Archive for the ‘just a word…’ Category
chomp
“I promise you one thing. A lot of good will come out of this. You have never seen any player in the entire country play as hard as I will play the rest of the season. And you will never see someone push the rest of the team as hard as I will push everybody the rest of the season. And you will never see a team play harder than we will the rest of the season…”
~ Florida Gator Quarterback Tim Tebow, after loss to Ole Miss on 9.27.08
Finish well, GATORS!
No Commentsto be good
I found several articles today at Google News saying most people aren’t making New Years’ resolutions for 2009. I’m not sure how the media knows what 300 million people are planning for next year, but I can concur that I, too, am not making a resolution this year.
I’ve never really made resolutions, but the difference this year is that I don’t feel guilty about my resolution-less entry into 2009. In fact, I didn’t give one single thought to a resolution until I skimmed aforementioned Google News.
What I did decide was this: Rather than resolve to do anything, I’m going to be about listening this year. Specifically, listening to the voice that calls me Beloved. Because simply receiving my name, my deepest identity, and knowing the One who sings it over me, is far better than any of my meager, grasping, halting, nagging, and selfish intentions to be good.
2 Commentsadvent: holy night
…the Sunrise from on high has visited us, to shine upon we who sit in darkness & the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of wholeness & shalom.
~ Gospel of Luke, Chapter 1
By His example, He inspired us – even commissioned us – to love one another. After all, His law is love and He displayed that by bringing us the gift of wholeness, healing and health (in other words shalom – the fullness of peace).
He also breaks every chain and comes to destroy all our oppression as well as the bondage of our brothers and sisters in every corner of the earth. In fact, the mention of His very name annihilates injustice and invites freedom.
I don’t know about you, but this makes me want to raise my voice and sing a song of gratefulness and thanksgiving. I’ve seen this breaking of chains, this shalom, this love that He brings – and it makes every part of my being respond by ascribing worth to His Divine Name.
Does it make you want to fall down on your knees? Can you hear the angels’ celestial aria? Some distant strain from ancient places? Just at the thought of that sacred night, that blessed and peculiar night, when Christ was born? Can you believe that in all the grime of a stable and a little town called Bethlehem, it was a glorious night? A holy night?
May mercy & grace, peace & love from the very heart of God be multiplied to you this Christmas. And always.
*Inspired by O Holy Night.
No Commentsragamuffin nativity
Jason was taking artsy pictures of our nativity scene a couple days ago as we enjoyed a leisurely Advent morning.
“Look at this one,” he said, holding up the camera’s preview window. “I’m calling it, ‘Wiseman With a Missing Hand.’”
We laughed at the stub on the wooden figure and my smile lingered as I remembered how his hand had recently been broken off. Visions of my brother dancing around the living room, mimicking the dancers in the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, came to mind. And, with one hilarious flourish of my brother’s left arm, the wiseman bringing myrrh was without a right hand.
It’s funny. Every year I’ve had this nativity set, some small piece has broken. Part of Joseph’s staff. The angel’s ‘Hallelujah’ banner. Mary’s foot. I smiled as I thought of the lost pieces and how they fractured; I smiled as I walked away from the ragamuffin nativity pieces.
The memories of the breaking better by far than any pristine presentation.
No Commentsadvent: four
This, said Joseph to himself, is the one of whom the angel spoke. He dropped to his knees beside the manger. This was the messiah.
~ Jim Bishop, “The Holy Birth”
How humbling for Joseph to kneel before the manger of this son Mary had just birthed, a son he had no part of.
How curious that Joseph should call his earthly son King, Holy, Messiah; to know Jesus from the moment of His birth and know Him as the Son of God.
How liberating for Joseph, aware for the first time as he peered over the well-worn feeding trough, that he was beholding the One who would forgive his sin and redeem his soul.
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