2010.11.08 Monday Morning!

Greetings and best wishes to each of you, our extended family. 

Thanks for visiting us "off site/on line".


Perhaps another birthday, fast approaching, has caused me to think about aging. Aging is an undefineable thing. Despite the date on your birth certificates, I know some people who were never really young, and others who never seem to be old. Where does the spirit of youth come from?

I think that spirit comes from "interests". People who have little or no interest in things outside their job are likely to become bored. Boredom is a major cause for a feeling of emptiness. What keeps a person really alive is interest.

Interests differ from person to person. We need not grow old in God's world of wonder, and in the world of human relationships.

Learn to be interested and stay young in spirit!

Cheers,
Richard

A PEARL OF VALUE:

To live all the days of our life

is to live fully with our whole being,

with heart and mind and spirit.  It means

"to act justly, to love kindness and to

walk humbly with God."

(Micah 6:8)

Monday Morning - Dr. Martin Luther King

Top of the morning from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church in Vinita, Oklahoma.

While trying to keep warm in our January frigid weather, I've come up with a question for you: Do you read your Bible? If you do, good for you, but know that you are in the vast minority.

One reason the Bible is left unread, on a shelf gathering dust, is that the "one story line" is not arranged in chronological order. Thankfully, biblical scholars have traced that "one story", which I call "The Golden Thread". Following that thread one finds a development of ideas which reveal the laws, rituals, doctrines and customs in terms of the generation from which they came.

The earliest Hebrews saw their obligation only to family, clan, tribe and nation. Outside those boundaries there was little, if any, obligation. Bigotry and prejudice arise when there is no wider range of concern.

The idea that God's will is the well being of all creation developed slowly, climaxing in the teachings of Jesus. Bigotry and prejudice are sinful. When tempted to make a racial slur, one ought think of a friend of another race and ask, "Would I make the same thoughtless remark to my friend, or my friend's family?"

Intelligent faith goes a long way in fulfilling the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr., a non-violent, remarkable American, whose birth we celebrate today.

Peace,

Richard

2009.04.06 Monday Morning!

Greetings and best wishes from Pilgrim Presbyterian Church, located in the heart of Vinita, Oklahoma!

This is Monday of Holy Week, the most significant week of our Christian calendar. It is a week of joy (Palm Sunday), sorrow (Maundy Thursday and Good Friday) and triumph (Easter Sunday, the Resurrection of our Lord).

Life is like that: joy, sorrow, mixed feelings and triumph...bittersweet!

Our granddaughter was born in Holy Week. Our family was overjoyed; she was the first grandchild. In the midst of our joy, another family was gathered nearby in the waiting room experiencing the grief of life slipping away for their year old child.

Jesus knows the ups and downs of human feelings and emotions. Life, bittersweet as it is, beckons us to move forward into an unknown future certain that our Resurrected Lord is God with us. That is central to our year 'round Easter faith.

A blessed, Happy Easter to you and your loved ones near and far.
Richard