Random rambles

Charter is running slow so I may not bother with this for long! Facebook visiting has , in fact, reduced my time with the blog. I hope you all had a pleasant thanksgiving. Jeff Ozanne fulfilled Park Church's preaching obligation/privilege in our shared Thanksgiving eve service with the Congregational Church. We had a a pleasant house full of good food and good company for Thanksgiving Day. Later in the evening I retreated to the church to gather up my notes from the previous days meeting with Don Paxton's family. We had Don's funeral service this morning. In addition to his 1o years with the Navy and Air Force, he was with the foreign service as a power plant supervisor for the Voice of America in Liberia, Morocco, Okinawa and Washington DC. I was fascinated with his stories and will miss him. This afternoon I visited the new home of a church member family, rebuilt after a fire so we did a house blessing. Sara hosted a party of college students home on Thanksgiving break so they swarmed through the leftovers, for which I am also thankful. My brother, Randy, gets a ride back to Moorhead tomorrow and I hope, with Nicks help, to get up a few Christmas lights...oh and the Sunday sermon needs some finishing.


Life is good . Still a happy thanksgiving

on line labyrinth

There are several out there but here is one
http://www.gratefulness.org/labyrinth/index.htm

Saturday

Unlike any other day of the week, Saturday morning gets to be slower and relaxed. No one is rushing out to work or school. Just slower. I look forward to some cooking and cleaning. I have a Thai rice recipe to try that Eric Hucke made for us at the Episcopal House of Prayer. Sara is home and hungry for things she doesn't get at school. Nick will get back late tonight ( I think) from the Augustana College Band Festival in Sioux Falls and Beth gets back around 10 pm from Rochester New York where she was the key note presenter at a conference. I will see a couple people in the hospital later today. But the sermon is done and the day is looking good. Maybe I will take a walk, do a load of laundry, and read, and spend some time in silent prayer!

......a thought for the day
”The real work of planet-saving will be small, humble, and humbling, and (insofar as it involves love) pleasing and rewarding,” writes poet and essayist Wendell Berry. “Its jobs will be too many to count, too many to report, too many to be publicly noticed or rewarded, too small to make anyone rich or famous.”

Rambling on

sacrament of waiting

By Macrina Wiederkehr

Slowly
she celebrated the sacrament of letting go.
First she surrendered her green,
then the orange, yellow, and red
finally she let go of her brown.
Shedding her last leaf
she stood empty and silent,
stripped bare.
Leaning against the winter sky
she began her vigil of trust.
Shedding her last leaf
she watched its journey to the ground.
She stood in silence
wearing the color of emptiness,
her branches wondering;
How do you give shade with so much gone?
And then,
the sacrament of waiting began.
The sunrise and sunset watched with tenderness.
Clothing her with silhouettes
they kept her hope alive.
They helped her understand that
her vulnerability,
her dependence and need,
her emptiness,
her readiness to receive
were giving her a new kind of beauty.
Every morning and every evening they stood in silence
and celebrated together
the sacrament of waiting.

Source: unknown From inward/outward

A prayer

A Prayer for a New President and a New America
by Shane Claiborne 11-07-2008

God of Abraham, Miriam, Hannah, Rizpah, and David…God of Elijah, Amos, Ruth, Isaiah, Deborah…
God of Mary, John the Baptizer, Peter, Paul, Philemon and Onesimus…
God of Anthony, Ambrose, Dirk Willems, Teresa of Avila, and Francis ofAssisi,
God of Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa, WilliamWilberforce, and Oscar Romero
and God of love, grace, and hope…
Thank you for creating a perfect world.
Forgive us for the mess we have made of it
.Thank you for creating Jubilee, gleaning, and Sabbath as patterns to
ensure that the poor are cared for,
the earth rests, and inequality isdismantled
.Forgive us for choosing the patterns of empire.
Thank you for using the weak things to shame the strong and thefoolish things to confound the wise.
Protect us from becoming too strong or too wise.
Protect us from ourselves.
Forgive us…for the groaning of creationfor the millions who die of hunger and curable diseases
for warehousing people in prisons and using them for labor
for the scandal of billions wasted in war
for worrying about tomorrow and storing up more than this day our
daily bread
for an economy that mirrors the seven deadly sins
for our Caesars and our Herodsfor the violence and greed in our own hearts
Save us from ourselves.
Deliver us…from the arrogance of power
from the myth of redemptive violence
from the tyranny of greed
from the ugliness of racism
from false hope and counterfeit change
from the cancer of hatred
from the seduction of wealth
from the idolatry of nationalism
from the paralysis of cynicism
from the ghettoes of poverty
from the ghettoes of wealth
from the blood-stained pages of history
and from the legacy of slavery.
Deliver us oh God.
Give us the courage…to bless the poor in a world that blesses the middle class.
to bless the meek in a world that admires aggression.
to bless the hungry in a world that feeds the already fed.
to bless the merciful in a world that shows no mercy on evildoers.
to bless the pure in heart in a world of clutter and noise.
to bless the peacemakers in a world that baptizes bombs.

Give us imagination…that we might not conform to the patterns of this world.
that we might shatter indifference and interrupt injustice with grace
that we might choose the cross over the sword
that we might be as shrewd as serpents and as innocent as doves
that we might consider the lillies and sparrows as they shame WallStreet’s splendor
that we might choose the dream of God over the dreams of nations
that we might cling to the God that so loved the world, not just America
that we might allow our Jesus to change America rather than America to
change our Jesus.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

from Gods Politics and http://www.sojo.net/blog/godspolitics/?p=3639

Happy 21st Anniversary

A prayer for today

GOD, HELP US TO BE OPEN to new ideas, daring to err on the side of idealism rather than settling for entanglement in the practicalities of expedience. Forgive our idolatry in insisting on our particular way as the only way. Whatever our differences, help us to express them with charity, from a perspective always tilted toward the needy. Amen.
- W. Paul JonesAn Eclectic Almanac for the Faithful
From p. 101 of An Eclectic Almanac for the Faithful by W. Paul Jones. Copyright © 2006 by the author

from Today's Upper Room web site