the shoes without the socks. He walks the city on children's feet that grow too fast to stay in shoes at all. He walks the street in high-heeled shoes that pinch the toes but attract the client.

He walks the city. He stands behind a table serving breakfast, drives a truck that carries sandwiches to the grates where homeless sleep to garrison themselves against the cold. He climbs the narrow staircases to purge the burned-out buildings and restore them into homes again. He paints and disinfects and hauls out trash.

I've seen Christ stand by a dental chair fixing worn-out teeth; I've seen him tutoring a drop-out and heard him say, "Keep reaching for the sky." Christ holds a baby whose mother is a child herself, so needing to be mothered--and holds that mother's mother in his arms at night when prayers become such groanings that they cannot be uttered. He groans with them all, a mother to three generations of motherless.

Christ walks the city and carves saints in stone for some cathedral, the cherubim and seraphim with faces of the street. He weaves the cloth that transforms rags into a lovely tapestry. Christ dances when he himself can find no other way to say, "I love you", to a world in which there is left no word for "Love".  He acts the part that tells the story of how that Love invaded humankind, for only story tells the Story.  Christ incarnate.  Christ the living, walking parable, takes to the stage to be the Story.

Christ the advocate walks the city. "You have an advocate with the Father," he said. That is done. But now the powerless need an advocate to the government, to the red tape, to the powers-that-be. Christ walks there. Jesus, "our lawyer in heaven", walks the city to become a lawyer in the streets, filling out welfare forms, phoning case workers, petitioning agencies, drafting legislation to protect the poor. Christ the advocate walks the city.

Christ walks the city's Ivy Halls where students debate his existence. He holds out his nail-scarred hands to the agnostics and invites them to "touch and see". He is there at the "gay caucus" and the "feminist rally" and the meeting for the "anti-war demonstration". He, who is question and answer, he who sets brother against brother yet whispers "peace, be still" to the turbulent waves, walks here.

Christ walks the halls of government and in his presence, statesmen hammer out the laws. The just and the unjust, the honest and the ruthless, those who struggle for truth and those who live the lie convene in his presence, for Christ walks the marble halls of government, sifting the "wheat from the chaff".

Christ walks the corridors of justice. He is in night court and stands with the accused and the accuser. He who is truth and mercy and justice weighs them both and walks both to the judge's chamber and the prisoner's cell. Christ is no stranger to locks and bars. He paces with the convicted her narrow space and hears the curses of despair. Yes, Christ is present in the prisons where fear has built walls around the heart thicker than the walls that guard against escape and higher than the barbed wire that makes an ugly frame for the grey skies. He walks the empty corridors and offers the key of freedom to whosoever would become citizens of a new country, a different kingdom. It is the very key he offers to the judge who is also a captive, a key that makes both the sentencer and the condemned free men and women--family.

Christ calls all to communion. The table of the Eucharist is spread. He takes the bread. He is the Bread.  He breaks it, breaks himself and offers this brokenness to us explaining that if we take it, we ourselves must be broken and consumed. He takes the cup. It is the pouring out of himself. He says, "Won't you, too, be poured out with me?"

The table is long and spans centuries. Some leave the table to go in search of silver. Some chairs were empty from the start, for though many were invited, some had wives to marry, parents to bury, houses to build, empires to manage. Those who have come are a motley blend of ages and nationalities, races, and genders, privileged and disenfranchised. But they are all poor and hungry and needy. Slowly, they break the bread--again and again--and lift their morsels to their mouths. It does not go down easily. Sometimes it sticks in the throat until the wine is passed. The pressed and poured-out fruit washes away the dryness.

The bread--"my flesh"--and the wine--"my life's blood"--together make a sacrament of joy, and the rite becomes a celebration of paradox. In the breaking we have become whole. In the pouring out, we have been filled. In bringing our poverty and hunger and need, we have been made rich. In daring to sit with seekers whose differences we did not understand, we have been made one.

Christ the paradox walks the city. He is the broken, and he is the healer. He is the hungry and he is the Bread of Life. He is the homeless, yet it is he who says, "Come to me all you who are overloaded, and I will be your resting place." He is the loser who makes losing the only way to win.  He is the omnipotent who calls all who follow to choose powerlessness, and teaches us how, by laying down all power in heaven and in earth. He is the sick, and he is the wholeness. He who said, "I thirst," is himself the Living Water that promises we will never thirst again.

Just as the disciples in the Emmaus house recognized their Lord through the broken bread and the shared cup, so our blindness turns to sight in Holy communion, and we see him for who he truly is.

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Journal-worthy

First, let me say how much I enjoy all your comments on the blog.  I read every one and learn from them.  They also inspire and encourage me to keep sharing the insights God and life are teaching me.  I love it when you comment, share the blog with others, and click “Like”!

A few blogs ago (Friend in a Café) someone posted this comment: “I often thought about writing in a journal, then realized I don’t have a lifestyle that merits a journal.”

I’ve been pondering that comment ever since and decided to address you who might feel that your life isn’t journal-worthy.  I would also like to hear from you who don’t feel that way.

First, never buy a “diary”.  Journaling should never be a tyrant that forces you to keep account of every day or makes you feel guilty if you don’t.  Just find an empty, well-bound journal, one that pleases you to hold and of a size that you can take with you.

Second, if a moment means something to you, write it down.  Don’t wait for an important or consequential event.  Just a regular moment will do.  Did you love smelling the bacon frying and the aroma of morning coffee?  Write how it made you feel or a memory it evoked.  Did the sunrise on the new-fallen snow or the golden wheat field behind your house make you clap your hands inside? Describe it.  Notice the fairies dancing in the dew drops outside the kitchen window?  Say so!  Catch the moment!  Did your child say something surprisingly insightful?  Write it down.  You think you’ll remember, but you won’t unless you write it down. 

Don’t be pressured to write a lot.  Put a date at the top of the page and then scribble a few sentences. Think of it as if you are texting yourself.  Sharpen your focus; pay attention.  Then, tell the pages what you are seeing and feeling.  No flowery language is needed.  Journaling is like a prayer.  You don’t have to impress God...or the paper.

Third, if you spend the day sad or depressed or discouraged, tell your journal before you go to bed.  Puke it all out on the pages.  Are you frustrated or angry?  Vent to your journal.  Then let it go and go to bed.  Don’t re-read it the next day or maybe the next week or next month. I have a feeling that when you do re-read your entry later on, you will have gained some perspective.

Fourth, take your journal with you to lunch in a small café.  Keep it in the car while you’re waiting for the kids to come out of school or while waiting for road construction.  Sip a latté in an airport coffee shop and read the stories around you in the faces, the body language, the interactions (or lack thereof). Write what you see and listen with your heart to the messages. When you get up in the morning, write down your dreams.  Don’t try to interpret their meaning; that may come later. The main thing is to learn to pay attention to life around you and inside you, and record it for this moment.

When you have your devotional/meditation time, keep your journal close.  If you are reading the Bible verse for the day, read the whole chapter.  Pay attention to the story, the context of that verse.  I guarantee you will have a new revelation or fresh insight that will speak to your day. You’ll want to write it down.

Over my years of mostly sporadic journaling, I have discovered a few things.
1. What I thought was important at the time, turned out not to be, and the things so common I almost didn’t write them down, turned out to be very important.  Someone has said “big doors swing on very small hinges”.  Yes, journaling has let me know what is important—and what is not.
2. Journaling has taught me there is a difference between
     --acquaintances and relationships
    --calling and career
--setbacks and failure
     --success and accomplishment          
     --power and authority.
3. God is always up to something in my life.
4.  I have learned
--everyone needs to belong
--I need silence and solitude        
--meditation and centering are needs as innate and ancient as Adam and Eve
--silence needs to be coupled with reflection if it is to be restorative.
5. Eternity starts here. There is eternity to be found in each moment. My job is to recognize it and give myself away for things that last forever, for forever starts here.

I hope you will start journaling if you haven’t.  And I hope whether you are a life-long journaler or a brave new starter, you will share your experiences with us.

This song is the journal entry of my life.

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My Right Hand

I am intrigued by the passages of the Bible that say that when we are in relationship with God, He holds us by our right hand.  There are also many references to Jesus after his ascension being seated at the Father’s right hand (some sources list 100!). 

Biblical scholars say the use of this “right hand” metaphor symbolizes authority, strength, and a place of honor and protection. Most commentaries say that the references to God holding us by our right hand mean that we have the assurance that God is close and doesn’t leave us, even in the most difficult circumstances of life. That God is holding our right hand implies that HIS right hand is free. This should bring us peace and eliminate the fear and anxiety of feeling that we are all alone in this journey, no matter the challenges to our faith and trust.

I love, too, the metaphor from Matthew 11 of a yoke.  Although few young people of the last century remember seeing two strong animals, like oxen or horses, being joined using a wooden piece of equipment that combined their strengths to pull heavy loads, we can imagine this from movies and pictures. 

Not just the weight of the load, but the yoke itself becomes an issue.  The strain of moving with a strong wooden yoke, were it not expertly carved, shaped, and smoothed, could cause irritation to the neck and shoulders of the wearer.

Now, imagine this image in the context of Jesus offering to each of us who are overwhelmed by the load life has laid on our shoulders to be “yoked” to Him.  Come to me, he offers, and I will give you rest.  Yoke up with me.  Okay, let’s just stop there.  Don’t yoke-sharers have to be evenly matched, equally strong, equally sized?

But Jesus invites us wimpy and weary to join up in a team where our side of the yoke is just a figure of speech, because the God of the galaxies is in the other side of the yoke.  And our side of the yoke is not irritating or poorly shaped but perfectly fitted to our particular (scrawny) neck and shoulders.  It is perfect, and what’s left of our load is light.  How stupid of us, then, to claim credit for the outcome of this “shared” load bearing!

Now, back to God holding us by our right hand.  Yes, this means we are not alone.  And it means God is walking with us every step of the way.  But maybe, just maybe, He is holding our right hand tightly, so we won’t use it to take charge or take credit.  Our more awkward hand is free to carry through, but our right hand is held, while God’s right hand is free to overcome the circumstance, lift the encumbrances, fight the battles, or move galaxies, if need be, for His beloved children.

He has been given by his Father all authority in heaven and earth (Matthew 28), and it is He who holds our right hand.  That gives a whole new meaning to “fear not!”  And it also keeps us from taking over.  We must relinquish.  We must surrender to win. We must not use our right hand of self-sufficiency to wrench back control, for if we do, we will not know the sweet confidence that “He who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is interceding for us.” – Romans 8:34

It is He who holds our right hand, so “who can separate us from the love of Christ?  Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us and gave Himself for us!” – Romans 8:35,37

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A Birthday Prayer

I lately found a prayer I wrote in my journal on my 60th birthday.  It was the time of life when my days were filled with singing and traveling on weekends, helping our daughters with their four children (ages 3-10) with their schedules, writing song lyrics, publicity pieces, and articles, and keeping up with home, meals, guests, and the laundry. At that time I had also opened a place we called Gaither Family Resources, a welcoming place filled with books, music, décor, and coffee shop.
My life was varied and busy—too busy.  I was always fighting for solitude to think and read, and longing to expand my academic research.  There were books I needed to write. I was jugging all these things like a circus performer, loving it all but seemingly never able to focus on my “calling”.  Here is the prayer: 

Dear God,
It seems as if my plans for myself have always been written in Jello.  Maybe it’s because my best gift has turned out to be adapting.  I never could narrow down what I wanted to do or what I should prepare for because I was interested in it all.
I still feel that way, but now I am coming to believe that this smattering of jobs you’ve given me is my calling.  In fact, I’ve come to recognize after sixty years of living – how dense can I be? – that maybe even the things other people perceive are my callings, the things you’ve given me to do, weren’t my calling either – or at least, not all of it.
I am finally coming to believe that you simply call me to show up for work.  (I’ve always been everybody’s workhorse and sometimes resented that.) But you give me a job to go to so that you can interrupt my days.  It’s been the interruptions – as I look back – that really counted for eternity.

I’m so sorry that I have missed some of these.  I repent that I’ve sometimes turned people away you sent into my life – put them off, cut short my times with them, scheduled them for a more convenient time – when you intended them to be my life.      
I used to pine over books that didn’t sell as much as I hoped they would, degrees I couldn’t finish, and opportunities I couldn’t take advantage of.  I still do sometimes.
     Today help me to see what you really give me to do: help the person in the ditch; take the child on my knee who’s interrupting my conversation and talk to him or her; fix soup to lift someone’s work load; talk to the person in the store who’s keeping me from finishing the display… Whatever you put in my path – let me assume it’s my calling and do it with verve and joy. Amen.

  Now, more than two decades later, I have come to believe what our daughter Suzanne always says:  God’s will for your life is to do the next thing. 
Yes! God’s will is and always has been to embrace and do what is on my plate for today with all the energy and passion I have, and not ask God for any more information until I have done that.  I have discovered that when we “walk in the light”, the light moves.  If we stay in the light of “God’s will” for today, we must move, too.  Perhaps we see God’s will only in hindsight.   As “regular” as it seems at the time, it doesn’t get any more glamorous than that. But I have also learned that when we bring our preparations to God, give up our pre-made plans, and give all our struggling to the Holy Spirit, we have grabbed a whirlwind by the tail. When we ask God for an adventure, we better mean it!  

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Planting Instructions

We are building a pergola outside our kitchen window seat. I thought climbing roses would be perfect growing up the lattice attached to the support pillars. 

I was searching through the David Austin catalog of roses (my favorite breeder of English roses) and came across a video on how to plant bare root roses.  I wanted to be sure I didn’t mess this up, so I went to the video site and found these instructions:

1.   Soak the bare roots in a bucket of water for a few days to be sure the roots are well-hydrated.
2.   Dig the hole where roses are to be planted wider and deeper than the fully spread-out roots.
3.    Mix the soil from the hole with humus and, if soil is dense, a bit of sand.
4.   Fill the hole with water, then add enough of the soil mixture in the hole to give the roots a rich place to start.
5.   Place the rose in the hole, spread roots out, and gently fill in around the roots with the soil mix, so that the top of the roots is just below ground level. Gently press the soil in place.

I couldn’t help wishing that new and raw-root believers were planted in the soil of God’s love so gently and carefully.

What if the spirit of our worship was like the water people so need to hydrate their vulnerable roots?  And what if the space where hearts are planted were wider and deeper than the tender roots, so that no tight and harsh confines would bruise their thirsty exploration?

And what if any hard clay of legalism were mixed with the soil of compassion to enrich, without bruising or breaking, their fragile tendrils of joy and enthusiasm?

And what if our greatest reward for serving the Lord was to see in new believers the greening leaves begin to unfold, and new shoots begin to bud and blossom?

And what if all of us could find our roots going “deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love” so that we could “be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high his love really is; and to experience that love for ourselves, though it is so great we will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it.  And so at last, we will be filled up with God himself.”  (Eph. 3:17-19 NLT)

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Mountains and Sea -- A Valentine

It is never easy to find a valentine that says what I want to say. So over the years I have ended up, more often than not, writing my own messages to the lover of my life.  If I laid these valentines end-to-end, I would find a progression of seasons of the heart. This last December we celebrated 62 years of seasons.  There has been (and still is) a lot of learning how to read the road signs and subtleties of loving.  One only trusts the inner sanctum of the soul to another bit by bit as trust is built, and even then, only God knows the deeper hidden places that each of us harbors.  Bill and I are alike in some ways; we are very different in others.  But strong marriages are not built on unison, but on two-part harmony and the willingness to let, and help, the other grow toward what God made us to be.  So, my tender love, here is my valentine.

MOUNTAINS AND SEA

You were all mountains;
I was sea.
You craved elevation;
I longed for vastness.
You needed to view things from above;
I wanted to survey the far horizons.
You preferred to get your perspective from looking down;
I got mine from gazing outward.
You were inspired by heights;
My muse was breadths and depths.
You needed to feel the altitude;
I needed to be dwarfed by expanses.
Together we have brought our perceptions
From separate frames of reference.
Yet together we have come to know—
Though we will never fully understand—
How wide, how long, how high and how deep
Love really is.
And so we are filled up,
Yes, filled up.

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Friend in a Café

I was in a small café in Sweden having coffee one morning. The waitress was not Swedish, but Spanish, and spoke both Swedish and English. As she wiped off the table with a sponge, then stopped to take my order, there was no barrier between us. She was a woman, doing what I had done a thousand times. She made coffee in the mornings, got her children off to school, and tried to make ends meet at the market.  She was very bright; her snappy eyes told me that.

Yet she served. She managed things there in the café. She was capable of more. What we exchanged across a cultural barrier was instant friendship because we shared a kinship with women everywhere. 

Women have always been able to make do out of what life hands them, to create an ordered universe in the midst of chaos and stress.  Women have always been able to make something from nothing, stretching the stew, making the worn-out clothes or opportunities into something new, smiling and caressing in spite of their own inclinations to give in to tears and fatigue, mothering the world. Yet, like the new friend I made in the café, while their hands were performing the task at hand, their minds were racing on. Assimilating. Analyzing. Philosophizing.

Someone has said that men are effective while women are reflective. That may be true. So much of men's thinking is applied directly to their work. The result of their thinking is output, income, product. But much of what women think about does not create tangible product. Historically, their assigned roles in society have prevented this. Instead, they ponder the meaning and quality of life. Such pondering may not result in consumable products, but it can produce great souls—souls who ask why instead of merely what and how.  Women, after all, are about the industry of the heart.

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Sisters--Ever the Best of Friends

She was ten years old when I was born, and I never knew life without her. I don't remember any sibling rivalry, perhaps because she was more my protector than my peer at first. She helped with my bath, fed me when Mother was busy, and showed me off to her friends. When I was bigger, she took me places and made sure nobody picked on me.

I remember that she took me with her to visit high school when I was four or five years old. I sat in study hall and drew pictures with her colored pencils and circles with her protractor. I thought it was great to move from class to class, and I remember that her teachers made a fuss over me. I got the feeling Evelyn was proud.

I knew I was proud of her! She was the highest scoring forward on the girls' basketball team, and I couldn't wait to grow up to be like her. I liked her brown hair, her saddle shoes, and her boyfriends. I'm not sure they were all that crazy about me, especially when she took me with her on her dates. "Those guys won't want your little sister tagging along," my mother would tell her. "If they don't want her around," I'd hear her answer, "they don't want me either." And that was that. I knew I could grab my roller skates and go to the skating rink one more time.

I got quite good at roller skating. But I didn't get good at any other sport. The first day of school was always great for me. My sister's reputation as a crack athlete would always precede me, so when recess came and the kids chose up teams for softball and basketball, I'd always be the first chosen. That was the first day.

The second was another story: "We'll take Sam; you can have Gloria." "No, that's okay; you can take her. We had her yesterday." After that I was always the last to be chosen. I resigned myself to the fact that I was uncoordinated and too nearsighted for good depth perception. But I began to show promise in other areas, and it was my sister who always cheered me on.

 When I won my first speech contest, she was the first to brag on me. When I was elected president of the student council and tied for valedictorian of my class, she cut the article out of the paper and had it preserved in plastic. When I failed or came home broken-hearted, she was the sympathetic shoulder to cry on; when I succeeded she beamed from ear to ear.



When the calling of my life took me into more public arenas, there was never a shade of jealousy or distance from her. She loved my husband and my children as her own family and helped me through pressured times in ways I could never explain.

 Her husband Dave was like a brother to me and made sacrifices few men would make to keep my sister and me together.  When my mother was no longer able to keep up with the schedules of our teenage children while the Gaither Trio traveled on weekends, Evelyn and Dave made a complete career change. At a stage when few couples would take such a risk, they moved from Michigan to Indiana to be the stability we could count on.

 Evelyn was a Junior High School science teacher.  Most of the time if someone was looking for her at school, they would not find her and her students in the classroom, but outside under a tree picking up leaves or acorns for leaf collections or turning over stones in a nearby creek looking for tiny crabs or observing tadpoles and frogs. Two of our grandsons (her nephews) who went into fields of science say they credit their interest in science to their aunt Evelyn.

 Our mother's illness and ultimate death from cancer was a bittersweet process we shared together. It made me love Evelyn all the more to share the experience no one can put into words, the experience that left us orphans. After Mother’s death we were all that was left of our family of origin. We held to each other more tightly than ever, treasuring every stolen moment together--each opportunity to share insights from what life was teaching us, each exchange of cute or brilliant antics of our grandchildren.

 She was a Virgo, and was somehow connected to the soil. Anything she planted grew just to please her. We traded plants from our gardens in the spring and gave each other seeds in the fall. We took trips to the nurseries to buy new breeds of geraniums or to find unusual perennials. But deep in my heart I always knew that the rarest thing we'd ever grow was the deep friendship that would never die with any season. Someone has said, "You can't take it with you," but I was convinced that what my sister and I had grown together was already being transplanted in the perfected Garden of Eden on the sunny banks of Jordan.

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Tasting, Seeing, Touching Christmas

Taste Christmas!

This is the season to throw diet to the winds and to eat our way through this happy season.  Because America truly is the “great melting pot,” the foods of all our various national heritages have marched right onto the Christmas table, bringing our roots together while at the same time, making each family’s celebration unique.     

Italian families may add pastas and fabulous sauces to the Christmas menu, while Swedish families insist on including gubböra (an egg and anchovy mixture), vörtbröd (a rye bread), and lutfisk to the traditional ham and potatoes.  For the Irish descendents, potatoes are not an option and soda bread will be a staple, as well.  A breakfast favorite of the South, having made its way to us via France, is “chocolate gravy” over homemade biscuits.

Whatever our family histories might be, food is a vital part of Christmas and kitchens are bound to be the place to be, while fruit cakes, Christmas cookies, cream pies with meringue, mince tarts, turkeys, hams, roasts, winter vegetables, and special breads are pulled from the ovens or simmer on the stove.     

Some of the best gifts of the season are those from the kitchen.  Baked goods wrapped in colorful boxes, homemade and canned jellies, jams and chutneys, delicious breads and pies are sure to get grateful responses from neighbors, mail carriers, teachers, and business associates.    

Some of my favorite tastes of Christmas are those sipped steaming hot from a mug or cup: hot chocolate, wassail, rich coffees, chai or Christmas teas, and warmed fruit juices and punches.  At our house, we have a special golden yellow earthen-ware pitcher and a set of gigantic matching cups and saucers lettered on the sides with the word “chocolat.”  This special set is saved for one special purpose: hot chocolate with a melting marshmallow for children that come in half-frozen from sledding on the hillside.        

I guess when I think of it, Christmas is, for one thing, a giant season-long tasting party.  From home to home, family to family, we find ways to say: “Christmas is love.  Taste and see!”

See Christmas!

Ever since the shepherds were overwhelmed by a sky full of singing angels and said to themselves: “Let’s go see this thing that has come to pass”, Christmas has been a wonder we just have to see with our own eyes!    

The sight of a baby, born in a stable, resting on a nest of hay made these same shepherds race out into the surrounding villages “glorifying and praising…God for all that they had heard and seen”.      

The wonder of Christmas is something we still want those around us to see.  “Come over and see the tree,” we say to our friends.     

“Would you like to drive around with us to see the lights?” we invite our kids and grandkids.      

“Hey, how about going with us to see the celebration in the city square?” we phone our neighbors.

 “Have you seen the great display of Gingerbread Houses the county kids have built at the Minnestrista Center?” we mention to someone at church.      

“Would you like to go with our family to the Live Nativity Pageant at the country church near Noblesville?” we ask another mom after rehearsal for the Christmas program.  “We could stop afterward and see the Christmas tree on the Circle and get some hot chocolate.”

Lights, wreaths, pageants, angel choirs, stars, garlands, sparkling centerpieces, beautiful packages, colorful displays, street decorations, light shows… so much to see at Christmas that the whole world is eye-candy. 

What child hasn’t stood in awe to see the lights catching the crystals of freshly fallen snow and in them see “fairies dancing on the night”?  Or watched in wonder as the skaters glide like angels over the ice at Rockefeller Center, while magical snowflakes land on his tongue or catch in her eyelashes?    

So much to see.  Christmas is a carnival for the eyes.  Come, look through the Kaleidoscope of Christmas!

Touch Christmas!

What a wild circus of textures Christmas is!  Come, let’s “feel our way” around the glories of this tactile celebration!

First feel the soft skin of a baby, who is God-made-most-touchable, most-vulnerable for us who “were afar off.”

Touch a baby; tenderly embrace a child to honor Him who was Love in a baby blanket…. in our arms.

Touch the rough texture of a well-worn wooden manger and the prickly straw that fills it.

Touch the moist noses of the cows and horses that stand, curious, around.  Feel the night air.

Then touch the celebration that has gradually come to surround this “most touchable” happening.  Feel the needles of the evergreen tree and boughs that announce that because of Jesus we shall always live!

Touch the snow that covers the ground and remember the “covering” – the atonement – that makes us “whiter than snow” in the eyes of God.

Touch the red berries on the branches we gather and put in all sorts of containers, remembering that this child would one day shed his blood, that its life-giving qualities could fill us all no matter the shape, size, or condition of our containers.

Touch the lights as they burn warm, string them everywhere.  Light the streets and the houses, the cathedrals, and the back streets with them, for the chill of death has been replaced by warmth and light.

Touch your children, your neighbors, the community with reconciliation.  Take someone a warm cake; extend a warm handshake; offer the thawing warmth of forgiveness.

Hold and ring the gold and silver bells.  Ring out the news that the Creator of the galaxies has touched us.  Yes, ring the bells and pass them on!  Touch someone else.  We are not alone!

The Incarnation is the most immense mystery we will ever try to wrap our hearts and minds around! Let’s use every avenue we have to say to the children, and to each other, something that transcends our comprehension. Our lives depend on it!

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