I hoisted a waterlogged lily sideways onto the potting bench, compressing each side forcefully like a paramedic performing CPR. I threw a sharp trowel into the mass of roots, muscling them apart before plopping the divided plants into various pots. I was working for a pond nursery, a dream summer job. The heat and humidity of the greenhouses were a welcome change to the harsh, dry winds of the Colorado plains howling just outside the glass doors.

Most of the gardening around my childhood home was a frantic race against a short growing season—three months for vegetables and annuals. Working in a greenhouse opened up a new world to me. Here, plants thrived, protected from drought, gophers, and adolescent boys who didn’t check their rearview mirrors. Lush lilies rapidly outgrew their pots; frogs hopped into large tubs, and the air pulsed with life—sometimes, too much life. Which is what led to plants being so ruthlessly divided, and a potting bench that resembled the sacrificial altars I’d read about in Leviticus.

Years later, I planted dozens of snapdragon seeds on a tray under indoor lights. Slowly, my tender care was rewarded as the tray filled with tiny sprouts. Looking closer, I saw that each “pod” had grown multiple seedlings. My heart sank, knowing that gardening wisdom demanded I “thin” them. To the drought-scarred Colorado girl who had carried buckets of water out to languishing pines while the wind sucked all the moisture from my eyes, the idea of cutting any plant felt like sacrilege.

“Why must this be the way?”

Finally, reason, research, and faith overtook emotion. When I snipped away dozens of seedlings, I was shocked to see mildew had been lurking under the façade of abundance. The nefarious hairs had spread over the soil, suffocating the roots. I carefully scraped it out, exposing the soil to air and light. Weeks later, my garden was filled with sunset-colored blooms. Had I not cut away the “good stuff,” they would have died.

Ralph Waldo Emerson wisely said,

“As the gardener, by severe pruning, forces the sap of the tree into one or two vigorous limbs, so should you stop off your miscellaneous activity and concentrate your force on one or a few points.”

As a mom, it is my job to regularly and diligently analyze what needs to be cut away. Are my children’s critical virtues, connections, or conversations being suffocated by distractions?

I once heard a commander’s wife, someone I greatly respected, say that as a mom she hadn’t been attending all the squadron’s “mandatory fun,” and she made no apology for it.

As a new mom myself, with a baby on my hip and obligations on my calendar, her statement broke shackles off my mind. Here was our fearless leader’s wife—the one who should be hosting, organizing, and fundraising—saying those things weren’t her priority. I was never the same again. If I couldn’t make it to something, I didn’t. Throughout those years, my family and I had room to breathe and connect.

I hate that life can so quickly mutate from nurturing a few worthy endeavors into constant management. I want my family to feel like a place of connection, not a corporation. That requires looking at the full, green seed tray of our lives and determining what must be meticulously, even ruthlessly, removed. If our heart rates are constantly elevated, our hair is falling out, and our patience is thin, can it mean that there are too many “good things” inhaling a limited supply of oxygen? Can we eliminate unnecessary stuff, breathe deep, and open up spaces in our lives?

My “baby” is now 15 years old. Last night, after a trying day at school, she said, “Mama, will you hold me?” She knows I have margin. She knows she can ask. That’s the kind of growth she—and we—need.

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Narrated By: Kara Lea Kennedy

After years of foot problems, I found custom orthotics that became gold to me. I could slip them into any closed-heel shoe and wear them for hours without pain.

Then, one day, they simply vanished.

For months, I checked every pair of shoes I owned, multiple times. I cleaned out my closet. I looked under my bed. Finally, I resigned myself to wearing only my boring, “sensible” shoes— the ones that promised feelings of “walking on a cloud.”

One evening, my daughters and I walked through a local department store. Near closing time, the place was deserted. Drawn by the rows of clearance tables, I decided to take a quick look at the footwear; I am a magnet for a good deal. I was immediately drawn to a cute pair of boots. The price was perfect, so I hurried to slip them on before the store shut its doors.

But I noticed something peculiar inside the boots. I didn’t really want to stick my hand in to retrieve whatever was “lurking,” but gathering my courage, I reached in and pulled out—my orthotics! What? How was that possible? In that surreal moment, it all rushed back: I had bought these very boots online months prior and returned them, apparently with my inserts still nestled inside.

We want so much to control our environment. When we lose something—or lose our way—we come face-to-face with the reality that we aren’t in charge. But really, were we ever?

Whether it’s driving on unfamiliar roads at night, absorbing the reeling loss of a loved one, or even the disappearance of a cherished item like a wedding ring or shoe inserts, loss leaves us unsettled. It reminds us we are not in control. We have lost something or someone precious.

The Bible tells of a father who brought his son to Jesus, seeking healing. Jesus asked, “Do you believe?” The father replied, “I believe; help my unbelief.” This may be the most honest prayer ever modeled. In that same spirit, we can also pray, “I trust, help me to trust.” Perhaps the next time we face a loss, we can let that feeling of helplessness push us towards the only One who ordains our steps and brings order to our world.

From that place of trusting God, maybe we can allow our loss to help us really see those we pass in a different light. What if we stopped and took the time to hear stories? Might we learn what they’ve lost? Like the cashier at a local grocery store who lost her child and the use of her arm when she suffered a stroke during pregnancy. Or my neighbor who lives alone, surrounded by darkness and clutter, because he has lost the ones he loved the most. Connection is the best way to rediscover peace after loss.

Connection can come through the caring touch on the shoulder, fellowship over a cup of coffee, or just listening to a story. That connection may allow the one overwhelmed by loss to emerge into a newly discovered safe place.

Losing shoe inserts doesn’t compare to the pain many have known. However, the connection after my inserts were found is what I still remember from that mysterious event in a deserted department store. My daughters saw that what was lost had finally found its way home. They also saw what that loss—and recovery—did in and for me.

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I once heard the great preacher, Ern Baxter, talk about why we have such powerful language symbols. He said:

“God has ransacked all of nature, all of history, all events, all of creatures, relationships, and situations ... to come up with metaphors and similes and symbols and likenesses that He could use to communicate to us the various aspects of divine truth.”

No wonder the Bible, Aesop’s Fables, Virgil, C. S. Lewis, and others used ants, eagles, snakes, lions, horses, donkeys, and bees as models of behavior and wisdom for humans. Sometimes, we need to see examples from other species in order to detect our Creator’s signature.

Consider the sandfish, a small reptile that lives in the Sahara Desert and other parts of North Africa—places of deadly heat, predators, and drought.

Yet the sandfish is superbly suited to that environment. Its name reflects its way of pulling its legs close to its body to “swim” through sand, slipping beneath the surface to escape predators and find relief from the heat. Its wedge-shaped head allows it to dive quickly below the surface, while specialized eyelids and nostrils let it move through sand without damage or suffocation.

What it needs is always nearby.

Perhaps the central lesson the sandfish teaches is the wonder of adaptation. They don’t curse the sun, the sand, aridity, or predators; they adapt to reality. As ancient nautical wisdom says, “We can’t direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.”

The anger and polarization of the current age try to persuade us that crowds will save us. If we can just convince enough people to march in the streets, hang scripted messages on social media, or give enough money, we can change the course of wind and water.

That is profoundly false.

Tides, light, seeds, fire, migratory patterns, survival instincts, the hidden movements of weather and history—these are the forces that carry real change. If so, humility, patience, and flexibility may serve us better than anger and conflict.

Human nature will always try to convince us that this place is just not right, that it needs fixing. It’s too hot, cold, wet, dry, Republican, liberal, indifferent, etc. And so, we organize, resist, and fight.

But thinking that way can be like buying lumber at Home Depot to build a tree. Planting a seed is better, but slower. That requires patience. But as James Carville said, “The best time to plant an oak tree was twenty-five years ago. The second best time is today.”

Perhaps the sandfish points us toward quieter truths: we have been given a place we did not choose; we are shaped by forces we do not control; we live in the wide open spaces of our constraints.

Within that ecosystem, we find new traction.

As we learn its rhythms.

As we move with its grain.

As we adapt rather than harden.

In doing so, we may—like the sandfish—discover our limitations have become portals of wisdom.

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But I’m smart enough to know I wouldn’t be here had I not first been there. The giants who helped shape, mold, sand, and color my being over the past three quarters of a century include characters whose stamp left an indelible imprint. One of those was a force of nature who taught my high school English classes.

Mary Robel liked her Camels unfiltered, her Coca-Cola chilled in the 6.5-ounce green glass bottles God intended, and her races segregated. Arriving on this planet 47 years after the end of the Civil War, she grew up in a community where wounds from that conflict still festered. The South might not rise again, but I never knew her to stand for the playing of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”

Maybe the best way I can describe her presence is to say she filled her space. Her classroom was in the “new” wing, and she moved from the teachers’ lounge in the wooden-floored older building with a strong sense of purpose when it was time, bright-red lipstick freshly applied. Her deliberate stride called to mind that of a general approaching the parade ground, always firmly gripping the double handles of her soft-bottomed tapestry satchel; to call it a purse would have been an insult.

I never saw her thick gray hair worn any way other than upswept in a French twist. It suited her somehow: all business, nothing left astray. Gray glasses defining her steel-blue eyes took the color theme further.

My classmates and I knew little about her personal life, though we were always intensely curious. Once someone brought in a high school yearbook with a photo of her as a student. We stared in awe at her youth and beauty, feeling as if we were trespassing on forbidden ground. It was hard to make the connection between the decades-old photo and the teacher we encountered every day. Time, tobacco, and something rumored stronger than Mississippi sweet tea had left their impact.

In my 10th-grade year, this maven gave me an understanding of English grammar that ensured my later studies in that arena were mostly reminders. She fanned whatever spark of potential she saw in me, pulling me aside quietly as a junior and telling me it was time to start working on college scholarships.

As our class of 40 began our senior year, Mary Robel rolled out what became her biggest gift. In addition to her general lesson plans, she expected us to turn in a 3-page essay each Monday and recite before the class an assigned poem each Friday. In this environment I learned to get comfortable with words and to rewrite a piece until it flowed without a hitch across a reader’s comprehension. If my leading thesis wasn’t clear, I learned to recognize that quickly and fix it. If my paper headed toward sappy, I could reframe or choose a more appropriate topic. In short, I learned to write by writing.

The gift of editing my own work, and later the work of colleagues and clients, became as natural as breathing. And the recitation thing? Speaking before classmates continually as a 17-year-old set the stage for presentations to workshop and convention audiences years later.

People move in and out of our lives as purpose dictates. Some plant, some water, some weed, some bring to fruition. Today I hear in my memory the firm clack of no-nonsense heels tapping out a determined cadence on the concrete, and I nod and smile and silently give thanks.

After receiving a PhD in English at Ole Miss in 1977, Faye moved to Texas, where she met and married Walt, her IT guru, cruise partner, and barista. She is the mother of four children – Aimee, Carla, Steven, and Caryn – and the grandmother of Lexi, Sarah, William, and Rahel.

After serving as a copy editor at “American Way” and “Southwest Spirit” magazines while her children were young, she began a 20-year career with United Way of Tarrant County, planning and implementing community projects, while serving 26 years as a local school board member.

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For more than a decade, I’ve had the growing sense that we’re all missing something.

Not a policy or a program, but a social coherence; a warm, metaphysical essence that is quietly being displaced by something colder, more rigid, something unforgiving.

I’m not suggesting we need to do something. It’s not that simple. The usual suspects in this conversation—politics, gender, religion, technology, AI, etc.—are not the issue and are not helpful.

There is a light we simply do not see.

Birds and Butterflies

Lately, that thought has taken me back to a conversation I had thirty years ago with my dear, and now deceased, friend, Lee Earl. As we talked over lunch one day, his heart seemed to groan as he said,

“White people are obsessed with understanding black people. But as a black man, I don’t care if you understand me or not. I want your respect.”

Later, as we drove away, he continued: “Birds fly in a straight line. Butterflies don’t. But birds don’t try to teach butterflies how to fly.”

In that moment, I sensed something universal. Beneath all our affiliations and arguments, people want respect—not for their qualifications, conformity, connections, or status—but for something older than all that. For reasons that reach back to that holy moment when they were “... formed in utter seclusion... woven together in the dark of the womb.” (Psalm 139:15 NLT)

From Community to Centrifuge

From birth, sparks of destiny began glowing into our times and spaces. We tasted, touched, reached, and retreated. We found our voices, encountered virtues and vices, fell in love, raised barns, and served on school boards. Through it all, we discovered the treasure in others, that mysterious green sprout of life rooted in the moment they were “formed in utter seclusion.” All that formed our own ecosystem, our community.

This was called normal life. Then, somehow, our age became a centrifuge.

It spun faster and faster until it pulled us apart. Minds, bodies, personalities, and beliefs were sliced and stratified. Apparently, we were not acceptable as whole persons; markets preferred us reduced to particles, easier to sort and sell.

What Matters Most?

I first caught sight of what we are missing when my friend, Rex Miller, a speaker and author, convened specialists in architecture, education, commercial construction, and other disciplines for a collaborative approach to writing books. I served as the project editor.

Day after day, city after city, we worked with those leaders as they grappled with serious issues facing Western societies. Because of their education and careers, most were likely left of center politically (others surely were not). But politics never walked into our deliberations. Even when we met on November 8, 2016, the day Donald Trump was first elected—politics never grabbed the microphone.

The relationships in that room represented timeless examples of teamwork. People checked their stuff at the door, joined their minds and hearts, worked for a larger good, and kept their eyes on the ball. To paraphrase Goethe, they refused to let things that matter most to be at the mercy of things that matter least.

And no one tried to teach anyone how to fly.

The Possibilities...

Jesus once said of a generation “It is like children sitting in the marketplaces, who call out to the other children, and say, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’” (Matthew 11:16-17 NASB)

His words seem to reflect this present age. Culture bombards us with pulsating signals, directions to think, be, or do as it suggests. But real life does not allow external pings to jerk us into conformity with trends or experts. Beneath all the noise, we remain who we were when we were first formed.

For now, the best we can do may be to just get still and quiet. To become comfortable within our own limitations. Step away from the noise and fragmentation of daily life. Practice humility. Recognize and honor the wholeness in those around you, not for their skills or marketability, but for their internal and eternal value.

Perhaps what we’re missing is not light, but the eyes to see it.

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In 1936, he worked as part of a road gang blacktopping roads around Buffalo, Missouri. He was paid fifteen cents per hour. One hot evening, he stood with the other workers at the end of a long, hard day, listening to their foreman lay out the plan for the next day’s work.

Then, from across the road and about a hundred yards away, hymns began flowing out the open windows of a country church. As night fell, the work meeting ended and Grandpa walked down to the church, squatted beneath an open window, and listened to the stirring music. The next morning, his children woke to the sound of their father singing hymns he heard in the dark.

That moment marked the beginning of a Pentecostal pull on the family. They all walked the six-mile round trip twice every Sunday (they couldn’t afford the eleven-cents-per-gallon gasoline). But Grandpa would not enter the building with them. He didn’t feel worthy to enter a holy place, so he continued to crouch beneath the windows.

In April 1937, the family loaded up their old pickup and moved to Ford County, Kansas. Two years later, sixteen-year-old Mary traveled with other teenagers from their church in Dodge City to attend a “youth rally” at a church in Sun City. There, she met a family of eleven kids named Chinn. One of the Chinn boys was the good-looking, adventurous, face-to-the-wind Jack.

Love sparked—but Jack had already pledged himself to the U.S. Navy.

Five years later, on October 24, 1944, Jack was aboard the aircraft carrier USS Princeton when she was destroyed by a Japanese bomb in the Battle of Leyte Gulf. He survived. Two months later, he married Mary. I am their firstborn. Vernon and Carl followed.

When, as a child, my mind finally connected the details of this story, I became obsessed with its hinge moments—the what-ifs:

What if the road foreman had not called for the work crew meeting?

What if cool air had forced the church to close the windows?

What if Mary had not attended the youth rally?

What if Jack had died in the waters of Leyte Gulf?

Each hinge carried the call of destiny. Grandpa wasn’t the only one crouched beneath that church window in the dark; my brothers and I—and all our children and grandchildren—were there too. And my dad wasn’t the only one struggling to survive a naval battle; all his descendants were also fighting for their lives.

Our story began when an eternal sound—a wind chime from Heaven—rode the breeze into the ears and heart of a poor man living in life’s shadows.

Grace found him. In the dark.

It was a night when “...for those who lived in the land where death casts its shadow, a light has shined.” (Matthew 4:16, NLT)

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The hospital lights were dimmed to create a “peaceful” atmosphere, but the chaos of pain I was experiencing sucked all serenity from the room. I yelled in the disoriented agony that can only come from childbirth. Thirty minutes earlier, I could breathe and talk through each contraction, loudly telling myself I could do this. Now, the jaws of pain clamped around my midsection, with no sign of release. The dreaded “transition phase.”

In desperation I screamed, “Help me! Help me!” I was floundering, knowing there was no escape but hoping relief would come. Breaking through the turmoil, a nurse appeared angelic and took center stage in my tunnel vision. Grasping my right hand with hers and looking into my eyes, she said, “I am helping you.”

In the writhing and agony, I held onto her words like they were life itself. I wanted a tranquilizer, but her hand and eyes would have to do. I cried and pleaded some more. She remained, urged me to look at her, and repeated, “I am helping you.”

Minutes later, I held my precious, perfect baby. In the midst of the holy hush that descended on the room, the nurse gently adjusted my pillows, grinned, and said, “See? I helped you!” I laughed, cried, and agreed with all my heart.

In the hours that followed, I cried whenever I remembered the pain. But I also thanked God for the nurse who helped bear my burden with four simple words and one unflinching gaze.

What does “help” actually look like, and is it possible that we spend so much time worrying about what we cannot do that we don’t offer what we can? How hopeless would I have felt if that nurse had recoiled from my misery rather than boldly stepping into it?

We can learn the definition of “help” by reflecting on what brought relief in our moments of need. I remember when I was once lonely; a neighbor gave me a bouquet of hydrangeas from her garden. When I was scared, my husband kissed me on the forehead. When I was sick as a child, my dad would get down on my level and say, “I wish I could take it away.”

“Help” rarely looks like winning the lottery, receiving a miracle fix for my problems, or even being fully understood by a friend. More often than not, help comes in the form of a willing presence. It ignores its own shortcomings to just reach out. The best help almost always carries an air of childlike confidence.

What if we could get back to that uncomplicated eagerness to audaciously “pitch in” on projects we have no business touching? As a toddler clumsily stirs batter with a wooden spoon and shamelessly declares, “I helped,” are there purposes and people that would benefit from our joyous, and perhaps unsophisticated help?

It is too easy to disqualify ourselves from service. Easy. And arrogant. Who are we to measure the value of our contributions?

So, what can we do? Chaperone a field trip, even if you’re a “stick in the mud.” Visit your aging relative, even if they can’t hear a word you say. Stop assuming you understand the impact you have on others. Hold the hand of the one who is fighting a fight that only they can face.

Deliberately drop your “widow’s mite” into one of those slots of need in your community. Be glad you could help. Then, watch what happens next. You could find yourself ushering new life into a hurting world.

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In order to get a better viewpoint, you would have to walk to the rear of the train and step out onto the (now virtually extinct) observation platform. From there, your view would instantly widen to give you the sweep of a larger landscape.

Many years ago, I heard a reporter (whose name I’ve long forgotten) use that metaphor to contrast journalism with history. Journalism records the near, but incoherent rush of current events. History, on the other hand, gives a depth of field, a wide panorama of context and clarity.

Today, we seem to live in the age of speed and blur. Our search for information—often useless but quick and addicting—creates the illusion of significance. Sitting in a porch rocker with a good book creates the illusion of laziness. But, as Dwight Eisenhower famously said, “What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.”

When people press their faces against the windows, drawn to the kaleidoscope of fractured images, what they see moves very fast, but it does not enlighten. For that, we have to cultivate a serene center, an eternal secret place of the heart. From there, we can practice the mystery of living in a higher realm.

It’s called “normal life,” a spiritual dimension that spills into our earthly seasons and places. That’s where we find the freedom to slow down, breathe deep, get quiet, sit still, think, meditate, pray. That place allows us to step away from the noise to watch the surf, walk through a redwood forest, gaze at the night sky.

Life in the lower realm disrupts those slow and graceful rhythms, prodding us to react, to move quickly ... now!

That may be why many scholars recognize the need for distance between themselves and the issues, personalities, and ideas of their own time. Because emotional, philosophical, and moral entanglements distort judgment, they need the passing of time—like 30 years—before they can more clearly understand and present historical events and people.

That sets up a struggle between the careful, thoughtful, and undisturbed approach to life and the centrifuge that spins us away from it. That’s why I am naturally guarded against any force, agenda, proposal, or crisis that tries to provoke me to do something. I know there are times when we must fight. And die. But that’s different from seeking conflict. Until we learn to live in the secret place, we will carry our own conflict and anger around with us all the time.

I owe it to my wife, family (blood and spiritual), friends, work, neighborhood, society, and nation to see broadly and deeply and to live generously. But I cannot do that if I allow this age to place electrodes on my spine, jerking me into compliance with its whims and flavors. Nuanced and multilayered thinking sees further and hears deeper; it catches distinctions, tones, and possibilities that just don’t seem to find traction with frantic souls and societies.

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Narrated By: Kara Lea Kennedy

When I walked into Mrs. Sauer’s classroom midway through 5th grade, it was the third one I had attended so far that year. I didn’t expect to stay long, so I didn’t even try to make new friends.

Because I entered so many schools, I was the perpetual “new kid.” Adapting quickly was essential. As the merry-go-round spun, I had to just run in, grab the bar, and hang on.

I hated being watched and judged as I entered each new classroom. But within a couple of days, I could usually spot the kids who might join me at lunch or for jacks at recess. I was pretty good at jacks, though sometimes I’d lose just to win a new friend. Reading the social landscape accurately was crucial in a new school.

Mrs. Sauer was a petite, professional woman who saw beyond outward appearances. When she looked at me, I don’t think she saw a transient or even a lanky child. She saw someone in need of care. She seemed to look deep into my soul. I began to feel she saw my potential. That’s what dream makers do—they look past the surface and imagine a new future for certain ones in their paths. Through her words of inspiration, Mrs. Sauer changed the course of my life.

My father was a true dreamer; he seized job opportunities that required rapid relocation. My siblings and I learned to stash our keepsakes in a cardboard box, always prepared to move at a moment’s notice.

Dreamers are rarely dream makers. They get so caught up in their own dreams that they cannot see the budding dreams in those around them, even their own children.

In A Muppet Christmas Carol, Jim Henson gives us a glimpse into Ebenezer Scrooge’s childhood schoolteacher. He saw potential in him. As it turned out, Ebenezer was a math prodigy, bound for success in the world of finance. He could become wealthy if he played his cards right. Ebenezer bought into the dream, staying in at recess to get ahead instead of playing with the other kids.

Years later, Scrooge faced his fiancée, Belle. He had postponed their marriage for five years as he pursued his dream of amassing more and more wealth. Belle sings a mournful, heartbreaking song as she breaks off the engagement, “The Love is Gone.” Scrooge chose money over love. The dream planted by his teacher came at a cost. The love of money was more precious to Scrooge than the love of a woman.

When Mrs. Sauer looked inside me, she saw a rudderless child in need of hope and purpose. So, she planted two dreams. First, she saw potential for modeling. She often kept me in at recess, teaching me posture, poise, and confidence—strengths that would build my self-assurance and contribute to my direction. I learned to walk in a straight line with a book on my head.

Before summer break, Mrs. Sauer gave me another dream: she told me I could go to college. That seed, though possibly shared with every student she taught, was transformative for me. No one in my family had ever attended college; her words took root in my heart. From that moment on, I held onto the dream of higher education, quietly believing it was possible for me. That’s when I began to hear a future calling me.

When the time was right, as a high school senior, I shared my college aspirations with my mother. Naturally, her response was practical: “You’ll have to find a way to pay for it.” But the financial uncertainty and other challenges could not extinguish the dream Mrs. Sauer lit in me.

Now, years later, when I look back over my career as a special education teacher, college professor, and psychologist, I see I was able to influence the younger generation. I try to approach that responsibility thoughtfully, taking time to understand each student’s motivations and abilities before offering words that inspire a vision for a productive future.

Every one of us holds the power to be a dream maker or dream breaker. Our words can linger for a lifetime, either inspiring confidence or creating barriers that block pathways. By choosing to encourage and boost young dreamers, we may even help them make choices they won’t live to regret.

Words can create encouragement or discouragement. That’s why speaking or writing words that heal, lift, and bless represent a high calling.

Perhaps my father needed a dream maker in his life.

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Narrated By: Kara Lea Kennedy

As I do every year, I recently decorated our home for Christmas. I’ve always done so with great anticipation of our lovely house after I am finished. But this year, nostalgia and sadness also came over me in the process.

In years past, Christmas decorating was a family affair. My husband, Bob, would help me get the tree set up and untangle the web of Christmas lights (as he still does). But then the three boys and I would decorate the tree while listening to the same vinyl records that recalled and celebrated the Christmas story each year in our home. The task also included hot chocolate, laughter, and tripping over one another as we did what needed to be done.

But seasons change. Sons grow up, leave, and buy homes of their own to decorate. So, the job of decorating falls on Bob and me. And we now have a “decorator” tree instead of the cherished collection of homemade ornaments, craft fair treasures and other assorted Christmas baubles. Some of the same songs wash over me, but now they come from Pandora. When I’m done, it still looks beautiful, but then I have to shake off the tinge of melancholy from remembering Christmases past.

One recent morning, I read Isaiah 43:18-19:

“Do not call to mind the former things. Or ponder things of the past. Behold, I will do something new. Now it will spring forth: Will you not be aware of it?”

As I read that passage, I wondered if looking back through the lens of loss caused me to miss out on the new thing. Was I overlooking the joy and the richness of the present because I was so locked into the memories of what was? Could I perhaps create and broaden new circles of Christmas celebration and fellowship? Could we enjoy the delight of beautiful new things?

These questions brought new levels of gratitude for the now of my life, but also caused me to look for the new—in relationships, opportunities, and other new things that could be added to it. Perhaps by letting go of the former things, I can enjoy each moment that comes to our home from the new things.

Marianne Paulus is the mother of three sons and grandmother to nine. She has two college degrees she has never been paid to use. You can read about that story and others in her memoir, Intersections: Stories of Faith When God Intersected a Life. She and her husband Bob work together with their church’s marriage and family ministry from their home in Bedford, Texas.

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The Bible says that knowledge “puffs up.” Sure does. Knowledge is like vodka; a little of it gives the bluster, the ignorance, and the permission to announce judgments about things we know zero about or things that are none of our business.

David, the Psalmist, wrote of God, “Even the darkness is not dark to Thee, and the night is as bright as the day. Darkness and light are alike to Thee.” (Psalm 139:12)

Maybe a life is a life. Do you think lives of one hour, those lived with severe spinal injuries, or those born in prison could be as beautiful and blessed as ones lived in great health, luxury, and longevity? Is it possible that God sees them alike and grants the special grace required to live where and as they do? Perhaps life needs to be lived straight ahead, without comparison to others or the imposition of human designs or alterations.

Mary Clarke grew up in the wealth and splendor of Beverly Hills. Cary Grant, Spencer Tracy, and Dinah Shore were her neighbors. She was a member of the Beverly Hills Country Club, and she married and divorced twice.

When she was 50, she gave away all her possessions, became a Roman Catholic nun and moved into—into, not near—a notorious Tijuana prison. As “Mother Antonia,” she lived in the same conditions as the prisoners; her home was a 10’ by 10’ cell (which she painted pink) and she ate what the prisoners ate. She lived in that cell for the last 36 years of her life (she died in October 2013).

Prison was to her what a basketball court was to Michael Jordan. The Zone. In 1994, when a full-scale riot broke out in her prison, 5-foot-2 Mother Antonia walked through the blizzard of bullets. Eyewitnesses said she never stopped smiling and her face never stopped glowing. Armed only with love, she saw the riot come to a peaceful end.

According to her New York Times obituary, she once said, “Happiness does not depend on where you are. I live in prison. And I have not had a day of depression in 25 years. I have been upset, angry. I have been sad. But never depressed. I have a reason for my being.”[1]

Incredibly, this woman moved into the darkness and found that it became as bright as the day.

Borlaug was not rich, entertaining, or charismatic. So, how did he become one of the most significant people in world history?

Because of wheat. Most of the world’s wheat today comes from the disease-resistant, high-yield varieties that Borlaug and his colleagues developed. When he won the 1970 Nobel Peace Prize, the committee said it was because, “More than any other single person of this age, he has helped provide bread for a hungry world.”

Never a celebrity, Dr. Borlaug has been called the greatest person nobody knows.

His basic insight, formed as a child on an Iowa farm, was very simple: humans could push farm production beyond anything ever seen. Borlaug had lived during the dawn of Fordson tractors. As they spread to America’s farms, they released 75 million acres – previously required to feed horses and mules – for feeding people!

Borlaug understood the dawn of a new age. Healthy seed and fertilizer could pull miracles out of soil.

In 1944, at thirty years old and working as a scientist for E. I. du Pont in Wilmington, Delaware, Borlaug was invited into a dream. The Rockefeller Foundation wanted to help lift the people of Mexico out of poverty. They chose him to lead the project. Against all the professional and familial reasons he should not accept that challenge, he went. He stepped into a horror.

Mexico was a scientific wasteland; Borlaug had no facilities, no staff, no equipment, no vehicle, and no budget. In fact, he slept on the floor of a room that had no water or electricity, but did have spiders, rats, and snakes. But the real horror was that Mexico’s crops teetered on the edge of collapse. Famine was a genuine possibility, and Borlaug was the only person in Mexico who could see it.

Furthermore, he and his wife learned she was carrying a child with spina bifida. Because of transportation and financial constraints, she could not join her husband in Mexico, and he could not take a break to go home to her. So, besides trying to save a nation from famine, he was overwhelmed with worry, loneliness, and guilt. He came “perilously close to cracking” during that time.[1]

Borlaug lived in Mexico for sixteen years. Working tirelessly to beat rust, increase yield, develop shorter stalks (because of high wind), and teach the nation to use fertilizer. By the time he left in 1960, he had increased the national wheat harvest by 600%! And 95% of Mexico’s wheat was from varieties he developed.

He did so while enduring overwhelming adversity:

* Floods. Because of a drenching flood, he and a helper worked around the clock harvesting wheat by hand – just as it was done 5,000 years ago – in order to save precious seed. They reaped 50 tons by hand!

* Landslides. During a torrential rainstorm on a narrow and very slick mountain pass, two landslides cut him off from going forward or backward. His little truck (carrying the agricultural hope of a nation) came close to washing off the mountain.

* Rejection. Throughout much of his Mexico service, the government tried to kick him out; they thought the “Gringo” made them look incompetent.

* Isolation. For most of his Mexico years, Borlaug’s wife and family had to remain in the US. Despite their separation, they seemed to have a strong marriage. But loneliness remained a serious factor.

* Hurricane. A freak hurricane destroyed his Mexico operations and killed two of his scientists who were trying to save the precious seeds. All the seeds were lost; he had to start over.

Jesus said, “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain.”[2]

Like that grain of wheat, Norman Borlaug released his own comforts and desires to fall into the ground and die. But his life also produced much grain. He changed the patterns of nutrition for the whole earth, and forever.

We at The Timberline Letter care about focused living. Showing up, standing up. Living higher. Thinking clearly. Seeing further. Hearing deeper. Norman Borlaug lived an astounding life of high-altitude virtues, work, resilience, and wisdom. He endured; he remained in focus.

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[1] Noel Vietmeyer, Our Daily Bread (Bracing Books; Lorton, VA, 2011) p. 99

[2] John 12:24 taken from taken from the NEW KING JAMES VERSION (NKJV):

Copyright© 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

After dinner, my natural curiosity pulled me to the smoke pits. I stood in the shadows, watching the pit-master, half-concealed by the smoky clouds, systematically lift the heavy pit lids, stoke the orange coals, and meticulously arrange the various meats. Like a conductor, he knew each subtle maneuver to bring each cut to perfection.

Fearing I was interrupting a religious rite, I gained his attention with a guarded wave. When he gestured an invitation back to me, I cautiously tiptoed among the rows of black, belching barbecue furnaces.

He introduced himself as Benjamin Behrends.

His face was youthful for such a high calling. Lockhart is Holy Ground for Texas barbecue, and he was serving as its altar boy. What had brought him here? He chose his words as carefully as he managed the pits.

“For nearly twenty-five years, I lived in San Diego with my mother, far from my roots in Austin. I started working when I was 14. I’ve never stopped.” He paused to gather his thoughts.

“New Year’s Day, 2002, wrecked my world. That night, my brother, seven years and seven days older than me, was shot dead—murdered.”

That New Year’s night also nearly took the life of his mother, who began a downward spiral. In her despair, she grew unable to care for Ben.

“She didn’t handle it well. She couldn’t take care of me properly. There were suicide attempts, drug use,” Ben explained. “I decided I needed freedom. So, I left.”

Then a pause, and a regret. “I now understand my reason for leaving was very selfish. I cared more about myself than I did about her.”

His mother drifted homeless on the streets of Tijuana. After unknowingly drinking contaminated water, she contracted hepatitis C. Eventually, she lost a kidney.

Her fast decline called for radical intervention, but Ben had already declared his independence.

Eventually, Ben chose humility and compassion over self-interest, a choice that brought profound consequences.

“I moved my mother in with me. I became her in-home support provider.” Her doctor told Ben she had to be on total bedrest for five months. “I gave her medical injections. I changed her bandages.

“Her diet was horrid. She was addicted to the unhealthiest foods. So, I gradually changed her diet, removing all the unhealthy food she had grown dependent on.”

“How did you do that?”

“I found a cookbook with 30 gourmet recipes. That’s where I started. I prepared only the healthiest food for her. Gradually, I nursed her back to health. And you know, she’s become my biggest inspiration.” The pit-master paused, weighing his words.

“She went through hell. But can you believe it? She has not only survived, but she trained to become an Iron Worker and a Journeyman. She’s doing things 20-year-olds can’t do.

“I moved back to Texas, and I learned to work The Pit here at Terry Black’s Barbecue. I work 16-hour shifts, seeing my brisket from start to finish. I am only the fifth person—and the earliest—to achieve that. It’s like winning the Oscar for barbecue.

“I couldn't be happier! But I don’t cook for the praise.

“No, my secret ingredient is love and passion. It’s for that simple smile after hours of sweat and blood, just to make sure ‘Y’all come back now!’” I love it. It’s a service to be proud of.”

Like the comforting aroma from a barbecue pit, the love of a willing heart remains. That kind of heart cares for family, encircles strangers, and reaches beyond our own tribe.

“Why do I cook?” Ben grinned. “That’s easy. I cook to feed and heal the soul. And I cook for my mom.”

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Her only book, The Taste of Silence (English translation from Liturgical Press, 2015), is a beautiful, candid, sometimes searing, but wise view of her journey into ALS. Like so many others in history, she found a vast and pure view...in prison. But for Bieke, that prison was her body.

What do you do when a lightning bolt explodes out of a clear sky, blowing your body, soul, and spirit apart? Do you collapse into a pile of smoking rubble? Escape into chemicals, fight to regain control? Or surrender to the largeness of your Creator?

Vandekerckhove surrendered.

In her submission, she tumbled into great silence. That’s what often happens when loss pushes us beyond the walls of language. Many readers will identify with Bieke as, in the silence, she found profound gratitude, even for her diagnosis and for “the collapse of all my beliefs.” ALS took her beyond what she knew and preferred, and into the beauty of “not-knowing.” In that place beyond thought, she “discovered the art of waiting in the dark.”

In the dark, she found “the God of the Bible, and not the god who is … bound by the contours of logic and morality.” She also discovered that God meets those who live real life. Their habitat lies in a place beyond information.

As I read this book, I thought of Hebrews 11:34, which speaks of those who “became powerful in battle.” They found success as it was forged in the heat of life, not through knowledge or credentials.

What Do You See?

She learned that so much of life boils down to what we see. The deeper she went into the illness, she realized she suffered “more from an eye problem than from a muscle disorder.” Bieke seems genuinely grateful for the “great powers of suffering, death, and mourning,” that “work a simplification in us that makes us see things differently. Perhaps making us really see for the first time.”

Although she was certainly Christian, Vandekerckhove’s journey through ALS also gave her a deep appreciation for other religions and perspectives. She quotes the apocryphal Wisdom of Solomon 7:24: “Wisdom is more mobile than any motion; because of her pureness she pervades and penetrates all things.”

Vandekerckhove discovered a God so large and pervasive that His word can move through anyone, anything, anytime, anywhere. Because He owns it all, any or all of it can carry His voice. Just as His voice once (at least once!) animated a donkey, so it “pervades and penetrates all things.”

I deeply appreciate The Taste of Silence. It carries a ring of truth on every page. And I am moved by, and grateful for, a young woman who dared to tell her harrowing but hallowed journey into the God Who is larger.

To summarize that journey, she wrote that when she surrendered to the mystery, and thought she lost everything, “remarkably my grip loosened and I rediscovered everything in a new way. Life was everywhere, in the midst of death, even as life slipped away from me … Everything became a gift.”

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Please understand, we didn’t laugh all the time. I remember the crises, fears, bankruptcy, and prodigal children. But those episodes played out against a backdrop that never took life too seriously. I recall more laughter than sorrow around our dinner table, even when loss and pain pulled up a chair to join us.

After becoming an adult, the pressures of marriage, child-rearing, military life, and navigating foster care often became so overpowering that it was hard to breathe. But often in the midst of those dark places, luminous memories of my parents laughing at the dinner table would break through.

In the words of Chuck Swindoll, “Laughter is the most beautiful and beneficial therapy God ever granted humanity.”

At some point, I realized we had to seek joy and laughter. We needed people and stories around us that recalled our legacy of laughter. Like my grandma sewing grandpa’s overalls shut at the feet so he’d have to jerk them up violently as he left for his work on the railroad.

Our last duty station in South Carolina marked the end of a somewhat disillusioned era. David’s lofty dreams of becoming Chief of Staff of the Air Force had been deflated, and our focus had shifted from our glory to an open-handed, “What’s next, Lord?” That question took us down roads we never expected. They also granted us a higher view of life. We learned to let go of a lot of things.

When the annual “jet photos” day came around, David and I donned leather jackets in 90-degree weather, and struck a “Top Gun” pose in front of an F-16. A friend shot the photo. Her husband photoshopped the background—complete with an orange sunset, a jet slicing the sky above, and the words “Top Three” showboating themselves across the bottom of the poster. “Top Three” is the name of the universally despised job given to pilots—“flying a desk.” No engines thrumming except those of your friends as they dogfight in the skies above you. The modified title was the crowning touch to our Oscar-worthy snapshot, given the fact that David had frequently flown that desk. As had all the other pilots.

I marched into David’s office a few days later and victoriously hammered the masterpiece onto the wall. Most of the pilots gathered around and laughed accordingly. Those that didn’t laugh? Maybe they were planning to be the next Chief of Staff of the Air Force.

I’ve heard it said that “expectation is just pre-meditated resentment.” While that may be true, we are also given repeated opportunities to let go of those expectations, not out of resentment or failure, but out of a maturity that says, “Ah. I see. I can’t steer this thing. Clenched fists accomplish nothing. Maybe I should try opening my hands.”

It is imperative to “laugh at the days to come.”[1] The “foreseeable future” is, after-all, an illusion. I hope you’re having a wonderful day. If not, just go photoshop your disappointment. And let the healing laughter begin.

[1] Proverbs 31:25, NIV

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Dad felt a chill. He owned that equipment. His brother Harold had borrowed it and would have been driving it down that very road about that time. Dad soon found Harold lying beside the road. He was fully conscious, but Dad could see he was facing the worst day of his life.

Harold’s death brought a hard freeze to our family landscape. But it blew a deep and ragged hole right through Dad’s heart. He never recovered.

From that day it seemed Dad’s strong mind began to melt.

Dad and Mom visited our home in Virginia soon after that. In planning for their visit, I tried to find something that would engage Dad again, some spark that would animate his wonderful and vivid personality.

Two weeks before they arrived, I learned that Arleigh Burke, one of the last living admirals from World War 2, lived in nearby Fairfax. So, I found a phone number for his home.

When Roberta “Bobbie” Burke answered the phone, I introduced myself and told her about Dad, and that he would be here in a few days. Then I asked if “the admiral would be open to a visit from another sailor.”

“Oh, yes,” she replied gleefully, “He would so love that! Please come.” She gave me their address, and we agreed on a date and time.

When my parents arrived, I told Dad we had an appointment with Admiral Arleigh Burke the next day. Dad’s uncertain smile revealed his anxiety; he’d never met an admiral. Even after 48 years of civilian life, he still thought like an enlisted man.

The next morning, Dad asked too many questions about protocol and social courtesies as we drove from our home in Reston over to Fairfax. Then he grew stone silent as we entered the high-rise luxury condo. Finally, we stood at the Burke door. When I knocked, an elderly man, gripping a walker, jerked the door open and smiled.

“Jack,” he barked, and grabbed Dad’s hand. Dad relaxed in the invitation to a safe place.

We spent 90 minutes in the Burke living room. Bobbie gracefully vanished from the male gathering, as I’m sure she’d often done in 72 years of marriage to a Navy man.

As the fly on the wall, I watched in astonishment as Arleigh Burke, a former Chief of Naval Operations, a major player in the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, an admiral who had a class of destroyers named after him, sat with an enlisted man, a Kansas railroader, a Sunday School teacher. But their eyes glistened at the same heartsounds of battle, victory, and loss. And they burst into riotous laughter at the same nuances of Navy culture.

I’ll never forget Dad’s face as Admiral Burke described watching Dad’s ship, the USS Princeton, through binoculars as she exploded and sank.

The 20th century had taken those two men to vastly different places, but they also shared enormous common ground. I saw them touch their bonds. Class distinctions blew away like dust; they were both just sailors.

As we rose to leave, I saw sadness in Bobbie’s eyes. Admiral Burke, using his walker, escorted us to the elevator; he clearly wanted to extend the visit as long as possible. As we stepped onto the elevator, he softly said, “Come back anytime, Jack.” They both knew they’d never meet again.

Arleigh Burke died six months later. Two thousand people attended his funeral; President Clinton delivered the eulogy. Dad lived more than 10 years from that day. Many came to his funeral.

For me, that day of the old sailors has become a clear and enduring reminder that our value has little to do with the externals—possessions we acquire, the awards we win, or the accidents that cripple us.

We’re all His children. He leads us in an everlasting way, even when that way passes through the cemetery on the way to higher ground.

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In 1961, my parents bought me a J.C. Higgins 26” Flightliner Bicycle for Christmas. Sears’ top of the line bike was red with whitewall tires, dual headlights, rear luggage rack, and chrome fenders. It was one of the most impressive things I had ever seen.

The problem was that even with the seat set in its lowest position, I still could not reach the peddles. Apparently, I would just have to grow into it (as I did with jeans, shirts, and baseball caps). Therefore, my sister Judy, eight years older than me, told me she would ‘give me a pump’ (when one person pedals and steers while the passenger sits on the handlebars). She would take me wherever I wanted to go.

Problem solved.

So, on Christmas morning, she and I pushed the Flightliner to the top of the 11th Street Hill. From there, with me on the handlebars and Judy peddling, we began our descent. Life was beautiful. Face to the wind, screaming my delight, and the sun shining so brightly.

However, as we came down the hill, it became quickly apparent Judy did not know how coaster brakes worked. We picked up speed much too quickly.

Then, as we rocketed down the hill, the bike began to vibrate uncontrollably. That’s when Judy, who had a strong sense of self-preservation, dove off the bike into a neighbor’s front lawn. I continued on, precariously perched on the handlebars and moving faster and faster. With no one driving, suddenly, the bike veered to the right, throwing me headfirst into a thorny rose garden.

I had no broken bones, but I did have abrasions, cuts, and scrapes beyond belief. I looked like I’d been attacked by a mountain lion. Back at my grandmother’s house, shrieks of horror greeted me as they saw the blood and my torn clothes.

I learned two valuable lessons that day.

First, never (and I mean never) let Judy drive. Second, we gain all kinds of skills, insights, romantic relationships, marriage, family, cars, and other treasures as we pass through life.

And we are simply not capable of managing them.

That’s not a bug; it’s a feature. God delivers relationships, visions, and things that are too big for us, even dangerous for that stage of our growth. Our shoes don’t reach the bike pedals. Our levels of maturity do not prepare us to marry at 14. And our big ideas require wisdom, leadership, and funding.

What’s the secret? We must grow into them, and you can’t delegate the “growing into” process to a teacher, sibling, contractor, or cop. Those gifts and talents must be mastered by you!

The fine old biblical phrase—“The fullness of time”—is part of the magic. It takes time and patience to build majestic structures, thoughts, songs, and families.

So, if the bike is too big or if the novel in your heart won’t flow, be patient. Great purposes are at work. Give them room and time.

Timing can be everything.

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As the Los Angeles firestorm raged a few miles from my hospital room, needles had invaded veins in both my hands in preparation for my back surgery. Pain clawed my brain. The world around me—my body, other hospital patients, caregivers, and all those fighting flames—seemed to struggle against a rapidly darkening place.

A newly arrived nursing assistant had just started her shift. She was a woman with a big presence and even bigger false eyelashes. Needing relief, I asked her to tell me something interesting about herself.

“Honey,” she bellowed, “I just love people! I love helping people! I can’t help it! I just love people!”

My “dark place” violently imploded. She was just the cure I needed. God had worked overtime to intersect our lives at this moment.

But when the hospital shift changed, a different, more subdued and thoughtful nurse took charge of me. I soon discovered the reason for her demeanor. Because I asked, she showed me her family portrait—a handsome couple with their 3-year-old son. Last month, her husband’s father passed away from an inherited disorder causing glandular tumors.

Then, just last week, she discovered her son had inherited the same incurable condition. He faces lifelong vigilance and surgeries. As she told me her story, her face was resolute, unblinking, stoic.

As we talked, I began to think. How many people hold the cures for what ails others, if they would only reach out to them? And how many needy people have I passed by, never offering the help they needed and I could give?

I turned to look at my roommate. Helpless and diapered, nurses had to occasionally assist him in his bedridden state. But that triggered fierce coughing, which induced long bouts of vomiting.

Of course, I could hear through the privacy curtain when his daughter came to visit. He was confused, unable to connect the dots in their conversation. “What are your wishes?” she asked repeatedly and emphatically, like he was a child.

That was easy. He wanted to go back home.

“But that’s not a choice, Dad. I meant, which hospice facility do you prefer?”

He did not answer.

The next day, his wife visited him. She gushed with emotion. “Honey, I just love you so much!”

After a long silence, he sighed and muttered, “Oh, I don’t know.”

“You don’t know what?” she replied, confused.

“I don’t know. This might be the end.” Although he was speaking of his own life, his voice contained no hint of desperation, no anxiety, not a touch of fear. His pain seemed to push his heart into a new orbit. Perhaps he saw more clearly than anyone else around him.

Because of his suffering and commotion, the nurses offered to move me to a quieter room. I declined. Though we could no longer converse very much, we understood one another.

But, as I was wheeled out of the hospital to go home, I paused at the foot of his bed. I stared into his face and gave both his big toes a squeeze; he nodded and smiled back at me.

I know, and you know, that when our physical bodies reach the boundaries of their human capacity, hope can become stretched thin. But in that weakened place, those squeezes, nods, and smiles reach our deepest place. They carry the expressions of love, the best gift that God offers us. And they are the best we can offer to others.

OK—Big Eyelashes, Brave Nurse, Distressed Roommate, the Firefighters –- you all carried the same message:

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After a few days, he cautiously shared his feelings with Lenore, only to discover she felt the same thing. She had been struggling with how to tell him! Confident that God was directing them, they began giving things away.

Within a few days, everything was gone. Bruce recalls, “Even the original painting my grandmother had painted—a family heirloom—was given away.” Although somewhat perplexed as they slept on the floor amidst nothing, they felt peace and assurance that they had done the right thing.

A few weeks later, as they drove home one afternoon, they saw smoke rising from the landscape. As they got closer to their neighborhood, they could see the smoke was billowing up from their property. They watched their house burn to the ground.

Soon thereafter, one evening after the Mitchells had settled into temporary housing, car lights appeared in their driveway. Then, a couple walked to their front door carrying the gift which the Mitchells had given them a few weeks earlier.

During the following days, a stream of cars came to their home, returning the items they had given away.

Forty years later, Bruce told me, “We learned you can only keep what you give away. Today, we once again treasure my grandmother’s painting. But it only hangs in our home now because we gave it away.”

Have you noticed we all spend much of life’s energy acquiring and storing? But Jesus pointed to a higher way. “... If you cling to your life, you will lose it, and if you let your life go, you will save it..”[1]

[1] Luke 17:33 taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW LIVING TRANSLATION, Copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

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Afterwards, standing on my front steps and calling to neighbors up and down our street, we heard the off-base loudspeaker sound a siren as a Japanese announcement echoed through the air. I could only understand one word. “Tsunami.”

Even now, when I remember that time, I’m struck with a choking sob. But at the time, I was oblivious. I did not know what disaster was to come—I didn’t know 20,000 people were going to lose their lives from the tsunami that tore across small fishing villages and large cities alike. All I knew at the time was that 1) we lived at the highest point on base (two miles from the ocean), 2) the electricity was out, and 3) I had a kitchen to paint before I lost the gift of daylight. Oh, and I was due to deliver our first baby in two days. I went back inside and picked up a paint roller.

In the weeks that followed, the gravity of the destruction began to sink in. Then the Base Commander launched “Operation Tomodachi,” meaning “Operation Friendship,” and dozens of Americans would load onto buses in the mornings, ride out to the coastline, and spend the day picking up rubble and bringing relief to the victims. Feeling useless with my newborn Emma in my arms, I watched as the women I admired so much left each day to pour out their time and strength rebuilding the villages. All I could do was go off base and spend money, my baby swaddled in a wrap around me. It felt small, but I hoped a few yen and a customer would bring hope to the hurting.

What I expected was the traditional Japanese nod of gratitude as I dropped a few coins into their hands. What I did not expect was the sheer joy the people demonstrated at the sight of Emma. There is one image burned in my memory—an old man approached when he saw her. Then tears flowed as he reached out his hands, asking to hold her. As he held her, his wrinkled face broke into a beautiful smile. Tentatively, I pointed to her and said, “Tsunami.” He nodded as emotion flooded his face and voice again.

Then he declared over her, “Japanese!”

And I saw that moment as my way of picking up the rubble. For him and many other locals, the wonder of witnessing new life seemed to renew a pathway to hope. It was not about my small efforts, but about the divine gift of multiplication. The small seed turns into a tree, the smile offered from a stranger brightens a bleak day. The “I love you” written in crayon makes a mom feel seen beneath the piles of laundry and dishes. The infant brings hope to bereaved people.

As Mary Ropes beautifully illustrates in “Mary Jones and Her Bible,”

“Let no one say that what he can give is but as a drop in the bucket, and therefore of no value. It is by the tiny rills that like a thread of silver wind down the hillside, by the silent night dews, by the softly falling rains, by the quiet springs that swell among the peaty uplands-it is by these, that the river is formed…Not a drop is lost. Nothing is valueless. All goes to make up an inestimably precious whole.”

Ropes, Mary. “Her Works Do Follow Her.” Mary Jones and Her Bible. Generations, 2021, pp. 87-88

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A dear friend’s wife struggled with multiple sclerosis for over forty years. Then, during emergency surgery, she suffered a heart attack. When that same surgery revealed extensive cancer, they knew the end was near.

To read my friend’s email about that grueling trial is to stand at the edge of a deep, wide, and humbling canyon. Yet, he summed it up so simply:

“Life has to be lived in all the ways it might come to us.”

Those simple words could only roll out of humility, brokenness, and grace. They describe the attitude that has marked most people’s lives throughout history. That posture is not passive or evasive; it describes a life that leans into the wind.

From my childhood, I’ve watched farmers, ranchers, and others who worked within harsh environments cope with weather, disease, and market turbulence.

And accidents.

By the time many farmers recline in satin caskets, the passing mourners well understand the scars, missing fingers, and empty sleeves.

Not coincidentally, I also grew up in a sense of God. I’ve seen the religious matrix of farming communities mold people into a vertical posture. Dawn to dusk, they studied that vast canopy of sky, knowing it could bring every form and extreme of sun, moisture, temperature, and wind. Most bowed to whatever it brought. Maybe that’s why so many farm faces reveal such rugged splendor.

Recent decades have increased the possibilities for a self-designed life. “I’ll take a little of that... maybe just a pinch more. No, none of that.” Control, convenience, and comfort have become our culture’s new virtues.

Now, as we cross the threshold of a new year, including a new political season, we—as people always do—face the brisk winds of change.

For example, think about life in its pristine beginning. Pregnancy pulls a raw and tumultuous life into being; a tiny hurricane careens around the womb, wrecking all shreds of comfort, convenience, and control. The baby also brings pain, nausea, and—for the next quarter century—great expense. Babies change the course and terrain of life.

However, it seems that embracing life in all the ways it might come often weaves us into a larger tapestry, a more magnificent story, one we could not have created or discovered. Yet we so often feel the need for our own fingerprints across our own life. Maybe it’s our fear of mortality. We associate death with the loss of our being, not with the birth of newness. As Richard Bach wrote,

The caterpillar believes it is dying because it's being sealed in a tomb. The Master knows that the caterpillar is not dying ... things are never over, that change is carrying us, (so often kicking and screaming), to higher states of being ... What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls a butterfly.

When you meet life in all the ways it may come to you, remember the prayer of former UN Secretary-General, Dag Hammarskjold:

“For all that has been, thanks. For all that will be, yes.”

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Wiley was a giant of a man. A hunter, fisherman, golfer, business leader, and world-class uncle. As a little girl, growing up near them in Colorado, I was far more familiar with Aunt Alberta, his wife. My mom and I regularly went to their house to help her with housework. Afterwards, we sat at her kitchen table, enjoying gingersnaps and coffee.

My dad and my brothers, on the other hand, frequently went camping and fishing with Uncle Wiley. For days. They would leave with a camper full of lures, Vienna sausages, and English muffins, and return with tales of all they had caught and shot. I was proud to know Uncle Wiley, but it was always from the distant view of a wide-eyed girl with cookie crumbs on her plate. I loved him, but did not believe I could be of much interest to him. I was, after all, a girl.

In 2013, my husband, David, an Air Force pilot, got assigned to a base—and our next home—near Phoenix. We would live 90 minutes from Wiley’s retirement house. He was 94 at the time. Knowing we had only three years before the Air Force sent us elsewhere, we made it a point to spend time with the now widowed Wiley.

After several visits, I worked up the courage to invite Wiley to one of my plays. His “yes” became one of the most humbling experiences in my acting career. This esteemed and quite elderly hero entered my world for two hours, watched a staged “chick flick,” and stood outside smiling with me for a picture afterwards.

I asked him, “Could you hear me?”

“YOU WERE THE ONLY ONE I COULD HEAR!” he bellowed in his signature hard-of-hearing voice.

I felt so seen in that moment! His presence made a statement that no round-of-applause could ever compete with. He chose to come to me, in my world of stage lights and curtains.

Part of Your World

Years later, when David and I began fostering a little boy, it quickly became clear that our job was to enter his world. The deep dive into the realm of unfamiliar trauma drove me to hours of research (and prayer). As I dug deep, a phrase jumped at me. It became a plumbline throughout the journey.

“I can’t stop the rollercoaster, but I can ride it with you.”

Someone (whom I cannot remember) expressed that promise to each child she took into her home. And I have learned that a foster parent’s job is to enter that child’s hurricane of chaos and hold his or her hand in the midst of it.

Something mysterious and majestic happens when we choose to dive into someone else’s world. That plunge of, say, marriage, parenthood, true friendship, or other relational investments invites us to become subject to the same assaults and joys our partner faces. It is not Aladdin holding his hand out over a ledge saying, “Do you trust me?” It is a sacrificial presence that enters someone else’s world and says, “Your people will be my people.”

We all long for connection, to know and be known.

Is that why the Christmas story has captivated multitudes for thousands of years? What? God Almighty makes himself vulnerable by stepping into our world? Would he really subject himself to all that “being human” involves?

If an earthly uncle sitting in a folding chair in “my world” gives me butterflies, how do I even consider the God who surrendered all comfort and splendor to be folded into my life?

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That’s why my brothers and I grew up in the shadow of The Princeton.

Also In 1954, Dad and Mom bought a home on nine acres at the edge of town. The morning after the closing, Dad hated the place. So, his prayers got longer, louder, and scarier. Somehow, Vernon and I—Carl was born later—slowly realized our parents had spent all they had on that place. They only had $9.00 to spend for Christmas. So, they agreed to only buy gifts for their sons.

But on Christmas morning, a pickup from a big lumber yard in town pulled into our driveway. The driver ran up onto the porch and knocked. When Dad opened the door, the man handed him a small box.

“Merry Christmas, Jack. We appreciate your business.”

Dad thanked the man and opened the box to find a beautiful pocketknife. Although the gift was a mere business transaction, Dad dropped into a chair and sobbed. That was the first time I ever saw him cry. Then he looked up at Mom and said, “You’re the only one who didn’t get a Christmas present.”

He couldn’t take it. What Mom, Vernon, and I saw that day was probably the collective force of stress. A rough financial period (which didn’t last very long), deep regrets about a major purchase, unrelenting turmoil over shipmates killed in the Pacific, and a too-long-too-silent God finally blew him apart.

However, in the emotional scene in the dining room, I saw the depth of Dad’s love for his family. For me. My parents were always in love with each other, but before that day, I didn’t know Dad’s love for me. Then, in a raw, spontaneous moment, on Christmas, my dad’s love flooded that little farmhouse.

Like a bead of water holding the image of a mountain, what happened that day caught the character and purpose of Christmas. God’s Love is a dominion of light; it invades the darkness. In the timeless Christmas story, the Light won. It still wins. Every day. Even Dad’s dark night of the soul was no match for the love that walked into our home on Christmas 1954.

That Light swallowed the dark shadow of the Princeton.

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Their cremated remains sat side-by-side in my car’s back seat. Dad’s brass and mother- of-pearl cremation urn gleamed like a new sculpture. My mother’s identical urn showed nine years of tarnish as it awaited my father’s remains. All was now ready for their burials.

Inside the glass welcoming room, the muted military décor celebrated the service of those buried here. The receptionist sported an irreverent shock of fluorescent pink hair, a comedic contrast against drab military hues and the respectful displays of flags and military insignia.

He ushered me into the next room to complete the burial forms. “Is there anything I can do for you? Water? Soda? A candy bar? Goodness, I’m sorry for the long delay! You’ve been so understanding! You’ve made my day!”

Suddenly, I heard two familiar, though dead, voices. Like the cemetery voices in Thornton Wilder’s play (and movie), Our Town.

First, I heard my dad say: “Wow! Look at that hair! A beautiful shade, but perhaps it needs a bit more purple!” Dad loved extravagance and color.

Then, Mother’s voice: “Oh! How wonderful! We’ve made his day! And he is so patient and so kind to us! Let’s thank the Lord for him. Who wants to pray?” Dee Dahlberg always saw the best in everyone.

Before any of us could entreat the Lord’s blessing, Kyle, the attendant, walked in from his tidy office, dressed in suit and tie, administrative duties in hand. Kyle’s Louisiana accent graced his instructions.

As we chatted about his Louisiana roots after the service, Kyle admitted they could not even consider buying a home in California. Maybe he should have stayed in the South, he pondered aloud. We could see it had been a tough slog.

“Poor man!” exclaimed Mother. “With a family to raise! Let’s give him a little offering!”

“Louisiana,” Dad chimed in. “What a place! The architecture is just … odd. Half French, half Southern Colonial, and half … who knows what! I’m glad we’re being buried in California!”

Finally, at the burial site, the gravedigger met us. Ricky, a grinning, enthusiastic, and energetic man, seemed unbowed by his somber responsibilities.

“I love my job!” Ricky said. Even after digging war veterans’ graves for most of his life, he still loved it. “These are war veterans, and I’m the last person who gets to honor our heroes.”

Upon discovering Dad was 106 years old, he stood erect. His face morphed from joyous to resolute.

“A hundred and six years old? I never buried nobody that old! No, sir! Wow, what a life! What an honor!”

He gently placed Mom and Dad’s urns into plastic bags, and then into the holes we watched him dig. Then he invited me to take a photograph.

“The headstones will be dug into the soil exactly 26 inches deep,” Ricky explained. They’ll arrive a couple of months.”

“Hey,” Dad piped up, “What’s going to be inscribed on my headstone?” Ever the lifelong artist, we had expected his curiosity and wanted to please him.

I answered, “He Discovered God’s Beauty in All Things.’”

“I love that,” he choked. “Couldn’t have said it better myself.”

“What about mine?” Mother asked.

“Yours will say, ‘Loved God, Loved Others, Finished the Race.’”

“I did, you know! I really did love everyone. I sure tried to!”

“I know, Mom,” I assured her. “You did a great job.”

“One more thing,” she added. “Before you leave, could you place some Gospel tracts around the headstones of our new neighbors? We want them to know we’re all in this together.”

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Yet, the great cultural mold of our time demands certitude. On everything. When’s the last time you heard or read these beautiful words—“I don’t know?” We humans strut around our porch or planet, boldly pronouncing scientific, political, historical, and moral pronouncements that have no connection to reality.

So, what makes us so cocksure of … anything? How did we get caught in the loop where what we know becomes the enemy of what we don’t know? When I consider the size and complexity of the universe, my opinions carry as much illumination as pointing a flashlight at the sun. Yet, we often think everyone waits for us to speak.

For example, as a publisher, I know stuff about moving stories and ideas from authors’ minds into published forms. But new skills, shapes, and technologies make me the dumbest guy in the room. My knowledge, training, traditions, preferences, emotions, and memories mean zero. If I lean on my knowledge, I will fail. Every time.

So, how can I turn that into strength? I must be vulnerable and ask questions. In fact, in all areas of life, I should listen more than speak, test more than theorize, and inquire more than proclaim.

And I’ve become very comfortable with not knowing. After all, I wake up in a new world every day. I know nothing. I can only proceed in the confidence that I and others can find the right path through vulnerability, collaboration, and trust.  

Here’s my quick “4H” reference guide for finding the best path forward:

Humility

Humus is the Latin word for “soil,” “human,” and “humility.” Genesis 2:7 says God formed humans from the soil. So, humility recognizes our earthly origins and our mortality (“dust to dust”). Biblically, life is modeled by a seed falling into the soil and dying before it can rise into real life.

Honor

Every person who ever lived was created by God. So, where do we find the right to revile anyone? We do not see, know, or love anyone as their Creator does. That may be why the Bible directs us to show honor. For example, the Apostle Paul told Timothy, “Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father.” [1]

Does that apply to Donald Trump or Joe Biden? If not, why not?

We honor people, not because of their philosophical, religious, or cultural alignments, but because of our common Creator. Big question: can we treasure those who disagree with us? Must we delegitimize those who see things differently?

Home

Every marriage, every family is a lab where we work out the details of commitment, fidelity, respect, reconciliation, and intimacy—before we’re ready to join the larger society. Home is where we detect and absorb the truths about love, weakness, transgression, confession, forgiveness, and trust. When you hit the wall, go home. Confess. Cry like a Cat-5. Love your family. Recharge.

Humor

A sense of humor reflects confidence and trust. When we cannot laugh about politics, money, religion, health, sex, technology, and other arenas of life, we assign a power to them that is inappropriate and deceptive.  

Most people carry heavy loads, and they do the best they can. Where do I find permission, or authorization, to make their load heavier? How did politics, bias, and tribalism release me to invalidate anyone? Shouldn’t I try to encourage everyone I meet? If I find nothing encouraging to say, I can at least be silent.

First, do no harm.

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[1] 1 Timothy 5:1 taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, ENGLISH STANDARD VERSION, Copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission.

The death of a honeymoon.

It seems to be a rite of passage for all of us, whether it be in relationships, “dream jobs,” child-rearing, or owning a boat. At some point, that thing that looked like it was the answer to all our problems becomes rife with … flaws. What do we do then? When that glowing vision becomes marred with bits of shadow, is it time to find a new dream? Or is it time to start working?

A psychologist who specializes in neurofeedback therapy recently told me, “We don’t know why, but there is a honeymoon period with nearly every patient, regardless of their background. For the first three sessions, everything works great. After that, we start to get the REAL results. We can see where the left and right side of the brain have a breakdown in communication. Then, the good work begins, and life can get a lot more fun!”

Think of it. The “fun” begins when the work becomes visible. Work jolts us out of the useless rut of fantasy and into the deep joys of reality. It is to be faced, not avoided. It can even be our lifeline dropped from heavenly places.

As a missionary in China during the mid-1900’s, Gladys Aylward was asked to stop a murderous riot in a prison camp. After the inmates miraculously stopped their brawling, she asked one man what they had been doing that started the fight. “Doing?” he asked. “We were doing the same thing we do every day—sitting and waiting for the day to end.” In the months that followed, Aylward secured looms, yarn, and a grain mill. She taught the men to make their own clothes and food, and even bought rabbits for them to breed and sell. She brought light into the darkness through the dignity of work.

Two years ago, my husband, our kids, and I settled into a property that exuded a “dream come true.” Wide open fields, forests, and a huge pond in the backyard promised 9 acres of memory-building goodness. The prospect of owning land thrilled my heart. I could see myself writing and thinking, hidden in my woods, listening to the leaves falling. The clacking of my keyboard keys would deliver a fitting retort to the woodpecker tapping overhead.

Not that simple. Land demands “ruling and subduing” in order to be a habitable place. We burn fallen trees, swing sledgehammers, wrestle with rototillers and go “scorched earth” on any sign of poison ivy. We pull weeds the size of trees, hack at the hard Georgia clay, and rake a steady stream of cut fescue, pine straw, and leaves. These days of shovels and callouses, however, only sweeten the days of lemonade and sunshine. It’s a beautiful thing.

When the honeymoons end, what if our eyes adjusted to see that those shadows creeping in actually add depth to a picture that had been sterile and one-dimensional? We all must work to keep relationships, businesses, and families afloat. Can we see that work as a gift? As the tool used to carve lines of meaning into life?

My husband has now learned to give me a wide berth when I’m eating. And his statement that made a new bride cry? It has led to years of laughter, another artful brushstroke on the portrait of our marriage. Worth it.

“Gladys Aylward: The Adventure of a Lifetime”; Janet and Geoff Benge, YWAM Publishing, 1998.

“How many, please?”

“Uh, none. I’m just checking out your restaurant.”

The host’s grin commanded his entire face. I returned an uncomfortable smile.

“So, what do you do when you’re not here?” I vainly tried to normalize my peculiar behavior.

“I work a lot. Fifty hours a week or more.”

The sunlight illuminated his sturdy face, engaging countenance, and a brown mole on his right cheek. His slight accent suggested more of his story. I worked hard to pull it out of him.

Philip of Montenegro

Two years ago, he left his home in Montenegro, a thumbnail of a country carved from the former Yugoslavia. A lead for a restaurant job landed him here, on California’s central coast.

“Philip,” my restaurant host explained, “my name is Philip.”

“Oh, yes!” I exclaimed, concocting a vague geographic connection to his part of the world. “Like Philip of Macedonia, the father of Alexander the Great!”

“I don’t know about that,” he replied, evidently not an ardent fan of historical trivia. “I’m Philip of Montenegro, not Macedonia.”

Because Philip of Montenegro and his wife work hard to cover their nearly $3,000 monthly rent, they plan to migrate into the hotel industry and move to a less expensive area—Phoenix, perhaps. Within fifteen years, he plans to own his own home along with some investment property.

“And then I’ll retire,” he added confidently.

“Whoa!” I gasped, amazed at his tenacity and idealism. “To where?”

“Montenegro, my home!”

“And you know the language!” I gratuitously chimed in.

He grinned broadly.

What is Home?

When Philip of Montenegro eventually retreats to his homeland, he will surrender America and his green card. And leave this gorgeous place in California? I thought to myself.

Like homing pigeons, and like Philip of Montenegro, we can find our way home over vast distances. But when we return to a former home, we carry another sense—the memory of the way things used to be.

What exactly is what we call “home”?

Yes, home can be, usually is, a geographical location. But after returning, we note the growth of vegetation and the altered hues of paint. Despite those changes, is it really what it used to be? Yes, and no. What’s missing?

Forty years later, I returned to the home where I grew up. To my astonishment, the new owner recognized me staring from the street. He invited me inside, proud of the refinements he had made. Freshly installed wooden floors replaced the soft area rugs where we wrestled with Dad. A Pueblo-styled kiva fireplace replaced the cozy nook where I listened to children’s programs on the Grundig vacuum tube radio. The kitchen countertop where I kneaded Swedish rye bread with my mother had disappeared, leaving no hint of the baking bread’s aroma. Things that carried force were antiseptically cleaned away.

Why do we miss home?

What we call “home” is the people rather than the place. I don’t miss the Grundig radio, but I miss the radio stories as marinated in the aroma of Mother’s bread and the taste of her Swedish meatballs. I no longer recall the area rug’s pattern, but I miss Dad’s scratchy stubble and him pinching my belly as we brawled on that floor.

But, if home is the people rather than the place, what is left to us when those dear ones go away? What, then, will become of “home”?

We do not become homeless. Home is not a static place. We don’t return to a place on the map. Rather, our home is moveable. The players have moved on, but we now fill the roles. The same care and love that made home for us, we can now provide for others. Where we now welcome, where we now cook, where we now provide peace to a stranger—that is the place we now call home. We are the caretakers of the caring and cozy places where, years later, others will recall, “Remember who? Remember when?”

“Montenegro!” Philip declared, “is an absolutely beautiful place!”

I’m sure it is. And the comfort we give to those in our own homes also makes them beautiful places.

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Narrated by: Kara Lea Kennedy

Have you ever met a human pilot light, one always ready to ignite the flame of kindness in others?

When World War II ended, the U.S. Navy released Jack Chinn to return to Kansas and rejoin his own life. Like many veterans, Dad brought the war home. Inevitably, his fatherhood borrowed a military model.

I think that's why he was a stranger to me; it was impossible for a child to connect with a battle-scorched warrior. I needed but couldn’t find him; I later learned he looked for me too. But the circumstances of our lives simply booked us on trains bound for different places.

But in the late 50s, our trains happened to meet at a depot called Johnny Cash.

The rough-cut Arkansas baritone became our common ground. Dad was a Democrat, a child of the Depression, a patriot, a union man; he heard all that in Johnny’s boom-chicka-boom, rhythm-of-the-rails anthems. They had the same initials, and were both guitarists. Dad was a railroad brakeman; Johnny’s train songs ennobled his job (we took his release of Rock Island Line personally).

But Cash did something different for me. Maybe it was his might-be-dangerous eyes, that "get outta my way" growl, or the way he handled that big Martin guitar like it was a piece of farm machinery. He imparted a raw sense of manhood to me. Like an uncle or coach, Johnny provided a timeless function of fatherhood—helping a boy become a man—for a father locked away somewhere.

Dad and I could listen to Johnny and touch our bond, even though we were each hearing different sounds. The music was confirming him and waking me. Of course, we never just sat and listened to music. By the code of our prairie Calvinism, you had to be hauling stuff in a pickup, cleaning up the shop, or painting a barn in order to enjoy the radio.

Losing the Light

In time, Mom, my brothers, and I began to see something was wrong when Dad, the family historian, started forgetting names and faces and events and dates. Then, he began to worry the big cottonwood might fall into the house.

Dad continued to walk to his beloved shop, but gradually stopped making things. This man who always built picture frames, toolboxes, bookshelves, even houses with his bare hands, would just stand at his table saw and stare at the wall. Sometimes, he would cry and not know why.

After several months of tests, his doctor dropped a bag of bricks on us. “Alzheimer’s.”

At first, we couldn’t tell him. But we soon realized this man who rode an aircraft carrier into the sea, raised three sons, and wrestled trains for a living could handle Alzheimer’s.

So, a few days later, Joanne and I spent a weekend with Dad and Mom. Throughout that long, lazy Saturday afternoon, as Dad and I talked about the war, the Bible, and railroading, I noticed how his face was becoming so empty. His eyes were losing light, and the remaining embers seemed to say, “Help.” Finally, I asked if he’d like to go for a ride.

We drove all over town—oh, my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass. We were driving north on Main, just past Skaggs hardware, when I told him. We both stared straight ahead. The old sailor/brakeman/Sunday School teacher was silent for a while. Then, as we blump-blumped across the railroad tracks up by the Co-op, he asked, "Will I get violent?" Of course, his first concern was for Mom.

What Does “Walk the Line” Mean?

I remember the song that first galvanized Dad and me to Cash: "I Walk the Line." Although it’s a simple song about faithfulness, the lyrics reflect the assumptions that formed Dad’s generation.

Those guys really believed in "the line," a simple and certain standard, a plumb line, hanging from heaven. Since they didn’t hang it, they couldn’t take it down; they just had to deal with it. Dad and many other "greatest generation" guys chose to walk it. They fully accepted the "heavy lifting required" jobs the 20th century handed them.

To walk the line is to live the life that you’re handed. You don’t cut corners, and you don’t swap your relationships or responsibilities for others. You just walk them out. And, in the walking, you might connect with soaring graces you would have missed had you not lived your own life.

If I’ve learned that at all, it’s because I was shaped by one line walker and haunted by the hum of another. The life was Dad’s; the voice was Johnny’s.

The line is mine.

Author: Craig Dahlberg

Narrator: Kara Lea Kennedy

When I wrote for a conservative journal several years ago, one day my editor asked me to become more combative against “liberals.” When I told him I was not good at that, I heard myself say something I did not know before that moment: “God’s signature is written across every human heart; I’d rather speak to that signature.”

To my surprise, he said, “Well, we sure need someone around here who can do that!” The subject never came up again.

After a long estrangement from an old friend, I turned a corner one day and ran right into him. When he smiled, I suddenly remembered who he really was. Why did I forget he carried the signature? Because it’s so easy. We live in a thick fog of accusation that pulls us into believing the worst of anyone who might be other than we are.  

That’s not sane. As Michael Jordan explained about why he wasn’t an activist, “Republicans buy sneakers too!”

Our opponents are never as bad or as lost as we imagine. When people appear irredeemably dark or dangerous, it’s usually because we stumble into agreement with the accusations and anger that always swirl in the atmosphere. Rampant and furious dehumanization steals from our future.

Higher Ground

In 2009, during a trip to Jordan, I met a Palestinian Muslim. Ibrahim and I spent many hours together in restaurants, busses, and walking together throughout the country. At first, we spoke to each other from deep inside our own caves. But then, like Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird, we each slowly stepped from the shadows into the light.

One day, when Ibrahim told me about his son, who had lived with a chronic illness all his life, he recalled the night “Allah came to my house and healed my son.” My eyes burned as we walked back and forth across our common real estate. We found a heart connection within that signature, that too-good-to-be-true joy of God coming to your home.

We each found lift up above our religious, political, ethnic, and national borders. We stood together on higher ground.

How Do We Speak to the Signature?

When the Apostle Paul spoke at the Areopagus (in Acts 17), he did not react to their polytheism. He first recognized his and their common fatherhood in God. He also assured them God was near to them. He spoke words of life to everyone gathered there.

To live a life that is true we must get up above the mud rut labels so we can see God’s signature written across humanity. Everyone we meet carries it. Because God created and preceded us to that person, He already communes with him or her. We just need to see and love them as He does.  

As Goethe famously said, “Treat an individual as he is, and he will remain as he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be.”

If you speak to the signature, you might call new life into existence; you may even create a path to higher ground for the one standing in front of you.

Finally, I do not believe everyone can or should “speak to the signature.” Some can; most can’t. I’m just suggesting the possibilities of getting up above earthbound prejudices and reactions. If we find that zone where we can think clearer, see further, and hear deeper, we might find a new way of viewing God’s marvelous creatures.

Including your cranky neighbor, boss, competitor, or your daughter’s boyfriend.  

When I wrote for a conservative journal several years ago, one day my editor asked me to become more combative against “liberals.” When I told him I was not good at that, I heard myself say something I did not know before that moment: “God’s signature is written across every human heart; I’d rather speak to that signature.”

To my surprise, he said, “Well, we sure need someone around here who can do that!” The subject never came up again.

After a long estrangement from an old friend, I turned a corner one day and ran right into him. When he smiled, I suddenly remembered who he really was. Why did I forget he carried the signature? Because it’s so easy. We live in a thick fog of accusation that pulls us into believing the worst of anyone who might be other than we are.  

That’s not sane. As Michael Jordan explained about why he wasn’t an activist, “Republicans buy sneakers too!”

Our opponents are never as bad or as lost as we imagine. When people appear irredeemably dark or dangerous, it’s usually because we stumble into agreement with the accusations and anger that always swirl in the atmosphere. Rampant and furious dehumanization steals from our future.

Higher Ground

In 2009, during a trip to Jordan, I met a Palestinian Muslim. Ibrahim and I spent many hours together in restaurants, busses, and walking together throughout the country. At first, we spoke to each other from deep inside our own caves. But then, like Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird, we each slowly stepped from the shadows into the light.

One day, when Ibrahim told me about his son, who had lived with a chronic illness all his life, he recalled the night “Allah came to my house and healed my son.” My eyes burned as we walked back and forth across our common real estate. We found a heart connection within that signature, that too-good-to-be-true joy of God coming to your home.

We each found lift up above our religious, political, ethnic, and national borders. We stood together on higher ground.

How Do We Speak to the Signature?

When the Apostle Paul spoke at the Areopagus (in Acts 17), he did not react to their polytheism. He first recognized his and their common fatherhood in God. He also assured them God was near to them. He spoke words of life to everyone gathered there.

To live a life that is true we must get up above the mud rut labels so we can see God’s signature written across humanity. Everyone we meet carries it. Because God created and preceded us to that person, He already communes with him or her. We just need to see and love them as He does.  

As Goethe famously said, “Treat an individual as he is, and he will remain as he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be.”

If you speak to the signature, you might call new life into existence; you may even create a path to higher ground for the one standing in front of you.

Finally, I do not believe everyone can or should “speak to the signature.” Some can; most can’t. I’m just suggesting the possibilities of getting up above earthbound prejudices and reactions. If we find that zone where we can think clearer, see further, and hear deeper, we might find a new way of viewing God’s marvelous creatures.

Including your cranky neighbor, boss, competitor, or your daughter’s boyfriend.  

I tore across our field, maxing out the 24 horsepower, zero-turn mowing monster. A day of peaceful yard work quickly turned awry when my husband tromped through the grass, wearing his “I’m a man and I know machines” face. I knew he wasn’t approaching to tell me how pretty I was in my ball cap and tee shirt bearing the image of E.T., so I begrudgingly brought the mower to a stop. He yelled something, cranked the throttle from “happy-go-lucky turtle” to full “rabbit on methamphetamines,” and walked back to his beloved chainsaw.

Interpreting the world too literally almost always lands me in trouble. This case was no different.

I saw the rabbit silhouette as my signal to “give her all she’s got!” So, I bulldozed my way over the trembling fescue grass. Each hole, ridge, and ant pile lifted me violently out of my seat. Field mice ran in terror and crows circled overhead, anticipating the cadavers I was leaving behind. One hour later, finished, I killed the engine and hobbled over to my husband.

“I’m done. But I hurt. Everywhere.”

“Why were you in such a hurry?”

“Because you cranked it up to the rabbit!”

A mix of horror and amusement crossed his face. He grimaced, then told me the rabbit only showed how much power was going to the engine. It was not a “speed directive.”

One week later, the mower was crying out for help. After inspection, the diagnosis was clear: Every bolt that held the engine to the mower had been stripped. The engine clung to the mower like a man hugging a pier after swimming the English Channel.

Power or Speed?

Where might you be sacrificing power for speed? Sometimes this hunger for haste carries hidden costs.

While stationed in Germany, a friend watched with pride as her son zipped around on his tricycle. A German man stood watching. Finally, unable to contain his confusion, he asked my friend, “Is he in circus?” He then produced a balance bike, and, along with it, an education in power vs. speed. With no pedals, riders learn to kick their feet, Fred Flintstone style. They then lift their feet, using new muscles to keep them atop that rolling contraption. That’s how they learn balance. The transition to pedals will come after they master balance.

Slow Growth

A sign that hung in my grandma’s kitchen for years still speaks to me: “The hurrier I go, the behinder I get!” Doing puzzles at her kitchen table while waiting for noodles to dry on sheets of brown paper, I decided I didn’t want a life of speed.

But I did want power. Why? Power can carry people and things, giving a lift to those in need. Speed is usually solitary; it leaves others behind. That’s probably why I’ve always loved trains more than race cars.

We spend a lot of time racing to the next item on the list, despising the adage that “slow and steady wins the race.” I get it. “Slow and steady” is often painful. It makes you absorb and suffer things you prefer to skip. Proverbs 20:21 says, “An inheritance quickly gained will not be blessed in the end.” We often gain great power while moving at a slow and gentle pace. You have to let it overtake you.

Who are you supposed to take with you? Are you their ride to life’s higher ground?

Can they catch you? Or are they barely hanging on?

I tore across our field, maxing out the 24 horsepower, zero-turn mowing monster. A day of peaceful yard work quickly turned awry when my husband tromped through the grass, wearing his “I’m a man and I know machines” face. I knew he wasn’t approaching to tell me how pretty I was in my ball cap and tee shirt bearing the image of E.T., so I begrudgingly brought the mower to a stop. He yelled something, cranked the throttle from “happy-go-lucky turtle” to full “rabbit on methamphetamines,” and walked back to his beloved chainsaw.

Interpreting the world too literally almost always lands me in trouble. This case was no different.

I saw the rabbit silhouette as my signal to “give her all she’s got!” So, I bulldozed my way over the trembling fescue grass. Each hole, ridge, and ant pile lifted me violently out of my seat. Field mice ran in terror and crows circled overhead, anticipating the cadavers I was leaving behind. One hour later, finished, I killed the engine and hobbled over to my husband.

“I’m done. But I hurt. Everywhere.”

“Why were you in such a hurry?”

“Because you cranked it up to the rabbit!”

A mix of horror and amusement crossed his face. He grimaced, then told me the rabbit only showed how much power was going to the engine. It was not a “speed directive.”

One week later, the mower was crying out for help. After inspection, the diagnosis was clear: Every bolt that held the engine to the mower had been stripped. The engine clung to the mower like a man hugging a pier after swimming the English Channel.

Power or Speed?

Where might you be sacrificing power for speed? Sometimes this hunger for haste carries hidden costs.

While stationed in Germany, a friend watched with pride as her son zipped around on his tricycle. A German man stood watching. Finally, unable to contain his confusion, he asked my friend, “Is he in circus?” He then produced a balance bike, and, along with it, an education in power vs. speed. With no pedals, riders learn to kick their feet, Fred Flintstone style. They then lift their feet, using new muscles to keep them atop that rolling contraption. That’s how they learn balance. The transition to pedals will come after they master balance.

Slow Growth

A sign that hung in my grandma’s kitchen for years still speaks to me: “The hurrier I go, the behinder I get!” Doing puzzles at her kitchen table while waiting for noodles to dry on sheets of brown paper, I decided I didn’t want a life of speed.

But I did want power. Why? Power can carry people and things, giving a lift to those in need. Speed is usually solitary; it leaves others behind. That’s probably why I’ve always loved trains more than race cars.

We spend a lot of time racing to the next item on the list, despising the adage that “slow and steady wins the race.” I get it. “Slow and steady” is often painful. It makes you absorb and suffer things you prefer to skip. Proverbs 20:21 says, “An inheritance quickly gained will not be blessed in the end.” We often gain great power while moving at a slow and gentle pace. You have to let it overtake you.

Who are you supposed to take with you? Are you their ride to life’s higher ground?

Can they catch you? Or are they barely hanging on?

* Markets are conversations.

* Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors.

* Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a human voice.

* Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived.

* People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice.[1]

So, What Happened to Marketplace Conversations?

When I recently scanned my file in an online credit site, I did not understand one factor in the rating. So, I clicked on “Hey, Ed, I can help you understand your score.” But it only gave one option; “What are your goals?” What? Goals? Trying to play along, I picked one of only three choices. But that only led to a loan application. Incredibly, they could not help me understand that one factor in my score.

I’ve also noticed that automated voice response systems that use pre-recorded greetings to manage calls rarely provide a route I need. They only give selections that compel me to give my money to strangers. The transaction feels like a large mechanical opponent suddenly locked me into a full nelson.

As Rex Miller, author and corporate guru, told me, “Today we're being invaded and manipulated by algorithms that try to anticipate what we want but are designed to take us down their rabbit hole... It sends a weird sensation of this wanna-be guide or ‘friend.’ On the surface, it looks or sounds like the genuine thing until you try to go in a direction it does not want.”

Can We Get Back to Basics?

In its purest form, human speech carries the vocal symbols, the language, the heartsounds, the essence of the soul into communion between people. It is a holy and mysterious transport.

Here’s the ideal version of what that looks like:

You dare to open your heart as you seek information, help, clarification, perhaps forgiveness. The recipient of your words listens carefully and silently. You search his face or voice for some sign of awareness, warmth, or affirmation, some sense of God in this place. Both parties plead a case. They’re vulnerable. Humble. Hopeful. This thing could go either way.

We can’t talk without risk. When we choose language sounds, we load deep mysteries of the heart onto great sailing vessels of conversation. The wind will carry that cargo to others. The entire process becomes a smoky helix of spirit, soul, and body.

But today commercial interests use language to build chutes that force people into conclusions and expenditures. They perform a role similar to slaughterhouses that build chutes to force cattle to become meat products.

Calling mechanized communication “artificial intelligence” doesn’t mean anything. Any manufactured intelligence is not intelligent. It’s like a plastic flower; it may look “alive,” but it has no organic veracity, no similarity to a flower. That whole distortion violates the integrity of language.

This is no rant or crusade. I’m only trying to create a backdrop, a context of the travesty of lowland speech so we can better understand authentic and clear highland speech and its possibilities.

Proper Seasoning

The Apostle Paul wrote, “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”[2] Think of it; we walk on the earth with a magnificent commission, a calling, to speak words “full of grace” into our atmosphere. We must listen before and deeper than we speak. Everyone carries heavy loads. Give them a cool drink of encouraging and affirming words, sounds that comes from up there.

Paul said our conversations should be “seasoned with salt.” That’s so delightful; our words should create a magnificent stew. How many tasteless conversations have you endured? How many over-salted exchanges have you pushed away? We don’t need much “spice,” just a little salt to awaken the natural flavors. Not just for the one speaking, but for each participant in the conversation. Gracious communication does that.

And we can do that without regard for what politics, religion, culture, or other energy centers insist we speak about. We don’t have to react, dig in, fight, stand up and be counted, or anything else about what “they” say. Just speak in your own words, in your own voice.  

[1] The Cluetrain Manifesto, Copyright © 1999 Levine, Locke, Searls & Weinberger. https://cluetrain.com

[2] Colossians 4:6 taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION ®. Copyright© 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™. Used by permission of Zondervan.

* Markets are conversations.

* Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors.

* Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a human voice.

* Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived.

* People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice.[1]

So, What Happened to Marketplace Conversations?

When I recently scanned my file in an online credit site, I did not understand one factor in the rating. So, I clicked on “Hey, Ed, I can help you understand your score.” But it only gave one option; “What are your goals?” What? Goals? Trying to play along, I picked one of only three choices. But that only led to a loan application. Incredibly, they could not help me understand that one factor in my score.

I’ve also noticed that automated voice response systems that use pre-recorded greetings to manage calls rarely provide a route I need. They only give selections that compel me to give my money to strangers. The transaction feels like a large mechanical opponent suddenly locked me into a full nelson.

As Rex Miller, author and corporate guru, told me, “Today we're being invaded and manipulated by algorithms that try to anticipate what we want but are designed to take us down their rabbit hole... It sends a weird sensation of this wanna-be guide or ‘friend.’ On the surface, it looks or sounds like the genuine thing until you try to go in a direction it does not want.”

Can We Get Back to Basics?

In its purest form, human speech carries the vocal symbols, the language, the heartsounds, the essence of the soul into communion between people. It is a holy and mysterious transport.

Here’s the ideal version of what that looks like:

You dare to open your heart as you seek information, help, clarification, perhaps forgiveness. The recipient of your words listens carefully and silently. You search his face or voice for some sign of awareness, warmth, or affirmation, some sense of God in this place. Both parties plead a case. They’re vulnerable. Humble. Hopeful. This thing could go either way.

We can’t talk without risk. When we choose language sounds, we load deep mysteries of the heart onto great sailing vessels of conversation. The wind will carry that cargo to others. The entire process becomes a smoky helix of spirit, soul, and body.

But today commercial interests use language to build chutes that force people into conclusions and expenditures. They perform a role similar to slaughterhouses that build chutes to force cattle to become meat products.

Calling mechanized communication “artificial intelligence” doesn’t mean anything. Any manufactured intelligence is not intelligent. It’s like a plastic flower; it may look “alive,” but it has no organic veracity, no similarity to a flower. That whole distortion violates the integrity of language.

This is no rant or crusade. I’m only trying to create a backdrop, a context of the travesty of lowland speech so we can better understand authentic and clear highland speech and its possibilities.

Proper Seasoning

The Apostle Paul wrote, “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”[2] Think of it; we walk on the earth with a magnificent commission, a calling, to speak words “full of grace” into our atmosphere. We must listen before and deeper than we speak. Everyone carries heavy loads. Give them a cool drink of encouraging and affirming words, sounds that comes from up there.

Paul said our conversations should be “seasoned with salt.” That’s so delightful; our words should create a magnificent stew. How many tasteless conversations have you endured? How many over-salted exchanges have you pushed away? We don’t need much “spice,” just a little salt to awaken the natural flavors. Not just for the one speaking, but for each participant in the conversation. Gracious communication does that.

And we can do that without regard for what politics, religion, culture, or other energy centers insist we speak about. We don’t have to react, dig in, fight, stand up and be counted, or anything else about what “they” say. Just speak in your own words, in your own voice.  

[1] The Cluetrain Manifesto, Copyright © 1999 Levine, Locke, Searls & Weinberger. https://cluetrain.com

[2] Colossians 4:6 taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION ®. Copyright© 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™. Used by permission of Zondervan.

One of the greatest lines in history—six one-syllable words—comes from the old hymn, Amazing Grace: “Twas blind, but now I see.” That so often inscribes the summation of an act, a relationship, a failure, even a reach for the good.

On October 30, 2007, a doctor dropped a diagnosis of cancer on Joanne, my wife. Over the following five months, we lived in a shadowland of sirens screaming through the night, conflicting reports, confusing options, and continuous testing. Her doctor grew increasingly pessimistic. In his darkest pronouncement, he suggested it may be time for “palliative care.”

In the early morning hours of March 6, 2008, I thought Joanne was dying. After a hard night, including another trip to the ER, and her increasingly gray pallor, the swirling dark waters pulled me under. The searing numbness of imminent loss broke something inside. It surely seemed like The End.

The Terrible Tour

Then, throughout the pre-dawn darkness, God ignored my emotions as He pulled me through our house in a guided tour of my royal Edness. We stopped at several “scenic overviews” so He could point out the severity of my blindness.

The first stop took me to her office, where I stared at the large cork board of her pen pal photos. Forty women Joanne wrote to, prayed for, and encouraged in phone calls. I had never understood her “wasted time” on people she didn’t really know. But in that moment, I faced my visual impairment about her. I felt shame as I saw the pure heart that compelled her to reach out to hurting people.

As the tour continued, I saw the box of neatly organized sheets of stickers on her desk. Joanne had long carried a giggling joy for brightly colored little adhesive stickers—cats and candy canes, flowers and frogs, bicycles and butterflies. She splashed them bountifully across letters, greeting cards, calendars, and scrapbooks.

I saw the money she spent for the stickers. But standing there, I could only see the small spirit that turned such delightful colors of Joanne into a problem.

The next scenic overview was our closet, where my fingers brushed the silks, cottons, leathers, and linens which adorned this fine lady. My throat burned as her fragrance rose from the fabrics. I was ashamed to remember how I had questioned the money she spent on clothes. A question passed before my eyes: “What can you afford for her funeral dress?”

The Higher View

Joanne and I have had a long and wonderful marriage. Ask anyone. But, throughout that awful morning, I had to deal with a higher standard of measurement—one that didn’t come from our family, friends, or culture.

As the tour finally came to an end, ancient words from Job became my own: “I had only heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes. I take back everything I said...”[1]

It all came down to one of the great human mysteries. Why do we not see people as they really are until they draw near death? How can our view of loved ones dare to withhold blessing until … what? Why is the jury always out, even for those great treasures, like our spouses and children, whom God deposited in our lives?

Apparently, we need new eyes.

On April 2, 2008, Joanne’s surgeon removed a softball-sized mass. He said it was the largest non-cancerous tumor he had ever seen. Our long journey was over. We had passed through the valley of the shadow of death, that cold midnight ride of low-hanging branches and eerie shrieks from the forest.

We came out of it with Joanne’s good health and a larger future. But I came out of it with more than that. A severe mercy gave me the gift of seeing my wife—and myself—with new eyes.

[1] Job 42:5-6 taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW LIVING TRANSLATION, Copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

One of the greatest lines in history—six one-syllable words—comes from the old hymn, Amazing Grace: “Twas blind, but now I see.” That so often inscribes the summation of an act, a relationship, a failure, even a reach for the good.

On October 30, 2007, a doctor dropped a diagnosis of cancer on Joanne, my wife. Over the following five months, we lived in a shadowland of sirens screaming through the night, conflicting reports, confusing options, and continuous testing. Her doctor grew increasingly pessimistic. In his darkest pronouncement, he suggested it may be time for “palliative care.”

In the early morning hours of March 6, 2008, I thought Joanne was dying. After a hard night, including another trip to the ER, and her increasingly gray pallor, the swirling dark waters pulled me under. The searing numbness of imminent loss broke something inside. It surely seemed like The End.

The Terrible Tour

Then, throughout the pre-dawn darkness, God ignored my emotions as He pulled me through our house in a guided tour of my royal Edness. We stopped at several “scenic overviews” so He could point out the severity of my blindness.

The first stop took me to her office, where I stared at the large cork board of her pen pal photos. Forty women Joanne wrote to, prayed for, and encouraged in phone calls. I had never understood her “wasted time” on people she didn’t really know. But in that moment, I faced my visual impairment about her. I felt shame as I saw the pure heart that compelled her to reach out to hurting people.

As the tour continued, I saw the box of neatly organized sheets of stickers on her desk. Joanne had long carried a giggling joy for brightly colored little adhesive stickers—cats and candy canes, flowers and frogs, bicycles and butterflies. She splashed them bountifully across letters, greeting cards, calendars, and scrapbooks.

I saw the money she spent for the stickers. But standing there, I could only see the small spirit that turned such delightful colors of Joanne into a problem.

The next scenic overview was our closet, where my fingers brushed the silks, cottons, leathers, and linens which adorned this fine lady. My throat burned as her fragrance rose from the fabrics. I was ashamed to remember how I had questioned the money she spent on clothes. A question passed before my eyes: “What can you afford for her funeral dress?”

The Higher View

Joanne and I have had a long and wonderful marriage. Ask anyone. But, throughout that awful morning, I had to deal with a higher standard of measurement—one that didn’t come from our family, friends, or culture.

As the tour finally came to an end, ancient words from Job became my own: “I had only heard about you before, but now I have seen you with my own eyes. I take back everything I said...”[1]

It all came down to one of the great human mysteries. Why do we not see people as they really are until they draw near death? How can our view of loved ones dare to withhold blessing until … what? Why is the jury always out, even for those great treasures, like our spouses and children, whom God deposited in our lives?

Apparently, we need new eyes.

On April 2, 2008, Joanne’s surgeon removed a softball-sized mass. He said it was the largest non-cancerous tumor he had ever seen. Our long journey was over. We had passed through the valley of the shadow of death, that cold midnight ride of low-hanging branches and eerie shrieks from the forest.

We came out of it with Joanne’s good health and a larger future. But I came out of it with more than that. A severe mercy gave me the gift of seeing my wife—and myself—with new eyes.

[1] Job 42:5-6 taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW LIVING TRANSLATION, Copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Conversation between father and son:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY35eXTKVLY

Conversation between father and son:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY35eXTKVLY

By: John Sommers

Narrated by: Kara Lea Kennedy

By: John Sommers

Narrated by: Kara Lea Kennedy

Book Review

Step away into a book that captures grand adventure in another world. More than that, catch sight of the reality of what action does for and within us.

You can find the book at Trapper’s website store or on Amazon.

Why are we placed on earth? How do we pay the rent on our planet space? Have we been called...to a purpose, a plan, a person, a people? Let's talk.

The Gift of Sabbath

Father Ron Rohlheiser reminds us of the life-essential practice of Sabbath. This post could save your life.

https://ronrolheiser.com/en/

Book Review

Step away into a book that captures grand adventure in another world. More than that, catch sight of the reality of what action does for and within us.

You can find the book at Trapper’s website store or on Amazon.

Why are we placed on earth? How do we pay the rent on our planet space? Have we been called...to a purpose, a plan, a person, a people? Let's talk.

The Gift of Sabbath

Father Ron Rohlheiser reminds us of the life-essential practice of Sabbath. This post could save your life.

https://ronrolheiser.com/en/