All in DivineDialogues
A Woman's Work
The Gospel this week gives me a picture of returning from a long day at the office only to be greeted with more work to do. …and this work is either going to drain you or replenish you - and it all hangs on these questions: Who are you working for? In whose strength do you serve? From what reservoir are you giving / pouring out?
You’ll live
“Ah, you’ll live”…it’s like our family’s mantra to get up and keep going — to keep pushing…to never give up hope. They can have that attitude because they’ve lived it. We’ve lived it.
Terms of Condition: Question, Ask, Seek (part 1)
All these thousands of years later, one of the proofs WE use to support believing in these stories of Jesus of Nazareth as Son of God is that ALL his early supporters WENT and also DIED for the message.
Their willingness to die for the Resurrection is one of the proofs we use for it being a reliable fact.
So, I will not fault Thomas for wanting to be certain.
Seeking and Finding: the tale of grief and resurrection
I love that our Savior is someone who sees our broken heart and COMES TO US. He doesn’t watch us weeping and walk away – to follow up with his buddies. No, he comes to Mary. He heals her. She encounters the Living God, the Resurrection – and her heart is healed. She is transformed powerfully through the encounter with the God who loves us – again. This time, she is sent out. Her first transformation led her to follow Jesus and never leave his side. Now, He sends her out – fully transformed, fully equipped with a message.
Resistance
That’s what I felt in my heart as it sank…realizing this week is prep for the Passion.
I didn’t want to go through all that again, Lord. Please. Not now. I’m barely keeping it all together —I have so much to do — not this, too. …not this, too.
Shaken: Palm Sunday
Even at the moment of triumphal entry, I think Jesus looks out at the crowds and prays for us, saying, “Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.”
Dan's Advice for living in unprecedented times
For me, I sensed that God wants me to think about this related to how I work and how I interact with my students. They don’t need me to recede into myself. They don’t need me to disappear. They don’t need me to come up with a thousand new ways of doing things. They also don’t need me to KNOW ALL THE THINGS - which sometimes I think they do, and that is my greatest source of insecurity as an advisor or teacher when I feel like I’m letting them down because I’m not ‘all the things’ for them…. However, they do need ME.
The real Lenten fast
The point of Lenten fasts is to move us beyond ourselves. While “none of us expected to give up this much for Lent,” if we only focus on what we’ve given up - we have missed the point. If I only focus on doing better for me, then I have missed God in this lesson.
Callings: to become and to do
What stands out to me the most is that John didn’t know everything at the beginning of his ministry or his calling. If John the Baptist had to be faithful with little, so that he could be entrusted with much – how much more is this the pattern for all of us?
Reeds & Wicks
I love these two examples because they show how gentle God is with His people and those He calls into service (which is all of us). He does not quench the wick smoldering - barely putting forth a flame. He sends his minister to tend it - to call forth life and usefulness.
Wedding Dreams, Dances - and the magic in Round 2
Balancing your love for your deceased spouse…with the new love…these are hard things to do, you guys. …because either way, feels a little like betrayal. Like you’re leaving behind your first love to embrace the second.