Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love. He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In…
“Laughter doeth good like a medicine.” Prov. 17:22There is a creation story in the lore of the Apache nation which tells about how the Creator delighted in making the first humans able to do so many things. They could see, hear, talk, run, dance, and create things with their hands. But the Creator was not fully satisfied. Something seemed to be lacking in these wonderful new beings. And so, the Creator went back to the creation mount and experimented with the different possibilities.…
When I was growing up as a member of St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin (“Tosa” to those in the know), I found the Psalms to be exceptionally boring. There was so much repetition from Psalm to Psalm; the language and topics were archaic; there were no good stories, only a bunch of little verses that didn’t seem to fit together. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve found the Book of Psalms to be among the most meaningful parts of scripture. I…
Worship led by Trinity Lutheran Church, Nampa Idaho https://youtu.be/MM9JJxcZH9o Share on facebook Share on twitter
The calendar no longer says 2020. My first thought on New Year’s Day was, “breathe-it’s over.” However, in a way, as much as I hate to admit it, it’s not over. Although the clock struck midnight on January 1, 2021, the effects of 2020 linger. We are still going through a vaccine rollout, dealing with isolation, being cut off, fears of being forgotten, anger, and the aftermath of a tumultuous election cycle. The fingerprint of 2020 remains.Yet, the world spins on. Earth still…
“Like creation, humans are growing and evolving. Although we bear God’s image, we must learn to fully allow God’s presence within us to shine and to let our self-made masks fall away. Throughout our lives we have many opportunities—small deaths—to be reborn as our True Selves.” Richard Rohr “From the Bottom Up,” Daily Meditation, January 5, 2017 Tweet When I realized I was to write the devotion for Halloween I immediately remembered dressing up as a kid and pretending to be someone else,…
The world seems chaotic lately. Filled with problems that I have no solutions for. There is a lot of grief being held by our community: for lives lost, for justice denied, for the felt loss of agency and certainty, loss of income and stability, for the loss of physical gathering and fellowship. Yet we do not grieve as those without hope. So I invite you to join me in remembering the story of our hope: Before anything that humanity knows ever came to…
“But now ask the beasts to teach you,And the birds of the air to tell you;Or the reptiles on earth to instruct you,And the fish of the sea to inform you.Which of all these does not knowThat the hand of God has done this?In this hand is the soul of every living thing,And the life of all humankind.”Job 12:7-10I live in a treehouse. No, really, I do! It’s actually a third-floor apartment with a balcony overlooking a nice courtyard, but with a beautiful…
It was a morning like no other morning I’d spend for a long time. I had the opportunity to indulge one of my passions—fly fishing—on a weekday not long ago. The sun was on its way over the ridge that sat above the Salmon River just below Stanley, Idaho, in view of the majestic Sawtooth range. The aspen were quaking with the slight breeze and the colors of the wilderness were in full array. The morning was crisp with an air that levitated…
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