December 6/Second Tuesday of Advent If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them goes astray, will he not leave the ninety-nine in the hills and go in search of the stray? ~ Matt 18.12 In The Shepherd’s Life, his account of sheep-farming in England’s Lake District, the author James Rebanks describes a spring morning when a lamb…
Keeping Advent 9: Look Here!
December 5/Second Monday of Advent Make strong the weak hands, and the stumbling knees make firm.Say to the anxious of heart, “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God.” ~ Isa 35.3-4 There are plenty of reasons to feel anxious, these days. COVID continues to hang around like an unwanted guest. Inflation bedevils the economy. In our country, political…
Keeping Advent 8: Coattails
December 4/Second Sunday of Advent [John the Baptist said to the Pharisees and Sadducees,] “Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’” ~ Matt 3.8-9 It’s one thing to take a certain amount of pride in one’s family history (skeletons and all), and even in the…
Keeping Advent 6: Location, Location, Location
December 2/First Friday of Advent One thing I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after:to live in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to inquire in his temple. ~ Psalm 27.4 Location, Location, Location Years ago, when I was working in the off-Broadway theater in New…
Keeping Advent 5: Demolition by Neglect
December 1/First Thursday of Advent The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house. And it fell – and great was its fall! ~ Matt 7.27 Failure to build on a strong foundation is inevitably a pathway to collapse, whether one is constructing a house or a faith life. The obvious and salutary…
Keeping Advent 4: Only Connect
November 30/First Wednesday of AdventFeast of Saint Andrew He said to them, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” At once they left their nets and followed him. ~ Matt 4.19-20 Andrew, whose feast day we celebrate on this last day of November, is what we might anachronistically call a “team player.” He is a true…
Keeping Advent 2: He’s Got the Power
November 28/First Monday of Advent “Lord, . . . only speak the word, and my servant will be healed.” ~ Matt 8.8 Being faithful, being accountable, being committed – these modes of being seem to have fallen out of fashion in large segments of our troubled world. The idea that there is a power greater than we are, a truth…
Keeping Advent 1: The Readiness Is All
November 27/First Sunday of Advent Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.~ Matt 24.44 Each summer, as the waters begin to warm and swirl off the coast of Africa and head west towards the Eastern seaboard of the U.S., my husband and I go through the hurricane checklist. Canned food,…
Song 40: A Gracious Plenty
April 16/Holy SaturdayEaster Vigil You make springs gush forth in the valleys; they flow between the hills, By the streams the birds of the air have their habitation; they sing among the branches. From your lofty abode you water the mountains; the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work. LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have…
Song 39: Broken
April 15/Good Friday I am forgotten like the unremembered dead; I am like a dish that is broken. ~ Ps 31.12-13 I’ve always been enchanted by mosaics. The process of taking irregular and broken pieces of colored stone, glass or ceramic and out of them creating a pattern, a portrait, or a picture seems almost miraculous to me. The interplay…