17 12, 2018

Baking Christmas Cookies…a post by Joy

By |2018-12-17T15:01:52-05:00December 17th, 2018|Advent, Community, Emmanuel, Fear, Future, Grace, Living in the now, Matthew 19:13-14, Now, Waiting|2 Comments

Baking and decorating cookies is a Christmas tradition that I have done with my children, my grandson, my great nieces here for Thanksgiving, and with other children throughout the years. Connecting with my own “inner child” while making cookies with the children brings a lot of delight to me. It’s wonderful that God created us with the ability to be child-like at times. It’s a way that we  can  “step into” exemplifying that part of Christ. Amazingly, God chose to send His son into the world as an infant to live and experience the life of being a child before growing

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29 05, 2018

God is with me in the shifting…a post by Joy

By |2018-05-29T17:04:44-04:00May 29th, 2018|Character, Clarity, Decisions, Fear, Future, Hebrews 13:5, Human, Humility, Listening, Prayer, Presence, Stillness, Surrender, Trust and Faith|0 Comments

In the journey of Christian Spiritual Formation, when everything is shifting on the inside of our souls, like shifting sands of the sea, there is typically shifting in our external world as well. It can either paralyze us or inspire us to move forward one step at a time. Choosing to sit still to “Be with God” is not a posture of paralysis. It is a position of honoring God, the Father; God, the Son; and God, the Holy Spirit who live within us. Yet, when we are working, serving, or playing, these are also positions of honoring His

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5 06, 2017

When the Dew Dries …a post by Jim

By |2017-06-05T15:05:39-04:00June 5th, 2017|Character, Clarity, Decisions, Future, Responsibility, Spiritual Disciplines, Suffering, Time|1 Comment

When going for a morning walk last week I notice an unusual sight on the sidewalk. There were hundreds of dead worms. Strange. I’ve seen a few on the sidewalk before but nothing like this. I wondered what caused them to die there. After a couple miles I seem to stumble on what I thought was a reasonable answer. Worms need moisture. And we haven’t had rain in a week. Instead of doing the hard work of digging their way into the sod of the lawns they seemed to be seduced by the heavy dew that was on the

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15 05, 2017

Check Your Posture…a post by Joy

By |2017-05-15T15:11:03-04:00May 15th, 2017|Discernment, Future, Letting Go, Matthew 28:20, Prayer, Presence, Solitude and Silence, Stillness, Surrender, Trust, Waiting|3 Comments

Christian Spiritual Formation is a journey that is one of posturing ourselves to be awakened to the process of coming back to the true self of who God created us to be. The posturing is sometimes difficult. It can require us to be still or it can require us to step into something new because we have been still long enough. Being still requires us to let go of distractions of work, family life, or being busy for the sake of busyness. Stepping into something new requires that we let go of what feels safe and familiar. Which ever

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3 04, 2017

Invitation to Trust…a post by Rich

By |2017-04-03T20:21:25-04:00April 3rd, 2017|Clarity, Emotions, Faith, Fear, Future, Humility, John 14:1, Listening, Living in the now, Prayer, Questions, Quotes, Trust|3 Comments

Brennan Manning in his book "Ruthless Trust" tells the following story. "When the brilliant ethicist John Kavanaugh went to work for three months at “the house of the dying” in Calcutta, he was seeking a clear answer as to how best to spend the rest of his life. On the first morning there he met Mother Teresa. She asked, “And what can I do for you?” Kavanaugh asked her to pray for him. “What do you want me to pray for?” she asked. He voiced the request that he had borne thousands of miles from the United States: “Pray

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8 02, 2017

Butterfly effect…a post by Tom

By |2017-02-08T15:29:41-05:00February 8th, 2017|Beauty, Creation, Dark Night, family systems, Future, Rest, Solitude and Silence, Trust and Faith|2 Comments

“When she transformed into a butterfly, the caterpillars spoke not of her beauty, but of her weirdness. They wanted her to change back into what she always had been. But she had wings.” —Dean Jackson God’s first revelation is nature.  In nature’s cycles of life, death, and rebirth we see the gospel in action right in front of us.  Our spiritual journey is no different, we must journey through stages of order, disorder, and reorder.  The journey of Jesus was meant to be followed and not just worshipped.   Leaning into our own order, disorder, and reorder while trusting the

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17 01, 2017

I Have a Dream…a post by Jim

By |2017-01-17T19:00:27-05:00January 17th, 2017|Community, Desire, Future, Imagination, Responsibility, Vision|0 Comments

Martin Luther King, much like Martin Luther centuries ago and the Apostle John and the Old Testament prophets of old, had a vision of a different future. They had a dream of what life might look like when the kingdom of God is more fully lived on earth. They called people to live that reality. We cannot live well without a vision, without a dream, without hope of something better. At so many levels and in so many places we see the brokenness, suffering, and sin of people on the edge of the vision. Indeed, all of us need

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30 08, 2016

Imagination and Our Spiritual Journey…a post by Rich

By |2016-08-30T14:06:21-04:00August 30th, 2016|Desire, Emotions, Future, Imagination, Prayer, Scripture Reading, Spiritual Disciplines|0 Comments

Have we lost our capacity for imagination as Christians?  Have we assigned imagination to child’s play but now of course we are adults so we set aside childish ways?  Imagination is about pretend, we all know that.  We use our imagination for fantasy. Imagination takes us into the world of the improbable and the impossible.  Adult life has to face what is real and not engage in some imaginary goose chase.  So this is how many have come to think about imagination.  Could there be more to imagination than what we imagine? Imagination is a faculty or capacity of the mind. We all use our  imagination.

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18 07, 2016

A Time for Everything…a post by Joy

By |2016-07-18T19:27:03-04:00July 18th, 2016|Creation, Emotions, Future, Imagination, Responsibility, Sacramental Perspective, Time, Trust|1 Comment

“It’s time to wind the clocks,” he said as he walked to the grandfather clock that he had built so many years ago. “That’s what I do on Sundays.” As I watched him proceed to complete this process that he does weekly, I knew that beautiful tones of the chimes would sound on the hour as I have heard it many times through the years. It made me wonder if in our journey of Christian spiritual formation, Christ says at regular rhythmic intervals, “It’s time to reset the pilgrims on their journeys according to my time. As they live

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17 05, 2016

I Desire therefore I Am…a post by Jim

By |2016-07-14T21:36:14-04:00May 17th, 2016|Beauty, Desire, Discernment, Emotions, Future, Imagination, Memory, Prayer, Questions, Responsibility, Self-Clarity, The Heart, Trust|0 Comments

“What do you want me to do for you?” This was Jesus’ question to the blind man. Why ask that question. Isn’t it obvious what the man would want? It is. But Jesus asks about his desire because he knows it is critical for us to own and name and take responsibility for our desires. We must pay attention to our desires because they tell us something VERY important in the Christian life. Desire, more than our cognition, volition, or conscience, define what we believe is true, good, and beautiful. Last week a community of devoted souls met for

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