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Monday, July 26, 2010

Pluses and Minuses
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 54 Views :: 1 Comments :: Sister Carol Perry

The complex character of David will never be fully understood. His obvious ability to inspire loyalty and love is clear, but as a father he has fatal flaws.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Let Summer Tilt You
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 98 Views :: 0 Comments :: Nina Frost

In my last blog I wrote about the summer imperative to stop what you are doing, to pause, either voluntarily or involuntarily.

My husband and I recently paused in a special way by taking a cruise to Alaska, and both words were brand-new to us...both "cruise" and "Alaska."

A book I started on the trip is a memoir about traveling 25 years ago in rural China, and the author, a young college grad, writes about the chaos and impotence she feels upon being in a place where she can't understand a letter, much less a word of what is whirling around her. She muses about how "all power is contextual," in that confident, even cocky, Americans are reduced to pointing, jabbering, scared folk when suddenly unable to navigate life around them.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Reflecting on 10 Years
By webmaster @ 10:47 AM :: 63 Views :: 1 Comments :: Dr. Kimberleigh Jordan

This summer, my husband and I celebrated 10 years of marriage. Which really is ten (plus) years of love and growing complexity. When we got married, it was just us in a BIG apartment. Ten years later, it is us and two growing children in the same not-so-big apartment. We have grown older, our children have grown bigger, our mothers have grown more frail -- and seems like our lives have grown exponentially more complicated.

I pulled out our wedding liturgy for us to re-read on our anniversary day. In 2000, when we said our vows, I suspect that we had only had good intentions and an abstract idea of what we were actually promising.

Monday, July 19, 2010

A Clever Woman
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 83 Views :: 1 Comments :: Sister Carol Perry

This incredible young woman could be the heroine of a novel! We meet her as the wife of Nabal of Carmel, and this is how the Bible describes them: "the woman was clever and beautiful, but the man was surly and mean."

Doesn't that say a lot? David and his band of renegades have been careful to observe the desert code. They never raid the flocks of Nabal during the growing season. But when sheep shearing time comes, they follow the custom of the country
and ask for a share in the feast. It is what they have a right to expect.

Friday, July 16, 2010

Why Don't You Laugh?
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 80 Views :: 1 Comments :: Rev. Steve Pierce

Gentlemen, why don't you laugh? If I did not laugh I should die, and you need this medicine as much as I do. ~ Abraham Lincoln

Humor is perhaps life's best medicine. It has the power to heal, reduce anxieties, and even add years to one's life. Perhaps contrary to popular perception, Abraham Lincoln was a man who valued humor. According to historian Keith Jennison, the President held fast to his sense of humor even during one of those most difficult eras of American history. So valuable was laughter to Lincoln that one day he decided to open his cabinet meeting by reading excerpts from a book of humor. Perhaps others saw it as inappropriate or untimely. For not one person in the room -- save Lincoln -- laughed.

Monday, July 12, 2010

Love At First Sight
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 84 Views :: 1 Comments :: Sister Carol Perry

We will never know what her first glimpse of him was, but she must have been dazzled. Into Saul's court comes the handsome young musician, the boy with the ability to soothe Saul's fits of melancholy. David strides in on the waves of popular adulation. He has just slain Goliath!

Saul's daughter, Michal, sees him and wants him. Her father seemingly acquiesces by promising David that he can have this younger daughter in marriage if he brings a gruesome dowry. David has no money, but Saul doesn't want any. He wants the foreskins of 100 Philistines. Saul secretly hopes that in some
battle one of these warriors will dispose of this too popular youth. Undaunted, David sets about his task.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Timeless … and Timely
By webmaster @ 12:01 AM :: 147 Views :: 0 Comments :: Dr. Michael Brown

It’s hot. I left for church this morning all neat and clean, freshly showered and wearing a starched shirt. I arrived at church needing a shower, and my shirt looked like it had been wadded up and danced on. I am sure the temperature on the subway landing was about ten degrees shy of Hades.

Of course, upon arrival at the office I remembered that I had to do filming for Marble Update videos for summer. When one is on camera, and when some of those videos hit YouTube, you really want to look your best. Maybe my best is not quite George Clooney, but I still didn’t want to look like I looked. The word that comes to mind is "bedraggled."

Saturday, July 10, 2010

No Can Do: In Praise of Stopping
By webmaster @ 7:59 AM :: 267 Views :: 1 Comments :: Nina Frost

The other day I was trying to do some emails, and both Firefox, the web browser, and AOL, my email provider, posted strange and wonderful messages that I have not seen before or since.

Neither would allow me to get online, an unusual confluence, but instead of some brief and clipped techno reason, something very human appeared. I can’t remember the exact words, but both companies said, in effect:

“We are overwhelmed right now, and can’t possibly do what we are supposed to do. There is too much going on. Please try back again later.”

OK, so there is a little editorial license here, but not much. Each message was replete with the sense of hands thrown up, limits reached, and the ensuing time out: mandatory.