Mark 1:4-11 I came across my dad’s old compass a few weeks back. It was in a plastic bag nestled in a trunk which holds pretty much all the stuff of his that we have held on to. The trunk has been in a closet at my mother’s home and it was only as we were emptying …
Mark 13:24-37 It is late November. Every year at this time it is a challenge to get the leaves raked and bagged or pushed to the curb before the city’s December 1st deadline for removing them. One year I simply waited too long and was left with a dozen bags of leaves still sitting at …
Mark 13:1-8 A couple of weeks ago we were gathering in the classroom where we come together for Confirmation each Wednesday. Some were done with the service project earlier than others so Jim, one of our adult leaders, volunteered to wait with a handful of young people who were the first to return. I walked …
Mark 12:38-44 I spent an hour last week sitting at the foot of the bed of one of our own. Frieda was then in her last days, having lived 94 years. She was surrounded that afternoon by two sons, a grand-daughter, two great-grand-daughters, and an old friend. Not to mention the occasional ‘accidental’ visitors who …
Mark 10:35-45 “So Jesus called them and said to them, ‘You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant,and whoever wishes …
Mark 10:17-31 I am remembering today a conversation I had with my dad a long time ago. I was probably in college — home working for the summer. We were out in the garden late on a summer afternoon where he could have been leaning on a pitchfork digging up potatoes or loading tomatoes or squash …
Mark 10:2-16 Before I begin, let me say I write these words with humble heart today, asking forgiveness, if needed, of those who know more of what I attempt to speak than I can possibly begin to comprehend. Even so, I am diving in here, with a certain sense that this is tender ground we walk …
Mark 9:38-50 I was called upon to officiate at a funeral last Saturday. I didn’t know the one who had died, as he was not a member of the congregation I am now serving and apparently his connection to his own congregation had waned since his wife’s death and his deteriorating health made it impossible …
Mark 9:30-37 I pulled into the parking lot at the community center at a little after 5 a.m. last Monday morning for the beginning of a new session of my weight training/conditioning class. It struck me that there were fewer spots available than usual but I didn’t think much about it until I climbed the …
Mark 8:27-38 I don’t have a story this week. What I share now is a moment, a memory, a light-bulb turning on realization I’ve never forgotten and that continues to inform my every day. It was more than 15 years ago that I found myself caught up short. We were then still keeping vigil …