Thanks Giving

One great thanks we can all give is to be thanks giving. There is a special place in our hearts for children that give us their thanks for all we have done for them.  As we sat in houses warmed by vast amounts of inexpensive energy, cooking foods harvested worldwide, with family who are free let us not forget that thanks is an act that you give.  What “thanks giving” will you offer God for His abundant goodness to all of us on planet earth, our good home?

1968, Earth rise, Apollo 8

Runty Culls In Ivory Towers Built With Virgin Timber

“So spread your covering over your maid, for you are a close relative.” 

Ruth 3:9

Yesterday we walked in one of the few remaining virgin forest in the United States.  The mountains were quiet as we hiked among these towering oaks and poplars, their massive trunks drove deep into the forest floor, their bare winter canopies spread over the forest like great ancients.  As I watched Ferguson MO go up in flames last night I wondered where are the great ancients of this culture?  Citizens whose roots are deep in the community and whose wise arms spread out to cover and protect it.  We have long since cut down the ancients and replaced them with runty culls who will stay in Ferguson only until the fires are put out and then return to their ivory places built with virgin timber.   

Quilts, Covers and Lovers

We are in the Smokey Mountains.  There is a hard blow on this morning as if the mountains are determined to shake off all the summers dead and bear up for winter.  It continues to bowl down the mountains roaring cold like the soul of a rejected lover.  I first heard it as I lay deep in a hotel bed next to Betty.  I was thankful I was not rejected but safely boarded up with quilts, covers and lovers. 

Consequences Are Free of Charge

Absolute freedom is absolute responsibility.  “No simple deed is ever performed, such as a preparing a meal, reading a paragraph, or writing a letter, without ignoring a thousand allurements.  Attention shuts out literally hundreds of distracting sights and sounds, forbids hundreds of inward promptings that would divert us from the task at hand.”  Robert R. Wicks

We are free to choose but we are not free to choose the consequences of our choices.

                                    Happy that I can

Be crossed and thwarted as a man,

Not left in God’s contempt apart,

With ghastly smooth life, dead at heart,

Tame in earth’s paddock as her prize.

         Browning,  “Easter-Day”

What Are Your Sincere Acts?

The act of making art is a sincere act in life.  Often our days are filled from one existent act to another all the while time is sweeping life away.  We should all strive to make as much of life with the time we are granted.  Making art is one method, loving, serving and helping are others.  When we are young most art making is a self righteous act but if we preserver and our hearts desire is to know God then He manages to mold our art making into sincere acts of loving Him.  What are your sincere acts?

Part of my piece, "Reliquary To The Word Fly"
clay made with Holy Water, wood, india ink, bird, 24k gold

The Loser Wins or See You At The Back of the Pack

“…let us run with endurance the race that lies before us,”  Hebrews 12:1

The Christian walk (race) is a great paradox.  We are called to be the fastest person in the race so as to win and to win the race we must come in last.  There are several reasons for this paradox.  One of the great roles of a Christian is to continually run ahead to make the path straight, to lower the mountains and raise the valleys so that those who come behind will have an easier path to Christ (Isaiah 40:3-5).  We also continually run back to those slower in the race to run beside them, to encourage them and to let them know what lies ahead on the path we have already trodden and helped to clear.   

 At times God’s love for us is “sweeter than the day before.”