Today, I want to offer something a little different. As I have over the past two days, I want to share with you a guided meditation as our message and prayer. (Tomorrow we’ll return to our more regular style messages.) When you have the time, I would encourage you to put all three of these […]
Today, I want to offer something a little different. Just as I did yesterday, I want to offer you a guided meditation as our message and prayer. Yesterday we prayed for a loved one and for ourselves. Today, we remember that Jesus told us to pray for those who persecute us and to love our […]
Today, I want to offer something a little different. I want to offer you a guided meditation as our message and prayer. I invite you to read this slowly. Close your eye’s as you are able and take the prayer into your heart. Begin by taking a couple of deep breaths. Breath in God’s Spirit, […]
Today is All Saint’s Day. It is a day we remember that we are a part of a much larger family – a family that is often referred to as the “Communion of Saints”. This is a family that not only stretches around the globe here and now today, but also a family that includes […]
There is an old story about a little girl who was talking to her grouchy old uncle about whales. The uncle said it was physically impossible for a whale to swallow a human. Even though it is a very large mammal its throat is very small. The little girl stated emphatically, “Jonah was swallowed by […]
Today I would like to say a special word of thanks to those of you who have supported the Dial Hope Foundation with a financial donation. Your gifts make this ministry possible! In a play on Jesus’ story of the Good Samaritan, Barbara Johnson once wrote her own poignant parable: A man fell into a […]
Acclaimed preacher John Claypool once told about a thunderstorm that swept through southern Kentucky where his family lived. At the farm, which had been in his family for six generations, the wind blew over an old pear tree that had been there as long as anybody could remember. Claypool’s grandfather was saddened to lose the […]
I love the Dennis the Menace Comic where Dennis and his friend Joey are standing outside looking up at a rainbow. Dennis points up and says, “Look, Joey! God’s got his colorin’ set out!” Do you ever have that sense? Several years ago now, our family went to a summer church camp. In Bible study […]
In his biography of Leonardo da Vinci, Antonio Vallenten writes about something that happened while the artist was working on his famous painting of the Last Supper in a monastic chapel in Milan. Apparently, da Vinci spent many hours just sitting in the chapel in meditation, not actually painting. Some of the monks noticed this […]
Something I read early on in my sabbatical really struck me. Apparently, years ago, the English scientist Rupert Sheldrake was asked what single change he would recommend for the new millennium that could make a difference to the world. His reply was that every tourist should become a pilgrim. Of course in some places we […]
