Song of Grace and Hope

No Cover

2012-01-09T09:05:00.000-08:00

The announcement in the paper said, “No cover,” for the Live Poets Society meeting. Where does that strange phrase come from? Of course it means no charge to get into the event. Then again, who pays to hear poets read their work, except perhaps other poets?

I have been thinking today about the phrase, “No cover,” in relation to my poetry. I think it might work as the title for the poem I’ve been contemplating about the upcoming medical mission trip to Nicaragua. Poets at their best write with no cover—like those faithful members of the Live Poets Society, who lay their hearts out for all to see at our monthly meetings. I will be going to Nicaragua with no cover, as a poet, to a land which, like Ireland, reveres poets as national treasures.

For the trip to Nicaragua I will leave behind my normal cover and go into a place well beyond my comfort zone—no iPhone; no jewelry, not even my wedding rings and my grandmother’s engagement ring and tiny gold cross; no makeup (not that I wear much these days!); no blue jeans, but scrubs like nurses wear; no familiar food and drink, but gallo pinto (aka rice and red beans) three meals a day; no familiar surroundings and people, only strangers who speak Spanish, which I am expected to help translate.

If I can capture in a poem the sense that I am about to step into another universe, stripped of my usual cover, perhaps I can also capture why I go on these trips that are so far out of my norm. It is because on each prior mission trip, I have met Christ in a different incarnation. Stepping outside my comfort zone with no cover was the basic requirement for those experiences.

Grace and Peace,

Donna Sue

Gratitude

2012-01-01T13:42:00.000-08:00

I meet weekly in the early morning with a small group of writers at a local Starbucks, where we write briefly from word prompts and then share what we have written with each other. Last week, as we approached the end of 2011, we wrote on the topic of gratitude. I wrote mostly about my gratitude for my family and the blessing of being able to see them often. But as my mind has been preoccupied with the upcoming medical mission trip to Nicaragua, I also wrote about my gratitude for those things I most often take too much for granted—a roof over my head, food to eat and access to good medical care. What I neglected to include in my reflection on gratitude was thanksgiving for clean, safe, water that flows from the tap each time I turn it on. Janice, the leader of our medical mission adventure, has been going to Nicaragua on such trips for 15 years now, and she was excited to learn that the place we will be staying has running water with flush toilets and showers. She said on previous trips she has bathed out of a bucket, so this will be luxurious. Nonetheless, she had to make special arrangements for water that will be safe for us to drink. I have found that to be one of the ongoing challenges on prior mission trips. I have to remember not to take a drink from the tap and not to rinse my toothbrush at the tap. I have to remember to pack enough water for the day’s activities from the safe source that has been provided for us. It is so much easier to simply turn on the tap and have all the fresh, clean water I need. In this as in so many other ways, we are blessed in this country. Too many around the world lack access to clean water or to readily available water of any sort. We can live without many of the things we take for granted, but not without water. When I remember that, I realize again the power of Jesus’ assertion that he is living water, the blessed substance without which life is impossible.

Grace and Peace,

Donna Sue

Venison Sausage and Tough Love

2011-09-24T12:10:00.000-07:00

Moses and Zipporah joined our family several years ago now. Morning walks are a ritual, and I can expect to find two eager faces watching me eat breakfast through the door to the screened porch. When I finish and begin to lace up my walking shoes, they begin barking and running in circles with excitement. Some walks are more exciting than others. Squirrels and cats provoke frantic barking and tugs at the leashes that I have to restrain.

One morning this past week, the walk included discovery of hidden treasure. Why anyone would drop or toss a large, plastic-wrapped stick of venison sausage in the dried leaves along the side of the road where we walk is a mystery. When Moses found his treasure, I thought he had unearthed another dead squirrel and hurried to relieve him of the body before he could eat it. What I discovered instead was a fat sausage with a greasy plastic cover that made getting a grip on it impossible. I lost the tug of war and was unable to pry his jaws open to take the sausage away. Moses patiently opposed me and refused to drop the sausage.

Frustrated and in a hurry, I began walking towards home, for the first time hoping without success for a squirrel or cat alert that would prompt Moses to bark and drop the sausage. As we approached the house, I realized I could not let Moses off the leash as usual, or he would simply run away down the hill with the sausage. I feared the plastic and the sun-ripened meat would make him sick. Opening the gate, I let the dogs into the back yard as usual then walked into the screened porch and closed the door. I managed to let Zipporah off her leash with one hand. Then I turned to Moses, prepared for another tug of war.

He had dropped the sausage! I managed to grab it and pitch it over the fence, thinking that was the end of the adventure. Moses, however, planted himself by the chain link fence, growling at Zipporah each time she approached, an unusual confrontation probably prompted by the smell of the sausage just beyond the fence. Worried he might jump the chain link fence, I let myself out of the garage and searched through the dead leaves and fallen trees outside the fence, praying I would find the sausage and no snakes. When I found the chunk of meat, I learned the forbidden treasure was venison sausage, which I promptly dumped in the trash can. My hands were greasy and, dirty, and I had worked up a sweat. Tough love is also tough for the giver.

Moses was not happy with the loss of his giant treat. I regretted relieving him of his unexpected prize, but also did not want him to make himself sick. It would have been much easier to just let him have the sausage. I thought about the times I had to disappoint my sons by denying them some treasured item or experience. Then I thought about the times I had been the recipient of God’s tough love. It is no fun being on the receiving end either. I thought about the times God has gently denied some item or experience I thought was indispensable, until I gained the wisdom to understand the treasure was no prize. Tough love is one of those hard blessings that sometimes come to us in this life, love in a form that can be hard to recognize, but is love nonetheless.

Grace and Peace,

Donna Sue

Green Pastures

2011-09-14T13:23:00.000-07:00

As I opened my blog to write a new post, I realized that I wrote last about Psalm 23, which has been on my mind again for a different reason. My husband and I returned recently from our first trip to Ireland, a place that is cool and green and blessed with rain. As we drove around the countryside and watched the fat sheep in the lush grass, I thought of Psalm 23 and the Psalmist’s promise that God makes us lie down in green pastures. I found that just being there refreshed my body, tired from the 100 plus degrees of this summer in Central Texas, and my soul, weary from the sadness of the past few weeks. Simply being in such a place made the Psalm seem more real to me and reminded me of God’s love. What a blessing to have time away in a beautiful place among new friends to renew my spirit. Maggie, if you are reading this know that you are a blessing. The trip would not have been the same without you, and I am most grateful to have met you.

Grace and Peace,

Donna Sue

The Valley of the Shadow

2011-08-21T14:10:00.000-07:00

I have not written a post in almost three months. I have written elsewhere, but not here so it is past time to revive this practice. Today at church we said goodbye to a young friend, a child of our church, who is going to Northern Ireland for a year as a young adult missionary for the Presbyterian Church. She has started a blog about her adventures, and you will find her link under Erin Jezek. She said she too need to post something now that she is on her way, and I committed to updating my blog as well. We have had a bittersweet time at our church of late. Today was a sweet time of remembering this young woman's life and sending her off with our prayers and well wishes after she was commissioned for service. She is so full of life and promise and will be a blessing to those she meets there. I pray they will bless her as well.

The last few weeks have been a rough ones otherwise. A little over a month ago we lost a long time member to leukemia. Our pastor commented that there seemed to be a pall cast over the church as we waited knowing this woman would die soon. A month after her death, our pastor died. She went in for surgery and never woke up. We are still reeling from that loss. As a result of these bitter experiences, our congregation has spent too much time of late in the valley of the shadow of death. I have been thinking about that phrase from Psalm 23 as we have gathered around to support each other: "Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me." I am grateful for the words of the Psalm I memorized as a child to comfort me in this sad time. And even more grateful for the knowledge of the sure and steady presence of God with us as we have travelled through the dark shadows.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Poet power

2011-06-05T14:17:00.000-07:00

"The Elizabethans, more perceptive than later critics, feared [poets] as witches and hanged them as fomenters of treason." Ireland: a Concise History.

I ran across this quote as I was reading the history of Ireland in preparation for a fall trip to the one place in my heritage I have not yet visited. I have been chewing on the quote ever since and have written one poem in response. I do not think poets are nearly as powerful in our culture as they were in Elizabethan times in Ireland, but even here and now words have power, and those who use them courageously and well can have an impact. In my journey into the realm of poetry, I have spent many hours among poets and have come to appreciate their clear vision and honest reactions to this world in which we live. The ones I know are, for the most part, sensitive people in tune with others and the world around them in a way that can offer a fresh perspective to the rest of us if we have ears to hear and eyes to see. I am convinced the world would be a much better place if we spent less time listening to the politicians and pundits and much more time listening to poets.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Planes in the sky

2011-05-12T08:39:00.000-07:00

I experienced a surreal, heart-stopping moment as I left the local grocery store earlier this week. I heard the roar as I approached the door with my basket and looked up to catch a glimpse of a jet roaring past so low it seemed to barely miss the cars in the parking lot. As I stepped outside, I joined the knot of worried people gathered and watching the sky as two fighter jets appeared to chase each other around in circles in the kind of maneuvers I've seen before only in movies like Top Gun. As they circled around again and then vanished in the distance, the small crowd asked questions and made comments: Is it the air show? No that is over. Obama is in Austin today. The firefighters just coming into the store don't seem alarmed so it can't be local. It looks like they have missiles! Did you see if they said USA on the side? I held my breath waiting to see what would happen next, and talked with a young neighbor in the group. As nothing more happened, after a few minutes we disbursed. My stomach felt queasy as I searched the news channels on satellite radio for any alarms on the way home. When I arrived home I hurried to turn on the TV, but saw nothing on the 24/7 news and began to breathe a bit easier.

It was only later in the day after posting a comment about the experience on Facebook that I learned the event had been a farewell flyover from the air show. That knowledge would have made the whole experience less scary. I called the young neighbor to tell her, and we both talked about how nice it would have been to know that at the time. Since then I have been thinking about how much we have lost in the decade since the September 11th attacks on this country. Those attacks were of course freshly on everyone's mind with the recent assasination of Osama bin Laden in the news. Living as we do within 30 miles of Ft. Hood, the world's largest US Army base, produces a different sort of mindset. We see and hear the activity as Ft. Hood goes about its business: the boom of artillery that rattles the windows, the planes lumbering overhead, and the slow-moving, camouflaged vehicles that sometimes crowd the highways. The military is part of the air we breath.

I long for the sense of security I had growing up, and I grieve for the young people, like my grandchildren, who will never feel safe in quite the same way I did as a child. But perhaps there is a blessing hidden in the new reality, for we now know in our guts the fear that many in the world live with daily and can therefore be more attentive to their plight. As I am forced to face the fact that life is uncertain and out of our control, I am reminded in a stark way that my only true security lies in God's love. God is all I have on earth or in heaven, and all I need. It is a hard blessing to know that, but a blessing just the same.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Remembering

2011-05-03T08:38:00.000-07:00

The news that Osama bin Laden had been killed flashed me back to September 11, 2001 and the hallway leading to a seminary classroom as well as the shock we all felt at the news of the attacks that day. I can only imagine how much more painful this news has been for those who lost loved ones that day or who continue to suffer from the after effects of their efforts to help with rescue and cleanup. My heart is filled with sadness at the thought of so much grief and pain from the evil that caused it. I have no room in my heart for rejoicing at this man's death, which does nothing to erase the results of his evil. I pray his death will bring a sense of relief and closure to those who grieve and perhaps lessen the violence in this world somehow. But I am appalled at those who have danced in the streets with joy at this news. Their actions are too sharp a reminder of those across the world who also danced at the news of our tragedy here that awful day. Such jubilation only serves to stoke the flames of hatred and violence. Better to respond with prayer and a somber spirit that remembers all that has been lost.

Grace and peace,
Donna Sue

Heart song

2011-03-30T10:49:00.000-07:00

I have been wearing a heart monitor again and will be glad to turn it in at the end of the week. This is the second time the cardiologist has asked me to do this. It requires me to pay close attention to my heart rate and to push a button to record any irregularities I sense. For most of my life I did not pay much attention at all to my heart. I expected it to keep beating and it did. Now at times its steady beat has a jazz rhythm, mostly an annoyance, but the doctors want me to pay closer attention these days. I am grateful that my heart seems to be in excellent condition otherwise. I keep up the exercise routine as my contribution to its ongoing health, and I thank God each new morning when I wake up to another day. Both seem to be blessings rather than something about which I should complain. The cardiologist says some of his patients have lived well into their 80s with this type of problem, so I'm focusing on that and trying not to worry too much about the day to day changes. I have become more attuned to my heart's song, and grateful that it keeps singing. God is good and will walk with me on this journey whatever my heart's condition. I am thankful for that knowledge.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Coincidence or something else

2011-03-16T14:09:00.000-07:00

Somehow I don't think it was a coincidence that he came into the church when I was standing behind the food serving line. Tentative, but hungry enough to open the door and venture inside, he said Martha's Kitchen, the local homeless shelter a few blocks away, had sent him when he arrived there after dinner. We were serving pancakes for a choir fund raiser that Shrove Tuesday night. I hesitated for only a second before saying, "Have a plate!" Fund raising could wait. We are a church after all. When I looked up a few minutes later, I saw him sitting by himself. His faded clothes and nervous manner set him apart from the rest of the familiar, festive crowd. I left the the food service to others, grabbed a cup of coffee and went to sit across from him. In retrospect, I think the conversation may have been as important to him as the food. I learned he had been in the Navy, where he worked as a cook, serving thousands of meals on a ship. He said when he was in high school, college and the Navy, he never suspected he would end up homeless. He also told me his mom had died very recently. I discovered he knew a lot about the Bible. He talked about Abraham's demonstration of his faith when he was willing to offer up his son as a sacrifice, something we had just discussed in the Sunday school class I had been teaching on the Epistle of James. He said our country had its problems, but was better off than the ones he'd seen during his Navy time. He declined more food, saying, "I cannot eat much at a time anymore." When he rose to leave, I told him to come back, and he smiled. He offered me his hand, and on impulse, I gave him a hug. He hugged me back fiercely--the best hug I've had in some time--and in the process blessed me more than anything I had done for him. I think Jesus came to our church on Shrove Tuesday, and I almost missed his visit. I'm glad I was paying attention for once. I worry about the times I am not so attentive and miss God's presence.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Heaven Country

2011-03-11T17:25:00.000-08:00

I have been working on learning more Chinese characters using my Chinese-English Bible for morning devotions. At times I am rewarded with unique insights from a different perspective. This past week, I discovered that the characters used for the kingdom of God are the characters for heaven and country. I decided I really liked the idea of "heaven country." It sounds more accessible to me somehow, like a place I can visit from time to time rather than a more ephemeral idea I sometimes have trouble grasping. I think I visited heaven country this past week during our annual Gospel Jazz Service on the last Sunday before Lent. We had a jazz band with us again to provide lively music that had people dancing. It was a joyful time. Our pastor talked in her sermon about the origins of jazz in the African American church in worship services where slaves and their descendants were able for a time to express both their anguish and their joy in God's presence. She said that jazz had spread from the church to the world and is now returning to its roots in the church in services such as ours. Perhaps that history of gospel jazz music is why the music in this annual service regularly moves me to tears of joy. Maybe it's because I sense God's presence in the music itself. My heart is still dancing as I remember the music and the jazz version of Just a Closer Walk with Thee I got to sing with our choir. What a blessing to dance before God our creator in preparation for entering the somber season of Lent once again.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Spring in Texas

2011-02-21T14:13:00.000-08:00

When I stepped outside to feed Moses and Zipporah this morning, I discovered it was already warm. My days of walking the dogs whenever I feel like it are disappearing once again. Soon it will be too hot for such an adventure unless we go soon after breakfast. I will miss being able to walk whenever I feel like it. The air this morning was pregnant with the promise of new life. I heard a lawn mower going at a neighbor's house. Only a few have any grass at present, but I could smell the new mown grass. The mocking birds were challenging each other in the trees at one house and other birds seemed suddenly to be all around me. Soon, the trees out back will begin to leaf out again, and we will lose the view of the small lake in the distance. Each year, my husband says he plans on chopping down some of the trees that block the view in the summer, but as the windows along the back face west and the afternoon sun, I am content to have a winter view and a summer view that shades us from the worst of the Texas heat. One thing I have learned in thirty years of living here is to look for spring and savor it when it comes. Blink, and I will miss it's swift passage. All too soon the sun will be blazing each day, and I will be complaining about the 100 degree heat of the Texas summer. But for now, I am grateful for the spring breeze and the birdsong and the scent of fresh mown grass as the earth wakes from its slumber and all seems possible in the spring sunshine.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

In the company of poets

2011-02-19T12:06:00.000-08:00

I am home again and missing the music of the beautiful language I heard this weekend among the poets and other writers at an annual writers' festival I have attended for five years. It is always a blessing to be among people who see life honestly and with the wonder and innocence I so value in children. Too many of us seem to lose that ability when we become adults. But good poets see the world through different lenses. The really good ones are able to share that vision with the rest of us. I find I see God's world with fresh eyes myself after being among these good friends again, and I am enabled to return to my own writing efforts renewed and reminded of the importance of this work to which God has called me. So thanks, Anne and Alan and Brady and Chris. And Paul, who came to teach us.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Contrite and Humble

2011-02-07T07:27:00.000-08:00

I read in the book of Isaiah this morning that God, who is high and Holy, inhabits eternity and yet dwells with "those who are contrite and humble in spirit." Isaiah 57:15. The point of dwelling with the contrite and humble is to revive their hearts and spirits. I work at being contrite and try to be humble, but I'm not sure how well I do at either of those tasks most of the time. I have spent the last week in the company of pastors and other theologians, some old friends and some new ones. I am feeling generally contrite at present, for I have realized how much I have pushed God aside in the business of my life and then wondered why I was feeling burnt out and soul weary. I guess I am also feeling more humble as God has reminded me yet again that I cannot do it all myself, by myself, and more importantly that I do not have to. How often I have learned and forgotten that lesson. So I am trying once again to remind myself that I need God in daily doses to keep my soul happy and healthy and that I am not nearly as important as my frenetic activity would lead me to believe. Except to God and to those who know and love me for who I am, not for what I do. For that I am most grateful.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Nothing new under the sun

2011-01-12T14:14:00.001-08:00

I have been thinking about the book of Ecclesiastes of late and the message that there is nothing new under the sun, or more specifically, "Is there a thing of which it is said, 'See, this is new'? It has already been in the ages before us." Ecclesiastes 1:10, NRSV. I started down this thought path as my husband and I listened to old radio shows on a long trip recently on our new satellite radio system. I remembered my parents stories about listening to the radio in the days before television. Then I started thinking about the fact that online catalog sales are growing and traditional brick and mortar stores are struggling or closing. I remembered that at one time, if you needed something you ordered it through the catalog and waited until it arrived. Finally, I focused on one of the new shopping and living developments south of us, which combines businesses and residences in a convenient, small, dense area, much like cities did once upon a time. I suspect many of those involved in these new trends are not old enough to remember when these new things were the old normal. Maybe not exactly "nothing new under the sun," but certainly a return to old practices in a new form, which pretty much amounts to the same thing. There is a lot of wisdom in the ancient book of Ecclesastes.

Grace and Peace,

Donna Sue

Epiphany

2011-01-07T14:20:00.000-08:00

I spent the day of Epiphany with writer friends, beginning with an early writing group at a local Starbucks where we write responses to short prompts and then share what we have written. I suggested epiphany as a topic and it prompted some interesting results. I wrote that it had been some time since I had had the kind of epiphany that is a sudden insight. I was rewarded by a couple of epiphanies almost immediately that morning. Our second topic for the morning was piles. We laughed at each others comments. I discovered that each of us struggled to deal with the piles of information and stuff in our lives. It was a blessing to know that others also struggle with this problem, and I am not alone. Epiphany number one. I also discovered, as I listened to Bonnie, a reason I had not considered for my own struggles. She wrote that as a child she was a good little girl because that was expected by her demanding parents, but the one thing they could not control was her piles of papers and belongings, which she maintained as her own domain. Epiphany number two. I too was a good little girl with little freedom in my life and many demands, but mostly my belongings were my own to keep. It was the one place in my life where I could get away with some disorder. Strange to think I may have continued that childhood habit into adulthood. Perhaps this insight will help me tackle and reduce some of the current piles. It is time to lighten my load as I enter this new year. God's grace comes in the small blessings of insights from friends as well as in the large ones in this life.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Grace

2010-12-30T13:54:00.000-08:00

Only one more day is left in this year. I wonder what the new one will bring. I plan on being more intentional in the writing this coming year. I am glad to have a few days to slow down after the rush of the last few weeks, topped off by preaching in my home church the day after Christmas, while our new pastor was away visiting family. The week before Christmas, our church hosted three families through the Family Promise program. My husband and I usually sign up as overnight hosts, and we slept on a blow-up bed on the floor of the pastor's office again. A couple of nights later when we came to church for choir practice, we had a chance to see some of our guests again. I heard music as we left practice and went downstairs to investigate. There I found that night's hosts, the youth director and her husband, along with their daughter and two teenagers from two of the three families at the piano, playing and singing Christmas carols. One of the teenagers played her flute and the other sang like an angel. I joined in along with my husband and the choir director, who was coaxed into playing. For a time, we were no longer separated by the chasm between those who have homes and those who don't, but were one family, joined together by God's grace through the power of music.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Fast Eddy

2010-11-12T13:09:00.000-08:00

My sons would chide me for thinking and writing about death. Two posts in a row on the subject of death is unusual, but this has been that kind of a week. I learned when I made one of my regular trips to the gym that an older gentleman I often saw there had died of a heart attack. Edward, one of the trainers, told me. He described this individual, and I knew immediately who he meant. Edward said he called him "Fast Eddy." I did not know Fast Eddy well. In fact I still don't know his real name, though I did talk with him one day about his career as a railroad conductor. After that, we greeted each other regularly. The gym is that kind of a community, and his passing cast a shadow over us all this week.

Fast Eddy was one of my heroes because of his courage and tenacity. I learned the first time I saw him that he was recovering from a stroke when I listened to others greet him. He walked slowly with a cane into the gym that day and was received with warmth and encouragement. Sometime later, after an extended absence, he returned following yet another stroke, moving even more slowly. But he still continued to come and to use the weight machines. Now I know I will not see him again, and there's a tiny hole in my heart. It seems strange to grieve someone I did not know well, but it is a timely reminder of our connection with one another. None of us will ever really know how much of an impact we have on the lives of those we encounter in this life. We are each uniquely important to each other and to God.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Going Home

2010-11-06T12:51:00.000-07:00

I knew it had been some time since I last posted to this blog, but I did not realize how long it had been. Life has been good, but busy with lots of extra church work of late. Now that our new pastor has arrived, my life has slowed down a bit. I have been thinking this week about the funeral of a neighbor I attended a few days ago. It was a sad, but also a joyous occasion--the most joyful funeral I've ever experienced. Helen had moved in next door with her son and daughter-in-law a few years ago when her health deteriorated. I did not know her well, though I saw her often out walking their little dog. We rarely stopped to talk, however, as her dog did not like our two big ones. What I remember, is that she always had a sweet smile and a warm greeting each time we met. If life was getting her down, it was not apparent, even recently after her health had became so bad that she had to walk with an aide.

I learned more about Helen at the funeral, which was a celebration of her life with much laughter amid the tears. She had been a nurse for many years, and her huge extended family expressed their gratitude for her love and care. I think the story that told me the most about her, however, was the one her pastor related about a baseball game in which she participated just a couple of years ago when she was 81. She hit the ball and slid into second base and eventually scored. He said he had to stop her from climbing over the fence to retrieve a fly ball that went awry. What an amazing lady!

I do not know how much longer I will have of this life I love, but I hope that I too will be able to slide into second base and make it home at the very end. I also hope that my family and friends will remember me after I'm gone with as much love and genuine affection as I heard expressed by Helen's family and friends. Her funeral was a testament to a full life of love and service to God. I'm glad to have known Helen, and I am grateful she has made it home at last.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

God's mercies are new every morning

2010-08-16T11:42:00.000-07:00

Actually what the Bible says is, "The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." Lamentations 3:22-23. I have thought about those verses as I've used a new application or app for my i-Phone, which I originally downloaded to help me track calories when I'm away from home. I have been trying to lose a few pounds to help lower my cholesterol since I cannot tolerate the modern medicines that would do it for me. It has been a frustrating battle, but a necessary one.

When I read about apps that would help count calories, I checked them out and downloaded one that had a high user rating. Now I am hooked on this particular app. Not only does it have lots of information about food, but it also helps me track exercise. Now I can easily type in what I eat and add in exercise as I do it, which promptly adds to my calorie total for the day so that I can eat a bit more and still lose weight over the long haul. I find that a great motivator to keep moving.

What I have come to appreciate even more than the information, convenience and encouraging feedback, however, is the way the app gives me a fresh start each day. Every morning when I log in, I find that I have a clean slate. I have not yet indulged in too many calories or done too little exercise. I have the promise that today I have the opportunity to do better than yesterday. That reminded me of this verse in Lamentations with its promise that in life God gives me a fresh start and a clean slate each morning, regardless of how I did the day before. What a blessing to know my failures from yesterday are behind me. I can try to do better today. What a great gift from a loving God to keep me moving in the right direction in my life's journey.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

The God who fulfills his purpose for me

2010-07-26T08:51:00.000-07:00

I was comforted by the words of Psalm 57 this morning, especially by the idea that it is God who will fulfill his purpose for me. I don't have to do that on my own. What a blessing! Especially when a good bit of the time I'm not sure I know what God's purposes are. I did not expect to be doing what I'm doing at this stage of my life, writing and occasionally preaching and teaching. Yesterday I preached about the walls we humans build between each other, using the first line from Robert Frost's poem, Mending Wall, as a title. I think it went well, but it's always hard to know. People at our home church where I preached this time are always so gracious and encouraging. I did not study preaching in seminary. I went to learn more about ethics and hoped to use that knowledge to teach. I had an opportunity to do that for a few years, but now God seems to keep calling me back to the writing. I am trying to respond and to continue to improve my skills. I was not an English major, and it makes a difference, for all that I wrote regularly and carefully for many years of law practice. In spite of my regular doubts and insecurities, however, I have found the writing to be a blessing in my life. And I hope it occasionally blesses the lives of others.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Hello and Goodbye

2010-06-08T14:22:00.000-07:00

I remember when I was in seminary, our first grandchild was born within days of the death of another student's grandmother. Somehow life just seems to be like that. We are awaiting the imminent arrival of another grandchild and are on call to go and take care of his older brother when mom and dad head for the hospital. Yesterday, my husband's cousin called to let us know his brother, who had been battling cancer, had just died. Now my husband will be making a trip north for the service, and I will stay here. I hate to send him alone, but I do not want to be many hours away when the call comes that our new grandson is on the way. So it is a bittersweet time in our lives, saying goodbye to a good man and mourning his passing as we await the arrival of another beautiful child in our family. Sometimes life is more of a roller coaster ride than at other times, and this is one of those up and down times. I am thankful for family to care about, some people are not so blessed, and for the love that fuels both sadness at death and joy at new life. In this time as in all times, God is good.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Life Changes

2010-05-16T15:01:00.001-07:00

We voted this morning to allow our pastor to sever her relationship with our congregation. That's the way we Presbyterians do such things. I teased her husband before the service and asked what would happen if we simply voted no. But part of loving someone is being willing to let them go when that is what they need to do. The ancient Chinese were right. Crisis presents both danger and opportunity. This change in our church life is a crisis in that sense. The danger is that our church family will split apart in the crucible of the coming change. The opportunity is that we will continue to grow in new and exciting ways. I pray God will help us to take the second path. At the moment, however, I'm coping with a sense of deep sadness as Margaret has been not only a pastor, but a good friend as well, and I will miss her. Coupled with the illness I have battled for the past three weeks, it's been a difficult month. I'm hoping that my mood will improve now that I'm feeling better. I know my grief will ease with time. For now I'm trying to focus on the many blessings in my life. God is good, even in times of sadness and unwanted change.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Athe merciful

2010-04-13T12:23:00.000-07:00

I witnessed a small miracle this morning at the local U.S. Post Office substation, not a place I generally think of as miraculous. There were a couple of people ahead of me with the two clerks on duty at the counter. One woman was mailing heavy packages, probably for a business, so that understandably took awhile. Another woman was being assisted step by step in listing the contents of her two packages, popcorn, drink mix and cookies, and calculating the exact weight. She obviously needed the help. In fact when the clerk asked if she could help by taping one of the packages, after a moment the clerk gently said, "let me do that." The miracle was not in the kindness of the people who work there. I have seen them in action often, and in spite of the rudeness they sometimes encounter, they are always polite and helpful. The miracle was that no one in the growing line behind me verbally complained while we were kept waiting. I wonder if they assumed, as I did, that the women who needed help was mailing a package to a soldier overseas. If so, then it was our way of supporting our troops, and their families, by our actions. It's nice to be reminded once in awhile that ordinary people can be nice folk, even at the post office when you least expect it.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

A walk back into the valley

2010-04-06T13:34:00.001-07:00

I've been transcribing my journals from seminary with the thought of writing them up for a larger audience. So far I've only shared this with a good writer friend and our writing teacher, both of whom have been encouraging. I also thought perhaps I should continue the story after seminary to round it out, so I've been transcribing that time period today. That has been much harder as it's a darker story--at least initially. I underestimated how much the pain of that difficult time would echo through my being when I stepped back into that period of my life. I'm not at all sure that anyone else would be interested in reading what I wrote then. I certainly had no intention of sharing it with others at the time I wrote my honest and at times dismal ponderings in a journal. But perhaps just the exercise of going back through the story to see where I've been and how far I've come from that uncertain time is reason enough to slog through to the end, or more accurately the beginning of my current life. And it's good to rejoice in the knowledge that God has been faithful throughout my life, no matter my doubts and fears and anger. God is good, all the time, even when I don't necessarily recognize that goodness in my life.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Be still and know

2010-03-29T07:07:00.000-07:00

"Be still and know that I am God," the Psalmist says. That's a tall order for me most days. But last week camping in Big Bend, it was easy. The silence in the Chisos Mountains campground was like listening to God's heartbeat. I felt surrounded by the silence like a warm embrace. Here in my ordinary life, I am blessed with a good bit of silence, and I've learned I need that for my soul's health. The time in the mountains was different somehow. I found myself simply enjoying sitting and being for a time. One of my favorite seminary professors said once that "it's hard to hear God's voice in a place such as this," i.e. the world in which we live. In the Chisos Mountains it was easier. I felt God's presence all around us. I also found reading the Psalms to be a different experience, more immediate perhaps, as we lived in a tent and hiked the mountains. I think perhaps living in circumstances more like those of the psalmist made the words more powerful. This was our first visit to Big Bend out in West Texas, and we will go back. I'm trying to hold onto the silence and memory of God's presence as I reenter daily life here, for daily life is where I'm called to serve God most of the time.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Spring explosion

2010-03-11T07:16:00.000-08:00

I don't think I will ever become accustomed to the way spring simply explodes out of nowhere here in Central Texas. Somehow spring's arrival seemed more gradual in the north where I grew up. Only a couple of weeks ago, we had snow and all was grey and dreary when it melted. Then I realized that the neighbors' red bud trees were blooming, and the native plants in our yard are sporting spring green. Yesterday when I walked the dogs, it was warm, almost 80, and a hint of the summer that will be here all too soon. I have learned that spring here is fleeting so I try to soak it up while I can. Not long ago I was having trouble remembering what it felt like to be warm outside, as last August I could not remember what it felt like to walk outside and be cool. I am glad for the regularity of the seasons, which come and go no matter what else changes in my life. They are a reminder of God's faithfulness. Just like the coming of spring, I can count on God always being there, no matter the circumstances of my life. I'm grateful for that knowledge.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

God's promises are new every morning

2010-03-01T14:18:00.001-08:00

After I fetched the dogs from the vet where they stayed while we were visiting grand kids this weekend, I took them for a walk. What with the weather and the travel and too much to do, it had been several days since our last walk. As I looked around I saw lots and lots of robins feasting on the neighbors' yards as well as green shoots pushing up through the ground, a few daffodils and one tree that has burst into bloom. Even though the weather has once again become cloudy and colder, I'm content in the knowledge that spring will come once again as it has every year of my life. Somehow that reminds me of God's faithfulness and the reminder in Lamentations in the Bible that God's promises are new every morning. I like the idea that I get a new start with each new day.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Love is action, not feeling

2010-02-15T18:06:00.001-08:00

I can't remember who said love is action, not feeling, but I've come to realize the wisdom in that perspective. It's easy to say you love someone, but demonstrating that takes real effort. I thought about that this past weekend as we travelled 1200miles to help my brother celebrate his 50th birthday and to visit my husband's cousin, whose cancer has spread. The only reason we made such a trip in the midst of bad weather was because we love these people. Our presence is important to them, which made the grueling trip worth all the effort. The Bible says that God is love, and those who love are of God. I guess that is why love, like God, is powerful. That power drew us across hundreds of miles of frozen landscape to see two people who are important in our lives. I like to think they would do the same if our positions were reversed. Maybe by being there to show our love, we made God's presence real for them.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Growing Old

2010-02-07T15:09:00.001-08:00

I realized this weekend that the last two funerals I've been to have been for the brothers of friends and fellow church members. Death is starting to hit closer to home. I've been thinking about getting older a lot lately. I guess to some extent that's a good thing so I don't take any of the time left for granted. Where once we went to graduations and wedding showers and weddings and baby showers, now we are supporting the same friends at funerals. I suspect there will be more of that. It's that time of life. I trust God will see us through this time of life as God has seen us through the previous stages. How grateful I am to have my faith to fall back on. I will try not to depress my sons too much with the constant reports of illness and death. Life still produces lots of good news to celebrate as well.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Giving Thanks

2010-01-25T13:33:00.000-08:00

I was privileged to spend most of this past weekend with women from our church. We laughed a lot and shed some tears as well as we gathered around the theme of Women of God's Good Earth. Jan Seale, a gifted Texas writer and poet was our leader. I was responsible for the vespers services on Friday and Saturday evenings. As we were all weary Friday evening coming in from our busy lives, I talked about making space for God, using the book Space for God, and then engaged them in contemplative prayer, after giving each woman a candle to light. I thought with a candle in their laps they'd be less likely to fall asleep. Saturday night, I talked about gratitude to God, using another chapter from the same book, and asked them to list things they were thankful for from their time at the retreat. As I listened to them share from their hearts the things for which they were thankful and looked at their beautiful faces shining in the light from their candles, my heart was full of gratitude for the privilege of knowing them. They have blessed my life with their friendship. We closed with "Women at the Well" and "Sus Madres," two poems by Anne McCrady, another gifted Texas writer and poet. I think as long as there are women gathering together to pray and give thanks to God, there is hope for God's good earth yet.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Heart Sick

2010-01-20T06:30:00.001-08:00

I've watched the news about the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti with much sadness. I cannot imagine how I would cope if there was no water, no electricity, no food, no safe place to sleep, and no effective government to enforce security and begin to fix the problems. If I added on top of that losing those I love, I would probably not function at all. Perhaps knowing that is what has had me weeping over the pictures of people looking lost, and of the injured children especially. I think only God can begin to help anyone to recover from such a monumental disaster.

Like many of my family and friends,especially the Christians, I was appalled by Pat Robertson's comments. I don't worship a God that willfully kills people by the thousands. From all that I have read and heard on thoughtful news programs, poverty contributed immensely to the problems. And this country has had a hand in Haiti for many years, not always in a helpful way. Which leaves me to conclude that while it was God's creation that shook the island, the disaster that followed resulted in large part from human action or inaction. I pray the recovery will be helped by human action for the better. And I continue to pray for those children of God in Haiti.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Time travel

2009-12-29T18:14:00.000-08:00

With only a couple of days remaining in this year and in this decade, it is breathtaking to contemplate the changes in my life in the past ten years--mostly for the better. God alone knows what changes the coming year will bring, and I'm content to leave the unknown future in God's good hands. As for the coming decade, I may or may not be around to see it end, though with the heart problems currently under control I'm much more hopeful about that possibility than I was a year ago. In any case, I plan on giving thanks for each new day. I know that I am closer now to the end of this journey than I am to the beginning. I've been richly blessed so far, and as God is good I trust my remaining time in this life will also be blessed. I'm grateful for the distance I've travelled and for the promise of the coming new year.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Jesus loves the little children

2009-12-21T09:36:00.000-08:00

Our granddaughter became seriously ill with probable swine flu yesterday. Her brother had it a little over a week ago. I think what's scary about the disease is that it hits the young and very young the hardest, and there doesn't seem to be any rational reason why some become really sick and others don't. This bug has scared the doctors in the family, and it takes a lot to do that.

There's nothing like the serious illness of someone you love to put other problems in proper perspective. When she became so sick, the other things I was worried about became insignificant. I knew for sure that all I wanted for Christmas was for her to be healthy again. Well, that and world peace.

This morning she is much better, though pretty cranky. I'll take cranky over the feverish little girl of yesterday anytime. Thanks be to God for the prayers of our church family, for modern medicine, and for her return to health. I found great comfort yesterday when the congregation sang "Jesus Loves Me." I was reminded that Jesus loves my little granddaughter very much and would care for her no matter what happens in her life. A good reminder in this season of Christmas.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Wisdom

2009-12-18T19:29:00.001-08:00

I have been thinking about wisdom as I have worked on my latest sermon, which I will deliver the last Sunday of this year. According to my theological dictionary, wisdom is knowing what is good and true and knowing the difference between what is true and what is false. In the chapter, "Infallibility," in Kathleen Norris' book, Amazing Grace,she says, "Adult infallibility ... is a regrettable condition, a type of regression, a hardening of the arteries around the heart of ignorance." I think to avoid this kind of spiritual heart disease, we have to continue to learn and to grow in wisdom all the days of our lives. So I continue to try to teach myself Chinese characters by reading the Psalms each morning in my Chinese-English Bible and to study writing with a retired English professor at the local community center and to learn from others about life. I'm thankful to God for the ability and the opportunity to continue to learn and hopefully to grow in wisdom.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Distant Thunder

2009-12-08T12:50:00.000-08:00

When we first moved here to Central Texas, I found the sound of distant explosions frightening. Now, however, they have become familiar background noise, just the sound of artillery practice at nearby Ft. Hood. I heard them again this week, and thought how easy it has become to ignore this reminder of war and destruction. These days the two wars in which our country is involved aren't always on the front page of the morning paper or the lead stories on the news. The violence seems only to matter to those for whom it is personal, who have loved ones in harms way or have lost them to the violence of war and terrorism. In this season as I contemplate once again the birth of the Prince of Peace, I think how much this weary world needs peace. Peace is hard work. Violence often seems like a quick solution. Then we spend generations trying to fix the problems the quick fix of violence caused. Perhaps if more of us were willing to take a chance on peace the tide would turn. Perhaps I should be willing to take a step in that direction rather than waiting for others to move first. Maybe then I might be a light shining in the darkness of this world for others to see.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Giving Thanks

2009-11-27T13:00:00.001-08:00

We're in San Antonio for a family Thanksgiving celebration. At the moment all is quiet. One grandson is sleeping and the two youngest went to the zoo. Grandpa is watching football, and I'm trying to learn to navigate around my new laptop, which has a different keyboard. I like the Spanish name for Thanksgiving Day, el Dia de Accion de Gracias, the day for thanks action. Somehow that sounds like more is required than just sitting and eating, or even praying, though prayer is always a good action. The last two days I have been offering up many prayers of thanksgiving for family and friends, for health and living in peace and safety. Too many around the world lack these most basic requirements for well-being, for shalom. I'm especially thankful for being welcome in my sons' homes and for the opportunity to spend time with them, our beautiful daughters-in-law and our grandsons. To be this blessed has been worth all the struggle and occasional pain in the experience of arriving at this point in my life. I will try to give thanks each new day that God grants me on this earth.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Flashbacks

2009-11-13T12:52:00.001-08:00

It has been a year now since my dad died. This week was the first anniversary. It's hard to believe he's really been gone a year. Sometimes it seems like it was just yesterday. I've been having flashbacks of late, mostly to childhood Christmases. One morning recently I was walking the dogs and caught the scent of pine in the air, which instantly brought memories of the annual Christmas tree. More recently, I found myself frozen in the grocery store near tears as some sappy Christmas song drifted over the sound system. Grief has been such a strange experience, coming and going in waves that were initially overwhelming, but have slowly become more bearable, something like the ocean as a storm roars past first bringing enormous waves that gradually become smaller as the storm fades. Mostly I have found that the unpleasant memories have begun to fade, while the positive ones remain. Maybe that's God's way of helping me cope. I preached a sermon this past Sunday about trusting God in difficult times. Now I'm working on one on the topic of power. The world's view of power seems to generally involve force or violence. But I think the most powerful force in the universe is love. I remember my dad closed every phone call by saying, "Remember I love you." That memory has been a gift to hold close.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

The Clock Angel

2009-11-04T06:37:00.000-08:00

We were invited to a Halloween party by our oldest grand kids last weekend. We went with simple costumes. I once again dressed as the Fairy Grandmother in my long white dress with the scepter decorated with tinsel and the fuzzy halo. Of course the halo could also signify an angel, which is what the kids often assume. My husband asked me to bring him a simple costume from the grocery store if I could find one, so I brought home bright red horns surrounded with black fur on a head band. I told him it was not a comment on his personality, but the only thing available. He wore his red shirt. Some of the kids were a little frightened of the devil.

We helped set up the party, and while the 35 kids that had been invited ran around and had fun, I sat on the front porch with the big silver alarm clock, setting it off at regular intervals so the older kids and the younger kids could take turns in the jumping castle--our daughter-in-law wisely decided there would be less chance of injury that way. As the alarm didn't work on schedule, I set it off by simply turning it on, which worked fairly well. It also allowed me to vary the times, less for the little ones when they lost interest, and cutting short the time for the older ones when they became too violent in their jumping onto and into each other.

I wasn't sure anyone (besides the kids in the jumping castle) was really paying much attention to what I was doing. But, as she was leaving the party, one mother told me she had told her son he had to pay attention to the Clock Angel and leave the jumping castle when the alarm went off. So I have a new name, which I'm still thinking about. I think I like it. My mind keeps running to the scripture that says, "My times are in Your hands." I like knowing that all the days and times of my life are in God's good hands. Maybe he even has a Clock Angel to help keep track.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Blessings

2009-10-19T08:18:00.000-07:00

We had a crazy, wonderful weekend. Our three year old granddaughter and their six month old puppy came in Thursday evening. She and I watched the movie Enchanted, or half of it as she had to go to bed. We watched the rest the next day while we waited for two of her cousins to arrive. They are 22 months and 6 months old. We ate hot dogs and macaroni and cheese. The wagon got a work out as we took walks with the puppy around the big live oak tree. The mile and a half walk is too far for the little ones, but they love riding in the bright, red wagon we bought for walks. The neighbors stopped to talk or waved as they drove by our parade. What a blessing these beautiful children are in our lives. They help us see the world again with a child's innocent wonder. I'm so grateful to have lived long enough to know my children's children. I have learned to see God's blessings most clearly in the everyday, small blessings, like the opportunity to watch a princess movie with my granddaughter. God is good, all the time, and especially good to me, more so than I can ever deserve.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Acedia

2009-10-07T09:47:00.000-07:00

I've been reading Kathleen Norris' latest book, Acedia & Me. She has such a beautiful writing style and her wisdom as always shines through the pages of this book. I like that she has named what she says is a common sin in our time, that sense of apathy and detachment from all that is evil in the world, a sense that is much too strong for the meek word "sloth." It helps to know I'm not the only one who struggles regularly against this ancient demon, which regularly can convince me that what I do doesn't matter anyway, so why bother. I especially like her suggestion for combating this sin, "earnest devotion." I intend to do my best to remember this as an antidote when the weight of all that is wrong in God's good creation leaves me frozen in a state of inaction. I cannot fix all the problems of this world, but I can earnestly devote my attention to the work to which God has called me. Good news indeed.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Many hands make peace--International Day of Peace, September 21, 2009

2009-09-19T10:46:00.000-07:00

My grandmother had a saying, which I learned from my mother, her youngest daughter: Many hands make light work. I saw vivid proof of that last night as our church's youth group and their sponsors helped me bake the 300 cookies I had promised for the local Art of Peace Festival. The festival is this weekend and celebrates the International Day of Peace. The proceeds from the festival will go to the Central Texas Child Advocacy Center, which helps abused and neglected children.

Helen, the amazing artist who arranged all of this, said in January that she wanted to do something for peace as opposed to just talking about it. She decided that helping local children was a good place to start. Being Helen, she recruited artists and writers and singers and a myriad of other folks to help. Sunday evening my husband and I will go to enjoy the art and poetry and good food, including some of the 28 dozen cookies the youth helped me bake last night. I reminded them of the reasons for their hard work as we dashed around the kitchen, just as I reminded myself the night before during the hours it took me to make that much cookie dough! Sometimes making peace is as sweet as making homemade cookies.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

60 and Counting

2009-08-31T14:10:00.000-07:00

With the help of my wonderful family, I passed a milestone yesterday. I still find it hard to believe I'm now 60 years old. The celebration began on Friday and continued through the weekend so by the time Sunday rolled around I had begun to get used to the idea. I'm not sure why we humans choose to focus on such milestones, but this birthday has been a good time for me to stop and take stock of where I am and where I hope to go in the remaining time that God allows me on this earth.

I spent the weekend seeing vividly before me the many blessings of my life. Sometimes I think God allows us for a brief time to see the world through God's eyes, and this weekend was such a time for me. My sons and their wives and children spent months planning a celebration on my behalf. Their love helped heal the many wounds of this past year of my life.

I enjoyed the party immensely and especially the fact that we were able to be together for a time, a rare occurrence these days. So I watched all of their beautiful faces around the dinner table as my husband gave thanks for my life, and I gave thanks for having each of them in my life. I watched my grand kids play together with their cousins and aunts and uncles. My heart throbbed with the beauty of it all. Whatever happens in my life from now on, I will carry these wonderful memories with me. God is good and this weekend, I remembered to say so and to give thanks.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

You Raise Me Up

2009-08-02T14:31:00.000-07:00

This morning's church service took my breath away with the force of the feelings it evoked. Perhaps being tired from a day trip to Houston and back for a conference yesterday left me a bit more open and vulnerable to God's presence. The best part of the service was listening to young Wesleigh singing to us again. He still sounds like an angel, in spite of the trauma of the past year of his life. To see him and to listen to him sing once more meant being witness to a miracle. Last summer, he was in a motorcycle accident that fractured his skull and left him hovering between this world and the next for some time. Even when it became apparent that he would survive, there was no assurance that he would recover any kind of normal life or ever be able to sing again. Many prayed for his recovery for many weeks, and suddenly today, there he stood among us, whole and beautifully singing: "You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains. You raise me up to walk on stormy seas. And I am strong, when I am on your shoulders. You raise me up, to more than I can be." And God's people said, "AMEN!" This is the God I know and love--the God who, not always, but sometimes, returns one of us from death's doorstep to serve God a bit longer in this world. Thanks be to God for the chance to experience this miracle on this day.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Dream World

2009-07-16T07:15:00.001-07:00

I read somewhere that if you want to remember your dreams you simply need to remind yourself to do so as you're falling asleep. I don't know for sure if that really works, but I do know that of late I've been remembering more dreams. Mostly it's fun to contemplate the places my mind wanders while my body sleeps. The night before last I dreamed I was in the mountains at a resort where the surrounding scenery looked suspiciously like the opening scene in the movie The Sound of Music. I looked up at the mountains and realized I felt chilled, so I buttoned my sweater up around my neck. As I twirled around soaking up the cold, I commented to a woman sitting at one of the outdoor tables that it was good to feel cold after living in the heat of the Texas summer.

Then I looked up at the glaciers frozen high in the crags of the mountains and realized they were melting just like the snow used to melt in the sun when I was a little girl growing up in Kansas City. Or perhaps the water I saw raining down was tears for all that is melting and changing in a world that seems to be growing ever hotter. We're only at mid-July here in Central Texas, so August, traditionally the hottest month is still to come. It's been over 100 degrees every day for so many days that the promised high-90s for the weekend is called a cold wave. Maybe it's no wonder that I'm seeking out the cold in my sleep!

I pray God's blessing upon our children and their children and their children's children because if the scientists are right about the consequences of global warming, our descendants will need all the help God can provide. And I pray that we will find the courage and the political will to make the changes we must to alleviate our contribution to the growing warmth--before it's too late.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Heartsong

2009-07-07T08:50:00.001-07:00

I have been given a new lease on life, and the answer to a prayer I wrote in January at our church's women's conference. For the last many months I've struggled with a racing heart beat that has been at times very irregular. My doctor had increased the one heart medicine I was taking, but the problems continued. So I went to see the heart electrician. He prescribed a second medicine and told me to come back in a month. I saw him again today and told him he had given me my life back. I didn't realize how long I'd been feeling badly until the medicine fixed the problem. Now I'm back to exercising regularly and have something like my old energy and enthusiasm for daily life. I'm so grateful to God and to the doctors as well as to those who invented this magic medicine I'm now taking.

It's funny how I never spent a lot of time worrying about my heart until it started misfiring. It simply sang along to its regular beat, and I never paid any attention. Too often I'm guilty of taking the most important things in my life for granted, until something happens and I notice their absence. So I'm trying to be more thoughtful of my husband, and more grateful to God for all of my many blessings, too numerous to count. One of those is a heart that's been beating since my birth almost 60 years ago now. I'm glad it's no longer stumbling, and I hope it will continue to beat for a few more years so that I can find ways to continue to serve God.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

I've become a lovey

2009-06-30T14:03:00.000-07:00

Each of our younger grandchildren have their own unique comfort items. For our second grandson, they are tops his mother has worn so they carry her scent. I wish I'd thought of that when our sons were babies! For the two youngest grandsons they are burp cloths. For our granddaughter, it's a soft blanket with a satin edge.

We had a wonderful family celebration this past weekend when our two youngest grandchildren were baptized. Most of our family was able to come for the party, which included an Italian feast our daughter-in-law put together. It was an amazing, exhausting day. After lunch, as we sat talking, our granddaughter sat quietly in my lap. She's beginning to outgrow nap time, but she was still tired. For a long time, she has gone to sleep with her thumb in her mouth and one of her soft blankets with the satin edges snuggled close. As she dozes off she rubs the edge of the blanket with her thumb.

I realized that as she sat on my lap, she had her thumb in her mouth and was rubbing my hand with her thumb, the same way she rubs her blanket at bed time. I was at first surprised, and then overwhelmed that I had become her comfort item. I was honored that she felt that same sense of comfort with me. I've become a lovey! I can think of few things I'd rather be at this stage in my life than a lovey for one of my beautiful grandchildren.

I've been working on yet another sermon, struggling with the text in Mark that depicts Jesus being rejected by the people of his home town. The title of my sermon is "Looking for God in All the Wrong Places." I think we do that, hoping for a God who will come and punish our enemies and make us safe so that we never have to suffer. But that's not the kind of God we have. Instead we have a God who came to earth as a Jewish carpenter and who remains as close as our own heartbeat. I thought of my granddaughter as I was working on the sermon today and realized that God is a lot like her lovey, ready to be snuggled close to us whenever we reach out and to provide comfort in whatever circumstances we find ourselves.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Riding the Roller Coaster

2009-06-13T08:28:00.001-07:00

I have had a strange few days with ups and downs akin to riding a roller coaster. Tuesday I went to my appointment with the cardiology specialist who calls himself a "heart electrician." After looking through my records and talking with me, he prescribed a new heart medicine. I always take a deep breath and say a prayer before starting any new medication because I have unfortunately inherited my mother's tendency to react to many medicines. After two doses, I was ecstatic at how much better I felt. I hadn't realized how much the heart irregularities had slowed me down.

Then, yesterday morning, I had a serious allergy attack. I immediately thought of the new medicine as nothing else had changed in my life in the past few days. This attack was bad enough that I dug out my EpiPen and re-read the instructions. Fortunately I've never had to use it, but I was grateful to have it available. I called and talked with the nurse, who consulted the heart electrician and called me back. The doctor thought it unlikely that the reaction was related to the new medicine, especially since I'd already taken several doses.

So I said a prayer at supper and gingerly took another dose. My husband's prayer at supper was for me not to die. I sat up reading for some time last night with the EpiPen close by, and then I said another prayer and went to bed. My husband asked me this morning if I'd said my "Now I Lay Me's" last night, and I told him I had indeed. Sometimes the simplest prayers say it best: "Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take." So far today, I'm breathing okay. I'm so thankful to God for another day of life and for feeling so good again!

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

We are family

2009-06-01T13:08:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had a Pentecost celebration at church, including a birthday cake for this annual celebration of the birthday of the church. The children ran around the church at the beginning of the service in red, orange and yellow tunics waving wands with ribbons of the same colors attached. They were the tongues of flame that appeared in the midst of our worship. Two neighborhood young people who have been attending our church since their older brother was drawn by the basketball goal were baptized yesterday. Their home life is more challenging than that of most of the kids in our congregation, and as evidence of that their mother did not show up for the baptism. Seeing this, a young woman with kids the same age, who has worked with these two young ones in VBS and Sunday school, stepped up beside them, as did her husband. Tears welled as I witnessed this visible confirmation of the vows the congregation took at this baptism, to be family to these young people and watch over them. So now they are our kids too, baptized with water and the fire of the Holy Spirit, into the family of faith. I hope we will be able to bless them as much as they have already blessed us by their presence.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

The Farmers' Market

2009-05-27T09:14:00.000-07:00

Summer has officially arrived. The local farmers' market is now open. I went yesterday for the first time this year before braving the local grocery store. I bought a cornucopia of fruits and vegetables--sweet Texas onions, yellow squash, beets with the greens still attached, tomatoes, blackberries and peaches. God's bounty is so beautiful and so delicious! Last night I washed and chopped the greens before sauteing them and roasted the beets. Along with pot stickers (I've become a Chinese dumpling addict!), they made a great supper. Besides the wonderful, healthy eating, I find it a blessing to visit with the farmers who bring the fruits of their hard work to share. Time seems to slow down in their presence. Perhaps that's because they are used to waiting patiently for the plants to mature. Some things cannot be forced or sped up, but must wait for God's time to reach their fullness. I'm going to try to remember that in the coming days as I go about my writing work.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Poetry Patrol

2009-05-19T13:48:00.000-07:00

I latched onto Ted Kooser's phrase, "poetry patrol," in his book The Poetry Home Repair Manual. I realized that I had been on poetry patrol on our recent trip to Philadelphia. While my husband attended a conference, I walked around the city seeing the sights, some I searched out, like Galileo's telescope, and some found me, like the protest against Lockheed Martin's corporate contribution to war efforts. I came home with notes and ideas for several poems, which I now need to sit down and write.

I still have trouble making myself sit down to do the actual writing, though it's slowly becoming more of a habit. Why God has called me to the work of writing is still a mystery, but I'm trying to put one foot in front of another on this path upon which God seems to be directing me at present. I try to focus on the immediate rather than think too much about long term. After all, I have no idea how much long term I have. None of us know that for sure. My immediate problem is to find a way to describe the march of a half dozen individuals who chose to devote their time to protesting war and its profits, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they were a dozen at most heading to a confrontation with a politically well-connected mega-corporation. But then I learned as a child in Sunday school that when God is with us, our own size and strength are irrelevant. All that matters is our faithfulness.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Thin Places

2009-05-12T13:23:00.000-07:00

I have enjoyed my writing class at the local community center taught by a retired English professor with a gentle spirit and a gift for teaching. Each week he challenges us with assignments. This week one of those was to write about thin places--a Celtic concept that refers to those places where the veil between heaven and earth is thin, bringing us closer to God. I think of these as places the Holy Spirit haunts, reliably if not regularly. My favorite such place is the Presbyterian conference ground at Mo-Ranch outside Hunt, Texas. I never fail to encounter God each time I visit there.

This week, however, as I was thinking about the assignment, I discovered an unexpected thin place close to home. Last Friday our middle son, Greg, his wife and their two kids, came to visit. They took me for a picnic at Salado Creek for Mother's Day. The cool, clear creek meanders over pebbles and between tall oak and elm trees in the small tourist town of Salado, Texas. The creek has drawn visitors since Native Americans first frequented the spot. Our three sons loved to visit the creek when they were young, wading and catching all sorts of creatures they carted home. On Friday as I sat beside the creek and watched my son splash in the creek and look for tadpoles and minnows with his son, eternity stretched out before me and for a moment time stood still. I sensed God smiling upon us in that beautiful place. Perhaps one day Greg's son will take his son there as well, as life continues to spool from one generation to the next in God's endless blessing.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Pandemic Fear

2009-04-30T07:29:00.000-07:00

We were returning from a trip to Philadelphia when we saw the first alarming news of the spread of swine flu on CNN in the airport waiting room at Dallas Fort Worth Airport. Since then the news has been grim, but according to the physicians in my life also overblown and exaggerated. Fear is just as contagious as a virus at times. Fear was actually the topic of my last sermon, its difficulties and the way it can freeze us in our tracks. We live in a time of fear---fear of disease and storms and terrorism and economic collapse. The world is a scary place, but it has always been scary to be human. The important question to ask is how do you deal with that fear so that it does not consume your life?

My fear is made manageable by the family and friends who love me and care about what's going on in my life. I heard just this morning from our former Chinese teacher, who has returned to teaching in her university in China. She had seen news of the swine flu in Texas and wrote to ask if we were okay. I wrote back to assure here we are fine at the moment. I'm praying for all of those who have been affected by this disease, including those like my husband, sons and daughter-in-law who are physicians caring for those who are ill.

But mostly the way I deal with fear is by turning to God. The text I preached on the Sunday after Easter was from the Gospel of John and ended with the author's explanation that the gospel was written so that we might believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing we might have life in his name. Not constant fear, which is no way to live, but life abundant and joyful. That's a lesson I have to regularly relearn, and I have my own times of fear and grief and sadness. But I have learned to turn to God for comfort in such dark and fearful times, and I've never been disappointed or left alone when I seek God's presence at such times.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Considering the Lilies

2009-04-09T07:22:00.001-07:00

I'm slowly emerging from the fog of grief over my dad's death last fall, and I'm realizing how many things passed me by in that time of grief and family angst. I still find myself reaching for the phone to call him, and then remembering that, as my brother says, "It's LONG distance." Most recently it was because I wanted to share the news that he had another great-grandson. In this ongoing process of grief, I'm slowly finding that color and light and joy are gradually returning to my life, in the midst of days that are still unexpectedly bleak, gray and hard.

I found unexpected help a couple of days ago during my weekly trip to the local grocery store. I trudged in with my basket as usual, and there before me were the Easter lilies, scenting the air around them with their sweet smell. And Easter came upon me in that moment with all its promise, lifting the weight on my heart just a bit for good. As I always do, I brought one home with me to scent the air of our home and to remind me of God's promise of hope.

I just finished reading Rev. Dr. Scott Black Johnston's Easter sermon on Day 1.org. He is a former seminary professor, and an amazing preacher, who is now the Senior Pastor at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in New York City. One phrase in particular stuck with me, "Jesus is loose in the world." Praise God. Easter has come again. He is risen. He is risen indeed. Death doesn't have the last word after all. Jesus is loose in the world.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

The Still Small Voice

2009-04-04T12:08:00.000-07:00

I went to a court hearing this past week, something I've not done since I retired from active law practice almost ten years ago. A young man who has been attending our church was arrested and at this hearing plead guilty to burglary, a serious charge. I also know him to have a good heart as I've watched him care for his sisters and brother with wisdom and discipline beyond his years. He's not yet out of high school. I found out about the hearing by accident, and decided it was important to go. I wanted to remind him that he is still a child of God, in spite of the big mistake he made.

Actually, the still, small voice that I've learned to recognize as God speaking to me nagged me mercilessly until I made plans to go. At the hearing they brought the young man in with shackles on his feet and hands, and I was glad our pastor and another friend from church were there along with his mom and one of her friends. His attorney asked the judge to reduce his bond so he could go home while he waits for his sentencing hearing. He's not been in trouble before, so those of us who know him are hoping that he will be able to go to a children's home on probation--a second chance. We're praying for that result at the next hearing.

Who of us has not needed a second chance in our lives? The judge recognized me from my days practicing law, which I hope was a good thing. In any case, he reduced the bond so that the kid was able to go home on a strict curfew the next day. Once again I was grateful that I had listened when God nudged me, and worried about the times when I've not paid close enough attention to recognize God's nudges. Easy to do when life takes over and the daily noise crowds out God's voice, which is indeed still and small. As one of my favorite seminary professors said, "It's not easy to hear God's voice in a place such as this."

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

"Sons are a heritage from the Lord;

2009-03-28T06:27:00.000-07:00

Children are a reward from Him." Psalm 127. And I would add that grandchildren are a glimpse of heaven. Sam was born last week, and he and his mama are doing well. The rest of us are catching up on our sleep. I'm so grateful for this little boy, our fifth grandchild. What a blessing to live long enough to meet your children's children. I joke that I'm donating my brain cells to my grandchildren to explain why I don't remember things as quickly as I once did, but the truth is that they have taught me to expand my capacity for love.

When my sons were born, I learned what it was like, as someone wiser than me said, to have my heart walk around outside my body. With our grandchildren, I've learned the reality of sorrow and joy doubled. When something happens with one of these little ones, either good or bad, my heart rejoices, or hurts, for both the child and my child. Some of my friends are now having great-grandchildren, an experience I cannot imagine as our oldest grandchild is seven.

What I know for sure is that I have been richly blessed by the sons who are a heritage from God, and by the reward of knowing both them and their children.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Waiting for Sam

2009-03-12T06:32:00.000-07:00

My life is in something of a holding pattern at the moment as we await the arrival of another grandchild, Sam. He's actually not due for almost two more weeks, but as he tried to put in an early appearance the week before last, we have all been expecting him to show up at anytime. After the early warning, however, he seems to be content to lie low. I've told his mama that he appears to be a prankster. Nonetheless, my bag is packed, and I'm ready to head out at a moment's notice.

When our daughter-in-law first began having contractions, her doctor sent her home on bed rest for a few days, which thankfully stopped the process. The news sent my mind racing back in time 30 years to the 10 weeks I spent on bed rest before Sam's daddy was born. Thirty years ago, being born after only 6 1/2 months gestation was essentially a death sentence. The treatment to stop early labor was basically Benadryl, alcohol and a lot of prayer. Fortunately I was cared for by a physician at a teaching hospital, who gave me an experimental drug when things threatened to get out of hand, and it worked. With the help of our church, many friends, and God, our youngest son arrived safe and sound only a week early. I've been prompted in the last week to write the story for this son, who is now waiting for his own son to arrive, to remind him that every baby is a miracle, and that he was more of a miracle than most.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Beelzefly

2009-02-25T13:03:00.000-08:00

Today begins the sober season of Lent, but before embarking on this time of personal introspection and repentance for all the ways I fall short of what God intends my life to be, it's good to pause for just a moment to think back to last week and especially to last week's choir practice. We almost always have a lot of fun at choir practice, but last week's practice was over the top. Seemingly out of nowhere, a giant fly joined us shortly after practice started, alighting on the director's hair and refusing at first to budge. As efforts to shoo the fly away became more energetic, choir practice degenerated into a slapstick farce. Following the director as she flapped her arms alternately in time to the music followed by attempts to wave away the fly became a challenge. Some of the women on the front row began jumping up to help the director wave the fly away, making it even more difficult to stay in sync with the music. But when the fly landed on the piano keys, things really got out of hand! Responding to the cries urging her to swat the fly, the pianist swung gamely away, slipping backwards off her chair in the process. About this time, the pastor reappeared in the room with a can of insecticide and a large piece of cardboard and began chasing the fly around the room. Fumes filled the small space, but the fly finally began to slow in its gyrations. One of the tenors told us about a website where people can combine words to make new ones and of the new word "beelzebug" for an annoying insect that haunts a room. When the fly finally landed on the floor near the door, the woman next to me jumped up and, after several attempts, succeeded in squashing Beelzefly. In the midst of the cheers and hilarity that followed, the choir director was finally able to take us through the music for Sunday, which we sang with hearts made glad by holy laughter. If we are alert, we will often find God sprinkling our lives with joy, something like the fairy dust in the tales I loved as a child.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Out of Chaos, Hope

2009-02-17T12:37:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure why I thought that life would slow down a bit in the New Year. For the moment, I'm grateful for a few minutes to write. After months of planning and frustration, the mission trip from our church to the Texas Gulf coast actually came off the weekend before last. We were the first group to stay in the new Presbyterian Disaster Assistance Volunteer Village at Texas City. As it turned out our arrival was an answer to the prayers of the brand new manager, Doug MacDonald, who, with Mike Kelly, had been working to ready the place for our arrival. There was no way the two of them could have accomplished all of the tasks that needed to be done in the time they had between their arrival and ours. The bunk and shower trailers pulled in from further east along the U.S. coast needed cleaning after coming out of storage, and also needed to be hooked up to sewer, water and electricity. The pots and pans and utensils also brought out of storage needed cleaning as did the kitchen at First Presbyterian Church in Texas City, which had agreed to allow the volunteer village to set up on their grounds and use their facilities. Somehow when God is involved in the planning things come together. So we showed up with folks who knew how to do plumbing and electrical work and construction as well as one man who was able to hook up a giant industrial gas stove in the kitchen. Add to that the magical cleaning genies (my name for the amazing women who spent their time cleaning anything that didn't move out of the way), and the amount of work that was accomplished from noon Friday through Saturday afternoon was nothing short of miraculous. Doug provided us with bright blue T-Shirts that said Presbyterian Disaster Assistance on the front and on the back--Out of Chaos, Hope. We managed to bring some hope in the chaos of the village so that other volunteers coming after us can bring hope in the chaos of the destruction wrought by Hurricane Ike. It was an humbling experience to be thanked by strangers who saw our shirts in church and at dinner for offering hope for the future simply by our presence. We came home tired, but ready to make plans to return again for the important work of helping to rebuild peoples' lives in a disaster area. There is still much work to be done, and many more volunteers are needed. If you want to help, call Penny Noel in the PDA housing office at 1-866-732-6121 and make your reservation. Groups of five or more adults from any organization are welcome. You don't have to be Presbyterian to sign up. I promise you will be blessed as we were as you in turn bless others.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

In the Company of Women

2009-01-25T12:53:00.001-08:00

I had the privilege this past week of meeting for the second time with a group of women who gather to write and then to share stories from their lives. It's an eclectic group with a variety of life experiences, and both times I have met with them have been a blessings, especially the experience of learning more about these unique individuals. Of course God has created each of us as unique individuals, it's just that we don't often intentionally take the time to learn more about our sisters and brothers on this planet in such detail. This time we talked about crossroads in our lives--those times that changed the direction of our lives forever either through life circumstances or through our own actions. After listing all such crossroads we could think of in 10 minutes, we chose one to write about and to share.

Of all the many times of change in my life (and I was surprised how many I could list in such a short time), I chose to write about my decision to go to seminary. Doing so meant walking again in memory through the painful job change that led me to take a sabbatical from law practice and go to seminary to study God's word. In retrospect, I realize that God had already been calling me in that direction for some time. I learned through my own experience and those of my fellow classmates at seminary that when God calls, you might as well go quietly. Sooner or later you will likely end up there anyway, and it's less traumatic to go peacefully rather than wait to experience some of the ways God has of getting our attention. I personally know what it feels like to be run to ground by the Hound of Heaven. As a result, I've learned to pay better attention and to respond more promptly when God calls.

How richly my life has been blessed by the change I made, as painful as it was at the time. And how much I would have missed had I chosen to stubbornly stay in place rather than face the pain of loss and change. Time with these wonderful women was a good time to reflect on that hard earned wisdom and to share my story with the others. It was a time to remember that God is good and perhaps especially so in times of change.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Sanctuary

2009-01-12T13:27:00.000-08:00

I spent four days this past week in a little corner of heaven, among poets and musicians and artists, all intent on encouraging each other and sharing their art. I have come to know these people in the past three years of attending the annual UMHB Writers' Festival, which is a remarkable, intimate experience of learning from other creative people. I have had few places of true sanctuary in my life so I welcome those when I stumble upon them. The last time I felt as safe as I feel with this group of folks was during my seminary experience. In a world that too often seems intent on conquering others rather than embracing their unique gifts, it is good to spend time among those who pursue a different more cooperative agenda. So my special thanks to Audell and Helen and all those who made the conference happen, and to the poets who have encouraged me in my stumbling efforts: Chris Boldt, Angela O'Donnell, Alan Berecka and Anne McCrady among others. Their work is worth finding and enjoying as is the music of Still on the Hill, two remarkable musicians who are hard at work saving and promoting the folk music tradition I loved as a young person. They led a song-writing workshop at the conference that was delightful. My life has been blessed once again by this festival, and I have come away refreshed and ready to tackle anew this solitary task of writing to which God seems intent on calling me.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Travels at home

2009-01-04T15:20:00.000-08:00

We had the privilege of hosting a student from China during the Christmas break, and said goodbye to him yesterday afternoon as he moved on to spend the last few days of break with another family. The visit took me back to the days when our three sons were college age. He definitely lives in a different time zone. He was going to bed shortly before we got up each morning. We learned more about his country at dinner, and he was patient with our efforts to speak Chinese. We're learning the language for one of our beautiful grandsons, who is learning Chinese from his mom and other grandmother. We don't have many opportunties to practice here in Central Texas, so it was fun to try it out on Lan. I miss our conversations at dinner, and find myself thinking about this young man and how much his mother and father and grandparents must miss having him at home. Hopefully we'll get to see him again this spring, and perhaps meet some of the other Chinese students who are currently attending the university where I sometimes teach. What a blessing to get to know another child of God from the other side of the world. Shangdi bao you ni, Lan. Zai Jian!

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Beginning Again

2009-01-02T12:57:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what it is about the artificial beginning of a New Year that seems to provide a clean slate, but it is nice to think about the next twelve months and what 2009 will bring. We are expecting another grandchild this spring, so more joy is in store. I'm hopeful that this year will include fewer losses than last year, when my husband lost both his parents, and I lost my dad. I will be celebrating a milestone birthday this year and will have to give some thought to how best to do that in a way that honors God for all the blessings I have enjoyed in this good life I have been granted. I'm thinking about a trip to Zambia with a group from my seminary, but we'll have to see how things go this spring as well as how expensive the trip will be. I'm sure as the year continues, it will rapidly start to feel less like that clean slate. Fortunately I know that God's promises are new every morning, so I don't have to wait until next year to begin again--something I have no doubt I'll want to do frequently as the year progresses.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Hurting Heart

2008-12-20T14:31:00.000-08:00

The past few months have been difficult, and I'm looking forward to that artificial clean slate that comes with the New Year. I said goodbye to my latest class of students a little over a week ago, and I miss them. Several have graduated and are moving on in their life journeys. They were a bright spot in the bleakness of coping with my dad's illness and death this fall. I suppose in light of what's been going on in my life of late, it's not too surprising that my heart has been hurting. Unfortunately it's been more than emotional hurt as I've struggled again the last few months with palpitations and spells of rapid heart beats. The doctors have me on a monitor that records the problems so they can see if this is something that can be fixed. I hope so. This past week has been especially difficult, and left me contemplating my own mortality. That's probably a good thing for most of us to do from time to time. In any case, this past week after a particularly bad 24 hours, my husband and I went to dinner to celebrate with our church choir at the organist's home. As we gathered around the piano in her brightly decorated living room to sing Christmas carols, I closed my eyes and thought that if I had to die anytime soon, the memories of the beautiful music would carry my spirit heavenward. Then I thanked God for the good life I've had. My husband thinks that whatever is going on with my heart is not life threatening, and that's a good thing to know. I hope to live to see my beautiful grandkids grow up and to have a few more years to serve God here on God's good earth. As has been true from the beginning, however, my times are in God's good hands, and I'm content to rest in the peace of that knowledge.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Remember I love you

2008-12-06T05:52:00.000-08:00

It's been almost a month since my last post. My dad two days after my last entry, and the past few weeks have been surreal in many ways. I think I have delayed writing this because it means acknowledging in a concrete way that he is really gone. For all that I know that, I still find myself reaching for the phone to call and talk with him. Even knowing that for the last month or so before he died that was no longer possible. He became much weaker and demented and was unable to talk on the phone anymore. I miss our conversations about life and about God. He was fond of telling me that God laughs when we tell God our plans for the future. I am grateful he is no longer suffering, and my heart smiles as I picture him reunited with my mother, who died fifteen years ago. He missed her more every year. So I'm trying not to grieve as those who have no hope, but rather in the sure and certain hope of the resurrection. And I'm grateful that my dad ended every phone call with, "Remember I love you." Even though I can't call him any more, I can still hear his voice reminding me of his love. Remember I love you too, Daddy.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Waiting for the inevitable

2008-11-10T05:27:00.000-08:00

We won't get out of this alive--life that is. While that's true for most of us, for my dad it's become a matter of a few days or at most a week or two. I'm thankful he is now in hospice care where they are making him comfortable as he prepares to leave this life for the next. And so I'm waiting for the inevitable phone call to tell me he is gone.

In the meantime, I'm trying to stay focused on the obligations that keep me tethered here rather than at his side. And on the small joys that God keeps providing in my life to keep me going. This weekend, our youngest son and his son, our youngest grandson, came unexpectedly for a few hours. Our grandson is crawling everywhere now at the speed of greased lightning. He's also pulling up on any stationary object and occasionally letting go, so he'll be walking soon. He and I had fun playing peek-a-boo around the furniture while his dad and my husband watched football. He's such a happy, even-tempered, loving little guy. His presence eased the hurt in my heart.

So did the visit by our two oldest grand kids a few hours later. We got to keep them while their mom and and dad went to a college reunion. We played with the dogs, had mac and cheese and applesauce for supper, had a fire in the fireplace, watched Peter Pan after baths, and had a slumber party with the kids on sleeping bags in our bedroom. For a time, I forgot about everything else but the joy of being with these happy,loving little kids.

I'm also grateful for my class at the university. At first I felt guilty about having agreed to teach just a week or so before my dad was taken so ill. But as the semester has progressed and I've come to know these wonderful students, I've realized that God has provided me with yet another blessing to see me through this time. I cannot change what is happening with my dad, and he is in God's good hands in any case. Thank God for that! So I have the class to keep me busy, and the students who are a joy to teach.

God is good. All the time. Even now when life is sad, and my heart is heavy.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Angel Duty

2008-10-17T13:39:00.000-07:00

This has been one of those times in my life when I have wondered if God is paying attention to what's going on in my life. I know that God has many more important things to be paying attention to in this world. Yesterday, however, I had an experience I'll return to in the future whenever I wonder if God cares about the details in my life. I had an early morning doctor's appointment and fortunately was through in plenty of time to make it to the class I teach at the local university. As I walked up to my car in the clinic parking lot, I noticed someone striding purposefully towards me. While I was unlocking the car, this individual pulled her sweatshirt hood off her head, and I realized it was a young woman. She asked if I knew where the Texas Workforce Commission office was and if it was close. I started to describe where it was, pointing to the traffic light and telling her it was just down the hill past the light and left at the next street.

Her face fell, and I suddenly found myself asking if she wanted a ride. She said she would appreciate that, so I emptied the front seat, and we took off right about 9:30 a.m. She told me she had been walking from 25th street (a good 4 or 5 miles from where I encountered her) since the friend who was supposed to give her a ride had not shown up as promised. She also said she'd been praying the whole way that she would make it in time because they had told her if she was not there by 9:35 they would not allow her in for the appointment. I told her she could rest assured that God had answered her prayer as I'm was not in the habit of offering rides to people I didn't know. I also told her that I was sure that God had something waiting for her at the appointment.

When I pulled up to the employment office, it was 9:34. She thanked me, and I told her she had made my morning. She hurried into the building, and I said a prayer that this determined young woman would find a job. It all happened so fast, that it was only as I was driving away that I started calculating the odds of her walking up just as I was preparing to get into my car, of my being someone who knew where the employment office was located (it's in an obscure place, but close to where my office once was located), and of my being moved to offer her the ride, without which she would never have made it to the appointment on time. Only God could have coordinated such a string of split-second coincidences to both answer this young woman's prayer, and allow me the benefit of playing angel for a stranger. When I asked God about that, God just smiled and laughed, the way God often does at such moments.

Life has been sad and stressful for me of late, but now when I find myself wondering if God really cares about the details of my life, I'll remember the determined young woman, who prayed she would make her appointment at the employment office on time, and how God allowed me to be the angel who answered her prayer. And I'll rest assured that the God who knows the number of hairs on my head cares very much what's happening in my life and in the lives of all God's other children. Thanks be to God for that.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

First do no harm

2008-10-11T12:02:00.000-07:00

It was Hippocrates, a wise physician from ancient times, who said in providing medical care, the physician is first to do no harm. I have thought about that this week as my sisters and I have wrestled with how best to care for my dad at the end of his life. We returned late last night from our visit with him many miles away. Because he can no longer swallow even water at this point without inhaling it into his lungs, the skilled nursing center where he is now living recommended a feeding tube in hopes he will be stronger if he can eat and drink and participate in therapy.

The catch of course is that he did not want a feeding tube to simply prolong his life. After much discussion, my sisters and I, with the advice of my physician husband, reluctantly agreed to allow the tube to be placed with the understanding that the feeding can be stopped in the future if it is truly at that point merely prolonging his suffering. I am still ambivalent about this decision as it's hard to foresee what the future holds, and I'm afraid we may have just begun to do that which he did not want done. My dad has said he is ready to die. He's blind and his body and his mind are failing him. He has also missed my mother more with each passing year in the 15 years since her death. It's not a pretty picture all around. I am praying for God to watch over him and to guide us as we discern what is best for him.

My husband does not think he will be around for much longer in any case. When we visited him in the hospital before leaving to return home, I held his hand and read to him from the Psalms. My husband and I prayed with him before we left, with a heavy heart on my part as I don't expect to see him again in this life. I'm glad to know he is in God's good hands whatever happens.

This past week also included a funeral for a friend from church, a graveside service for my husband's mother, and news that the wife of one of his cousins had died. We will not make that funeral tomorrow. I am weighed down with sorrow at the moment. I've learned that some times in life are simply more full of sadness than others. At such times I'm especially grateful for the love of family and friends and for God's presence when I with me. I would not be able to stand at all in such times without God's help. I have no doubt this time of sorrow, like the ones that have come before, will pass. For everything there is a season, and now is another season of sorrow. Even at such times, however, God's love sustains me. Thanks be to God!

Grace and peace,
Donna Sue

Fear and Faith

2008-09-23T07:03:00.000-07:00

The past ten days have been some of the longest in my life, longer even than the days of waiting for our oldest son to be born a week late. This waiting has not been so happy. Our oldest son's son has been gravely ill with high fevers for many days. He also refused to drink or eat much of anything.

I have learned again the exhaustion of prayer without ceasing. We finally got to see him this weekend, and I was able to hold him in my arms and not just in my prayers. It was hard to see him so thin and listless, like the little ones I used to rock in the local neonatal intensive care unit. He's always been such a happy baby with a joyous laugh. I've spent these many days beseeching God for healing for him, and for comfort for his parents. I realized, with great reluctance, that all I could do besides pray was to place him in God's good hands and trust that God would care for him, whatever the outcome. Not an easy thing for a grandmother to do.

I was helped by memories of a young woman I met among the evacuees from Hurricane Ike. She came to the arts and crafts room where I volunteered with her small children and created a beautiful piece of artwork out of construction paper. She made an apple tree, complete with bright red apples cut with a hole punch, and below the tree she wrote in Spanish, "Count the blessings God has given you." On a small heart, she wrote, "Jesus will not leave you alone and friendless. Live your faith." In the past ten days I have clung to the wisdom of this faithful young woman in her challenging circumstances as I've attempted to live my own faith in a difficult time.

Thanks be to God, our grandson finally seems to be making some progress towards health. His fever is gone, and he has started eating and drinking again and sleeping. So now I'm praying for his complete recovery. I want to see once again the happy, laughing little boy who brightened our lives. I'm still exhausted, but now with relief. I'm especially grateful to God for accepting my prayers and my fears and my hopes in such a dark time. God is good, even when a grandmother's heart has a hard time feeling that reality.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Glitter Glory

2008-09-13T14:15:00.000-07:00

My husband and I spent a number of hours yesterday and today at a Red Cross Shelter for Hurricane Ike evacuees, who came in from the Texas coast. He spent most of his time doing sick call since he's a physician. I spent mine doing arts and crafts with the children, who were bored away from their normal activities. What a blessing it was to spend time with them. I got to practice my Spanish, as many spoke Spanish and some spoke little English. I had to ask some of the kids for help translating the words for such things as markers, scissors, hole punch, stapler, glue and glitter. They were not in my vocabulary.

The shelter is at a Jewish camp north of us. The director and his wife are good friends, so that is how we ended up volunteering there. We were there after Hurricane Rita as well, and I learned then that my rudimentary Spanish was most helpful. I joked with Loui, the camp director, that since Rita I'd learned a little Chinese. He commented that he didn't think I'd need that. Turns out he was wrong. Four-year old Jason, who's from Houston, heard me speaking Spanish yesterday, and told me he spoke Chinese. His eyes were huge when I told him I did too (an exaggeration though I can carry on rudimentary conversation). He giggled whenever I spoke to him in Chinese, and his big sister, Amy, gently corrected my pronunciation. She also gave me a picture of horses she drew, which I will treasure. Before they left after lunch today to go home to Houston, she took a picture of me with her brother, and he took one of me with his sister. I will miss them!

I actually owe Jason credit for the glitter escapade. Anna, the young rabbi and chaplain from Dallas who was at the camp, opened the art supply closet for us. It was a kid's dream. We couldn't allow the kids in, but Jason would stand at the door and make requests. He was the one who saw the glitter and asked for some. It turned out to be the most popular of all the art supplies. The kids had great fun with glue and glitter, which of course ended up everywhere! What's an art room for if you can't make a mess? My husband laughed when I joined him for lunch because I had glitter on my face. I also had some on my shoes and my clothes--bits of sunshine and rainbow glory in a dark and scary time, a reminder of the rainbow promise God gave Noah. God is good all the time. Even, and maybe especially, in the midst of a hurricane evacuation.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Computer blahs

2008-09-10T13:50:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm not bored, and I'm not finding it easy to find time to write these days. I'm enjoying the Business Ethics class, but keeping up with the assignments is keeping me busy. I suspect my students would say the same thing. I've also spent more time than I would like so far wrestling with the university's computers. That has happened in the past at the beginning of each semester, but I was lulled into complacency since I was able to log on without problems this semester. Now for some unknown reason the messages I'm trying to send to the class are bouncing back, and I'm frustrated. When the technology works it's a blessing, but when it doesn't it's anything but. Of course I guess that's true with a lot of things in this world. All in all I prefer the simpler blessings, of which my life has a great abundance, a loving family, enjoyable work to do, plenty to eat, a safe place to live, freedom to worship, good health. Focusing on them makes it easier to forget the technological challenges that are part of life these days, at least for many in our culture. Better to focus on God and God's blessings. O, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. God is good. All the time. Even when the computers are not.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

For everything there is a season

2008-08-28T13:40:00.000-07:00

This has been a week of ups and downs. I met my new class of Business Ethics students this morning, and I'm looking forward to getting to know them better this semester. They seem like a great bunch, and several know each other already. They are all close to finishing college and stepping out into the world, though at least one is in college after a career in the military. From what I heard this morning, there is such a wide variety of experiences represented that I think we will have great discussions.

At the other end of life from these students on the brink of beginning their professional lives is my dad. My sister called to tell me his retirement home had called her today. He fell last night, and they've sent him to the hospital to be checked out. He's been struggling of late, and I had to gently tell my sister that at 85 it may simply be that his life is approaching the end. For now I've requested prayers from our church for him and for us as we struggle to know how best to care for him long distance. I'm grateful for my church community, and especially grateful for God's presence in this journey.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Hope

2008-08-25T13:30:00.000-07:00

I am sad today that the Olympics are over. I love to watch people who are good at what they do, and Olympic athletes are very good at what they do. I'm not sorry to stop watching, because I will now have quite a bit of extra time (which I'm going to need as I agreed the end of last week to teach again), but I am sad that after two weeks of positive interaction among citizens of many of the world's countries, the world will now mostly go back to business as usual. That will involve lots of less than pleasant interactions among the world's countries.

I was touched by the comments of one of the newscasters at the very end of the last broadcast last night after the closing ceremonies. He wistfully said, if we can get along for two weeks, maybe we can do that for three weeks, or a month, or even longer. Wouldn't that be a blessing!

On the other hand, I would not discount the benefits that will flow from the interactions that occurred at the Olympics. It's a lot easier to hate people you don't know, and those that participated in and attended the Olympics now know people from other countries in a way they didn't before this event. That will inevitably color their perceptions of other countries and their people in the future, hopefully in positive ways.

Now if we could just work that same magic among the Democrats and the Republicans in this country.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Tis a gift to be simple

2008-08-22T06:11:00.001-07:00

I fear I may be turning into a grumpy old woman, set in my ways and even more resistant to change than I was when I was younger. My husband is sitting at the breakfast table with a manual trying to figure out how to make his beeper stop sounding off at 7:40 a.m. each morning for no particular reason. I commented that it ought not to take the equivalent of a semester of college to figure out how to work each new electronic device. It seems as if everything new thing these days has an electronic chip implanted. It becomes wearying to my soul to try to figure them out.

I like the simpler things in life, though obviously I also like the computer and the wonders it has brought into my life. Perhaps in part my brain is simply full from too many years of learning many things, and I'm starting to become choosy about what else I want to learn. Simple is a blessing these days. I think one of our grandsons thinks so as well. I found a big plastic truck with little cars on top for his first birthday, and then worried when I saw all the flashing toys with their music and action that others brought to the party. Turns out he really likes the truck. He makes the noises and the motion himself. Hopefully he'll hang on to some of that impulse as he matures! For now the beeper is probably not going to sound every morning. And I'm going to go walk Moses and Zipporah. Dogs also like the simple things, which may be why I value their company. Somehow I think simple is in some mysterious way closer to the heart of God.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Finding Faith

2008-08-10T06:29:00.000-07:00

I have been struggling yet again with scripture in preparation for preaching. I think this may be the toughest scripture yet, though I admit I've thought that in the past at times. I'm been wrestling with the story in Chapter 15 of Matthew's Gospel about Jesus' encounter with the Canaanite woman. She comes to him for help for her daughter, who's possessed by the demons of mental illness. Jesus at first is silent and then rebuffs her with a racial epithet common at the time before finally responding to her wit. It's a tough story.

The biggest part of the difficulty with this story for me is that the actions of Jesus portrayed by Matthew are simply out of character compared to the rest of the stories about Jesus. This was a man who regularly reached across the boundaries of gender and culture and even religion, and who got in trouble with his faith's religious leaders because of his association with the wrong sorts of people. Wiser minds than mine have also struggled with this story, and from what I have found in my research, there doesn't seem to be any consensus about the reasons for Jesus' uncharacteristic behavior. One commentator suggested Matthew was trying to appease two factions within the church, one of which was opposed to any mission to the Gentiles, and one of which was not. Some suggest Jesus was testing the faith of the woman, or of his disciples or both. Yet others suggest Jesus was being humorous in his interaction, which of course does not translate well on the written page. All of this of course began with writing that probably came from oral tradition and that has since been translated through several languages. Anyone who knows anything about translating from one language to another knows how imprecise that can be.

What is clear is that the Canaanite woman was possessed of deep love for her daughter, a love that made her willing to overcome any barriers, including those of gender, ethnicity and religion, to obtain help for her daughter. She also acted with reverence, responding to God's presence and promise in Jesus. She was persistent in seeking God's mercy and grace. Jesus responded to her love and faith, perhaps against his inclinations, perhaps not. In return her faith had to have been balm to his spirit, wounded by encounters with the religious leaders of his own faith. Matthew's story is a reminder that faith can be found in places and in people where we least expect it. It's also a reminder that the human created boundaries that separate us from one another are no barrier to God's love and grace and mercy.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Suffering

2008-08-04T14:52:00.001-07:00

A number of members of our congregation have been reading through the entire Bible this year. It's been a rewarding project. I've been reading Eugene Peterson's paraphrase in The Message, which reads more like a story book than the NRSV translation of the Bible. I've learned things I didn't know, and have a greater appreciation for some of the things I already knew. For example, after reading all the details of the planning and construction of the Temple in Jerusalem, I found myself truly sad when I read the story of its destruction in 587 B.C. I have worked hard to be sure I never fall more than a day or two behind. There's not a lot of reading for each day, but it piles up if I don't do the work on a regular basis. So far I've managed to never get more than a couple of days behind. I will miss this next year when I've finished all the reading.

In a couple of days, I will have finished reading the book of Job, the story of one man's suffering and all the inadequate responses his friends make in their efforts to get him to see the light and admit that he must somehow deserve what has happened in his life. Otherwise they will be forced to accept the fact that sometimes bad things really do happen to good people. We visited my husband's step mother this past weekend, and she is still deeply grieving the death of my father-in-law in May. They had such a short time together, and were so happy that his death has been really hard on her. This morning at the gym I struck up a conversation with one of the twins, two men in their 70s who are at the gym whenever I show up. He said that this week his wife will have been in a nursing home for seven years, and that's a long time. She has Alzheimer's, and he says he thinks it's the worst disease. I said I could see that as the person you love is still there, but they're not, and I expressed my condolences for his suffering in this situation. His wife seems to be beyond much suffering a this point.

Some days, like Job, I wonder what God is thinking when I look around and see the suffering of this world. For all the great theologians that have struggled with this problem, I don't think anyone has come up with any good answers. I know Job's friends didn't! What I do know is that in the darkest times of my life, when I have hurt beyond bearing, God has been as close to me as my very breath. So while, like Job, I may question God in my hurt and anger, I also trust that God loves me, and I'm grateful for that love to hold onto in this scary world.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

All Creatures of Our God and King

2008-07-30T14:37:00.000-07:00

Lift up your voice and with us sing, Alleluia. This wonderful ancient song based on a poem by Francis of Assisi from 1225 has been running through my head since Moses and Zipporah woke me up barking this morning in stereo. My husband told me later they were watching two armadillos working their way down the fence. Though at the time they woke me from a dead sound sleep, I was not thinking of singing, the song is a reminder for me that we are the creatures, not the Creator. This past week was a sober reminder of that fact. We once again left the beach to escape an incoming hurricane. We left South Padre Island as Hurricane Dolly's outer rain bands began blowing in. What blew up rather quickly as a tropical storm was a Category Two hurricane by the time it hit South Padre Island dead on. By then we were in San Antonio watching the weather on television. For all that the vacation at the beach was cut short, we were grateful to be safe and glad that at last report there did not seem to be many injuries, though there was quite a bit of damage. Even after Dolly made landfall, the damage continued from the torrential rains. Whenever we think we are in control of this world and the universe, nature can quickly remind us that we are not. On most days I think that is a good thing.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Summertime

2008-07-17T06:55:00.000-07:00

We leave in a few days for the beach. My husband has a conference and our middle son will also attend with him for the first time. Both are physicians. Our daughter-in-law and two oldest grand kids will also be going, so we will have lots of kid fun at the beach. We're travelling together to save gas as it's a long ways from where we live in Central Texas to the coast. I pray this will be a good time for my husband, who lost his mother recently. His father died in May. I always find the majesty of God's ocean soothing to my soul. It's a reminder that I'm not in control of the universe, and that's a good thing! It has been awhile since we made this trek. Last time Hurricane Emily arrived in South Texas shortly after we did so we left the island after only one afternoon on the beach. I'm accustomed to taking my portable easel and sitting under a large beach umbrella and painting while we there. In fact I learned after the first couple of summers of painting on the beach that I had become mildly famous as the artist on the beach. I actually sold a couple of paintings, an amazing experience as I paint for fun, not for profit. This time I think I will reluctantly leave my easel behind. There's only so much room in our van and with six of us making the trip I suspect we'll need the space for other things. And I will want to spend the time playing with the grand kids and talking with our son and daughter-in-law as well as simply relaxing. When we return I have another sermon to prepare. Summer is almost over and the pace will pick up as fall arrives. What a blessing to have an opportunity to slow down and play in God's beautiful world. I pray that will be healing balm to my husband's hurting heart.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Sowing Seeds

2008-07-05T08:51:00.000-07:00

It's beginning to feel as if the only time I take the time to post to this blog is when I'm working on another sermon. Bloggin is probably yet another creative way to procrastinate getting back to the hard work of preparation. Even though I know for a fact that God helps me in this process, I still have to do my part. This time I'm wrestling with the parable of the sower, who scattered seeds with such wild abandon that they landed on the path, the rocks, and among the thorn bushes as well as on good soil--much like God's scattering of grace on the just and the unjust alike.

I have learned that broadcasting seed was the way to plant in Jesus' time and place. The seeds were scattered and then plowed under, the reverse of modern Western practice. Not being a farmer, what I didn't realize about this parable before I began this preparation process is that the reported harvest at the end of the story was a ridiculously extravagant one. The expected return for seed sown in Jesus' time and locale would have been about seven to ten fold. Instead the story tells of a harvest of 30, 60 or 100 fold, extravagant even with modern farming methods. As is always the case in Jesus' parables, something unusual is going on.

What I'm now struggling with is how to convey the unusual part of this story in a fresh way to our congregation. (As a side note, it's always scarier for me to preach in our home church, for these are people who have known me a long time.) What I've also learned in reading the commentaries and studying this passage is that Jesus aimed the parable directly at his disciples, implicitly asking them, "what type of soil do you provide and what kind of harvest can God expect in your life?" That's certainly cutting to the heart of the matter.

So now I'm wrestling with how to teach the congregation that this parable is not about judging the quality of soil in someone else's life, and that being good soil requires constant effort and attention, just like planting and caring for a garden. Maybe I'm also procrastinating because I'm now wondering what type of soil I am today, and hoping to produce a good harvest. May the Master Gardner grown an abundance of fruit in your life.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Carnage in the Kitchen

2008-05-31T13:57:00.000-07:00

When we came back from walking the dogs this morning, my husband found a fat spider crawling across the kitchen floor and squashed it. The carcass exploded into hundreds of itsy bitty spiders, which rapidly began to scatter while he ran to fetch the handheld vacuum and suck them up. I walked in on the tail end of this drama. I was glad not to have hundreds of spiders running amok through the house, but also sad at the thought of so much death and destruction. I am a mother myself after all.

I'm preaching tomorrow on the general topic of chaos, and this event was a good prelude to my discussion of the ways that chaos has of crashing unexpectedly into our lives. And a good reminder of the real topic of the sermon, which is that living lives of faith and obedience gives us a life preserver to hold onto when life's storms and inevitable chaos threaten to drown us. At least that's the message I took from Jesus' parable about the wise builder who built on a solid rock foundation by hearing and following Jesus' teachings from the Sermon on the Mount and whose house stood when the rains fell and the floods came and the wind blew.

One of the commentaries I read in preparation said there is an ancient rabbinical parable that also tells of two builders. The wise one knows the Torah and acts upon it, while the foolish one merely knows, but does not act. More is required for faithful living than just hearing the teachings. Life change in response to hearing is the only thing that will give us a solid foundation on which to stand when life's storms come crashing in upon us.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Time

2008-05-26T15:05:00.000-07:00

We managed to have all our children and all our grandchildren together in one place at the same time this weekend for a couple of hours, an increasingly rare occurrence. As I watched my sons and their wives interact with our grandchildren, I marvelled at what good parents they are. And I also wondered at where the time has gone, for it seems only the blink of an eye since our sons were little and demanding more energy and attention than it seemed humanly possible to provide. What a blessing to have lived long enough to know my children's children. I do not know if I will live long enough to see great grandchildren, but I am content to know my times are in God's good hands. At times such as we enjoyed this weekend, life seems filled to overflowing with God's goodness. At such times especially, it is worthwhile to take the time to reflect on that and to give thanks.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

For everything there is a season

2008-05-18T15:08:00.000-07:00

And a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die;... a time to week, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance." Ecclesiastes 3:1,2 & 4

This week has been a time for death and mourning in our family. My husband's father died after a long life and 6 months of increasing illness and disability. It was also a time to laugh and share memories and to be with family, which is always good for us even under difficult circumstances. I like the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible because it's a blessing for me to know it's okay to have a dark view of life at times and that one can still worship and hold God in deep reverence from such a perspective. The teacher who is credited as the author sounds much like a modern cynic at times.

I've been reading and contemplating different scripture as I prepare to preach again in a couple of weeks. The scriptures on the lectionary for June 1st have to do with water, and I've been thinking about the fact that to the ancients water was connected with chaos. I guess not just for the ancients as recent events in Myanmar demonstrate and in China where water is adding to the destruction of the recent massive earthquake.

Death is a different type of chaos. Roget's Thesaurus lists disorder, confusion and void as synonyms for chaos. Having lost my mother 15 years ago this month, I think those are all good descriptions of some of what I felt after losing a parent. My husband commented that now he's the old man in his family, as I'm the old woman in mine. I'm grateful for the teacher's writings in Ecclesiastes on the seasons of life and of death. I'm not sure of all that God had in mind when we were created as creatures who die, but I do know that we are all in God's hands and that they are good hands. And I'm content to face the chaos of this life and this world secure in that knowledge.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Zai jian

2008-04-24T07:12:00.000-07:00

My husband and I have just finished a semester of Conversational Chinese at the local university with Yan Yong, a young professor who came from China for a year as a Fulbright Scholar. It has been an amazing, challenging and wonderful experience to learn more about the language and culture that is part of the heritage of one of our grandsons. Yan is a linguist and a truly gifted teacher. I realize how much I don't know after one semester, but I also realize we have come a long ways. My husband and I can now carry on basic conversations in Chinese, and no one around us here in central Texas is likely to understand what we're saying--even people who actually speak Chinese because our pronunciation is so bad!

What I didn't count on was becoming so fond of our teacher. Saying goodbye to her Tuesday evening after the final exam, was really hard. She has the harder task of parting with many people she has come to know over the last two semesters, but I have no doubt her family and her fiance are waiting expectantly for her to return home. What a blessing she has been in our lives, a blessing that will continue to bless our little grandson now that all his grandparents speak at least a little Chinese (his other grandmother grew up speaking Chinese. Hopefully he will be encouraged to pass on his rich heritage to his children as well. The Bible teaches that God's blessings run to children and children's children. Yan has blessed our family far into the future. Zai Jian, by the way, is the Chinese way of saying good bye, and it literally means see again. A good way to say good bye. That English expression, by the way, has been shortened from the original "God be with ye," also a good way to say good bye.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Drinking Deeply

2008-03-28T11:01:00.001-07:00

I have begun work on my next sermon and have been focused on the text from John's Gospel where Jesus tells his disciples, "whatever you ask for in my name will be granted." I asked our choir director to repeat an anthem we did just before Easter on the Sunday I will be preaching. It's a particularly beautiful piece, and the choir loved it. More importantly it talks of drinking "deeply of the endless water of life." I think that's how one goes about praying in Jesus' name--by drinking deeply of the living water Christ offers. I don't think praying in Jesus' name means simply tacking on "in Jesus' name" at the end of a prayer like some magical incantation, though there's certainly nothing wrong with adding that phrase to a prayer. But I think what's more important is drinking deeply of Christ and in so doing learning how to pray as He did. It's that simple, and that difficult.

As I was pondering this topic and how best to speak to our congregation (which this time will include one of my sons and his wife!), I received a phone call advising me that I'd won first place in poetry and non-fiction in this year's local literary contest. A second call told me as a result of winning the poetry prize, I would be named poet laureate for the next year. I am still in shock over that! As I concluded my seminary education and was pondering what might come next, I attended a faith in writing course taught by Ann Weems, who is a wonderful poet. I had not written poetry before that conference, but have been doing so since then. God seems to keep turning me back to writing as a calling, and I remember well Ann insisting that faith in writing is a ministry. So perhaps this next year will allow me to share what I have learned of drinking deeply of the living water of Christ through my poetry. A scary blessing, but then most blessings are.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Tasting and Seeing

2008-03-19T18:38:00.000-07:00

This has been a long week. My little granddaughter has been in the hospital with a stomach virus, and I've been worried about her. I learned when our first grandchild came along that one of the hardest things about being a grandma is standing on the sidelines and waiting. Being a woman of action, I find that difficult. My son just called to say they were on their way home from the hospital, and I realized I've been holding my breath waiting to hear she was doing better. When kids are this little, they can't really give them anything to stop the vomiting. Instead they hook them up to an IV and hope that keeps their fluid level up enough so that they can survive until the virus has run its course.

The first night she was in the hospital, my son soberly reflected on the kids in third world countries who don't have access to health care and die from the kind of illness that hospitalized my little granddaughter. My son and I talked about the fact that their parents and grandparents don't love them any less than we love this sweet little girl. In Eugene Peterson's version of Psalm 34 in The Message, the Psalmist says: "Open your mouth and taste, open your eyes and see--how good God is. Blessed are you who run to him." We have certainly run to God and clung to him this week, and as always God was waiting with open arms to support us.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Being Important

2008-03-04T11:51:00.001-08:00

I'm thankful that today is the primary here in Texas. This year Texas is considered an important state so the candidates have been lavishing attention on us. I've lost count of the many computerized phone calls we've received. John McCain just "called," and Hillary "called" before lunch. Perhaps there are those who are impressed to hear the recorded voice of someone important. Personally, I prefer the human touch and was more impressed by a call from a live human being asking for my vote. I am grateful for the opportunity we have to go to the polls in this country and for a choice of candidates. All too many around the world are not so lucky. Our friends in Cuba, for instance, just witnessed a presidential "election" in which the result was preordained. I'm willing to put up with a few phone calls in exchange for having a voice. That's a blessing. As for being important, I know that in God's eyes I matter and more than enough importance for me.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Rethinking priorities

2008-02-23T13:31:00.000-08:00

This has been a week that has forced me to rethink life's priorities. My husband came home last week with the flu and graciously shared. This week as he was getting better I was getting worse. I am grateful we were not both sick at the same time. For a time, what became most important in my life was simply continuing to breathe and to drink. I didn't really care whether I ate or not. It's funny how such an experience always reminds me that many things in life that seem important don't matter all that much when you are forced back upon life's elemental basics. Of course I would consider love one of those basics, and I have been blessed by my husband's love and care as I've recuperated.

Ironically, I've struggled this week to complete my sermon for tomorrow, which is based on the Apostle Paul's assertion that we Christians can boast in our sufferings because suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. While as suffering goes, this has been small compared to the sufferings of others, surviving the experience required me to endure. I'm not sure how much it has enhanced my character, but I'm grateful for God's help in all of this. In that help is my hope, which is the sermon in a nutshell now that I think about it. The sermon is done, by the grace of God as always, but more so this time as I've not been thinking all that clearly. Hopefully tomorrow will go well for the sake of those coming to worship. I've learned to rely on God for leading worship and God has never failed me. I don't expect tomorrow to be any different.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

A Death in the Family

2008-02-13T10:26:00.000-08:00

I just received a message from our daughter-in-law. They are taking their boxer, Max, to the vet today to be put down. He developed cancer recently and has gone downhill rapidly. He woke up in pain this morning, and they don't want him to suffer anymore. They got the dog when our son was in medical school in Houston after a break in and shooting in the complex where they were living at the time. Since then Max has loved and protected his family with all his big heart. I'd never been around a boxer before, and I was impressed with how gentle and patient he was with our grandkids. He would walk carefully and stop in mid-stride when they crawled underneath. More recently he has put up with the attention of our little granddaughter, who has alternately tugged on him and dropped food to him from her high chair. She's not yet 2 and will not understand where her big friend has gone. I suspect this will be harder for her 5 year old brother as it will be his first experience of death and loss. I pray God will give me the right words when he wants to talk about it. We're going down for his birthday party this weekend. I think I'll tell him that I know that God is love, and I know that the God who created Max loved him as much as his family did. I may also tell him if he asks that Max has gone to a place where he will never be in pain again. Sounds like heaven to me.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Apocalypse

2008-02-01T14:28:00.000-08:00

I make my husband a little crazy by reading in bed for a few minutes each night before turning off my bedside light. Lately I've been reading Amazing Grace by Kathleen Norris and savoring her essays on the difficult words in the vocabulary of faith. Last night I read her thoughts on one of the most difficult faith words for me--apocalypse. Like me Norris says she has a hard time with those whose approach to evangelism is to beat people verbally over the head with accusations of sinfulness and threats of hell-fire and damnation. I like Norris' reminder that the apocalyptic writings in the Bible were written to those who were marginalized by the larger culture in which they lived and who had little or no stake in the status quo. I especially like her argument that apocalyptic literature is about hope, the hope that "despite considerable evidence to the contrary, in the end it is good that will prevail." Thus the God who is promised at the end of the apocalyptic book of Revelation is one who will come to wipe all our tears away. What a beautiful and hopeful image!

As I struggle to write about another trip to Cuba with a group from our church in a way that will reach the hearts and minds of those who have not had the opportunity to visit with the Christians in that country, I find myself returning again and again to the hope and joy I experienced in the churches and in the lives of the individuals we met there. As Kathleen Norris so wisely writes, we humans seem to show our real strength best when we are faced with disaster--when our perpetual delusion of self-sufficiency is shattered, at least momentarily. That is when we can begin to see "what is possible in the new life we build from the ashes of the old." The Cuban Christians have learned to live faithfully in a society that has experienced radical changes in my lifetime and in a place where everyday life is difficult. And yet these faithful Christians joyfully demonstrate the kind of hope Norris writes about. Like the writers in the Bible who proclaimed hope in the midst of calamity, the Cuban Christians live out God's possibilities in the midst of incredibly difficult circumstances. I pray I will find the words to convey the hope that they have and the reason for that hope to those here who are in need of such promise, which on any given day is most of us.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

I've become a "Hon"

2008-01-23T12:19:00.000-08:00

Sometime in the past few months I seem to have crossed over some invisible barrier in my life's journey. Recently my health care providers, as well as my young physician, have started to refer to me as "Hon." Granted the ones I'm thinking about are young enough to be my children, and I am approaching 60 at warp speed. But I confess I'm not sure how I feel about this development. On the one hand, I prefer "Hon" to other nicknames I could conjure up, but on the other hand it makes me feel that old age is catching up with me. I'm nearly certain this form of address is a term of endearment and that no harm is meant, but I also came of age when being called "Hon" under some circumstances could start a demonstration or at least an argument. So perhaps that's why this whole experience has made me uneasy. Or perhaps I would not have taken notice at all, except that I'm keenly aware that I will be 60 in a couple of years, and that has me more focused on my age, something I don't ordinarily spend a lot of time contemplating.

I guess ideally I had hoped somehow that in my old age I would be referred to as one of those individuals the Psalmist compares to "trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in its season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper." Now that seems to me to be a worthy goal for any one's life. I suppose I could tell these young women I'd much prefer to be called a tree, instead of a "Hon," but somehow I don't think they would understand. Maybe someday they will, but by then I'll have long since passed from this life to the next, hopefully after having left some worthy fruit behind in God's good creation.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Our times are in your hands

2008-01-19T17:45:00.000-08:00

I remember learning a Bible verse when I was a little girl, "our times are in your hands." Of course at the moment I cannot remember exactly where in the Bible the verse can be found. Today we made the long trip to Houston and back again to visit my husband's father and his wife. My father-in-law is seriously ill and for the first time as he nears 90 he looks like an old man. He is in pain and not thinking clearly, and his wife is struggling to care for him. My husband seems to be taking this better than my sons at this point. They are worried about their grandfather, for all that he has not made a lot of effort to spend much time with them. He has made some effort over the years. My prayer partners are praying for the doctors to figure out what is wrong with him. His wife hopes once they figure it out, they will be able to make him better. My husband is not so sure. Probably that comes from being a doctor himself.

Coincidentally, not long ago I had a conversation with my own father about death. He will be 85 this year and is slowing down considerably. I've been amazed at how well he has coped with blindness these last few years, but his body is slowing down and he seems to miss my mom more with each passing year, even though she's been gone for 15 years now. Perhaps as the discomfort of pregnancy eventually makes labor and delivery seem less terrifying, so our aging bodies eventually make the promise of what a good pastor friend calls "the next adventure" seem less frightening.

I'm glad I remember the verse from my childhood, and I'm even more glad that I know in the depths of my soul that my times are indeed in God's hands. As one seminary professor said, they are good hands, you know. I hope I can remember that when it's my time to move on to the next adventure. As I told my dad, as my body continues to age, sometimes not at all gracefully, I am slowly learning that at some point it will not be such a bad thing to lay down this wonderful life for the one to come. I think that's what my dad was trying in his oblique way to tell me himself.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Back to the Beginning

2008-01-11T14:44:00.000-08:00

My husband and I went to our first Conversational Chinese class last night, and we are going to learn more than conversation including some reading and some writing of Chinese characters. The teacher is a young woman from China, and her enthusiasm and encouragement are contagious. She believes we can do this, so I'm willing to suspend my own disbelief and charge ahead. My husband and I have actually been working for many months on learning to speak some Mandarin Chinese using CDs that our son loaned us. He's learning Chinese as well, but he has a wife who speaks it so he has an advantage we are lacking. We have good motivation, however, as our daughter-in-law is speaking Chinese to our baby suinzi (that's our grandson). We want to be able to understand him when he starts babbling. Hopefully we can learn enough to learn along with him when he starts talking.

As we headed out for class last night, I remembered something I'd not thought about in years and that is that my husband and I met as freshmen in college over 40 years ago. Standing in the bookstore line this morning waiting to buy the textbook for the class, I told my husband I had never pictured myself going back to college as a grandmother. Life does have a way of circling around upon itself, and God does have a wonderfully, wacky sense of humor. Even if I had thought about returning to school someday back when I was a college student, I would never in my wildest dreams have envisioned signing up for Chinese lessons!

But now I get to have two nights a week back at college with my college sweet heart, who's the only one who calls me Donna Sue. What a blessing, and something to make my heart sing an old almost-forgotten song.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Reading and Writing

2008-01-06T17:40:00.000-08:00

I spent three days this past week with Christian writers from around the country at the annual writers' festival at the local university where I taught this past year. It was such an amazing experience to listen to these remarkable poets and authors read from their works, and to participate in workshops with them to try to improve my writing skills. If you have not encountered Angela O'Donnell, Alan Berecka and Anne McCrady's poetry, you are missing out. They write beautifully about life and about God. Spending that much time in the company of those who use the English language to create works of great beauty was a real privilege. It inspires me to keep working to hone my skills. That will give me plenty of work to do this in this New Year. Part of me wishes it were easier, but in my heart of hearts I also know that if it were too easy I would rapidly become bored.

On the reading front, members of our church are participating in a program to read through the Bible this year, something I've not sat down and done cover to cover, though I've read large chunks of it. I started this afternoon and am enjoying reading Eugene Peterson's The Message, which is a translation written in contemporary language. It was especially fun to read the story of Noah after having watched the movie Evan Almighty this past week. I could easily picture all the animals and laughed when I read the last verse in Chapter 6. After God has told Noah to collect two of every species of bird, mammal and reptile to save them from the flood, God then tells Noah, "Also get all the food you'll need and store it up for you and them." Even with a large ark that's a lot of food and a lot of grocery shopping! What a great story that has come down to us from centuries ago. I'm going to enjoy the reading assignments this year.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Hope

2007-12-29T14:09:00.000-08:00

I've been working on a sermon for tomorrow on the text from Matthew 2:13-23, which tells the story of the slaughter of the innocents in Bethlehem. I've also spent some time researching Herod the Great, who was not called that because of his kindly nature. In preparation, I finally got around to watching the movie The Nativity this afternoon. While not the greatest movie I've seen, it does a good job of portraying life in Judea at the time of Jesus' birth. I'm actually going to talk about Matthew's report of the murder of children under the age of two in Bethlehem, which is pretty grim stuff, especially for a grandmother with grandchildren that age. I nonetheless kept finding myself pulled back to this passage in particular. I like Rev. Dr. William Willimon's take on this passage in his 1998 sermon as well as Rev. Joy Carol Wallis' in her sermon, Putting Herod Back in Bethlehem. This is the world that we live in, one where the innocent are violated regularly by the powerful. It's also a world where all of us have sinned and too often seek what we want when we want it, rather than trusting in God. Jesus came into that world, not into some sanitized Christmas card version, but a real world of suffering and pain. We have hope because Christ has overcome the powers of sin and darkness in this world, not some mythical, magical place, but the real sinful world in which we live. That's Good News to take into the coming New Year.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

And a little child shall lead them

2007-12-16T13:34:00.000-08:00

We have been blessed once again with a grandchild, another little boy, born earlier this week. I'm not quite as tired as if I'd given birth, but tired enough. This grandmothering is exhausting, exhilirating work. As I held this tiny child and looked into his bright, eager eyes, I found it hard to believe how much time has passed since his daddy was born. For a time, we were not at all sure that his daddy would make it as he tried to come three months early. Fortunately with the help of good medical care and ten weeks of bed rest by his mama, he arrived safely. What a blessing to welcome his child into this world. I have found that grandchildren are even more of a blessing than I expected. They help keep me young and remind me of God's unconditional love with their trusting innocence and ready affection. So I don't find the passage from the prophet Isaiah, Chapter 11, Verse 6, at all unbelievable: "The wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them." I've been around small children a lot of late, and it could happen. Someday in God's good time I pray this whole weary world will be blessed with such peace.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Waiting

2007-12-08T17:49:00.000-08:00

I suppose I've become a bit better at waiting thanks to my time at seminary, but that's only in comparison to my earlier even more impatient self. Now we sit poised between the past and the future once again as we await the birth of another grandchild. He was due today, but when we talked with his mama earlier, she said he seems to be happy right where he is. And so like Mary and Joseph, we continue to wait for the birth of a Christmas child.

I've learned my job as a grandmother is to wait, a hard assignment as I'm more of a woman of action. For now, however, all of us must wait for the miracle of this child, for God's timing. One thing I've learned in nearly 60 years of living is that it's always better to wait for God's timing. You think I would also have learned to be more patient in the waiting, and I suppose I have, but only in comparison to the past.

Now like the little girl I once was, I'm waiting excitedly for the birth of a child in this Holy season, a child who will change all of our lives, especially those of his mom and dad. I never had a Christmas present this exciting when I was a little girl, and at the moment I feel as impatient as I once felt as I waited for Christmas to come. It always seemed to take forever, yet somehow it always came. I'm sure this baby will come too, just not as soon as his waiting family had hoped.

May you too wait expectantly for the birth of the Holy Child who came in God's good time and changed all of our lives for the better.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Season of Hope

2007-12-04T07:15:00.000-08:00

Sunday was the first Sunday in Advent for 2007, and Sumner and her family lit the candle of hope at the front of the sanctuary at the start of the worship service. Advent always seems to arrive each year just when I most need the reminder that this is still God's world with a lot of good things going on in spite of the bad news with which we are inundated on a daily basis. Advent arrives when I am in need of hope.

Emily Dickinson wrote something like: Hope is the thing without feathers that perches in the soul and sings the song without words and never stops at all. One of the Biblical writers wrote something like: Without hope the people perish. I know that without God in my life I would have no hope and my soul would shrivel up and die.

This past weekend, I personally participated in a bit of hopeful good news that will never make it onto CNN. My husband and I live in a remarkable neighborhood, where we know each other by name, and know the names of the kids and even the names of the pets. We are in short extended family here, even those like us who have arrived fairly recently. Saturday morning we had a neighborhood workday, which often means picking up the trash thrown along our private road. This time the workday meant yard work at the home of a recently widowed elderly neighbor with Alzheimer's.

For two hours, Scott with his gas powered hedge trimmer, and others with their clippers trimmed hedges and shrubs that had grown ragged and were trying to eat the mailbox, while others like me picked up the trimmings and stacked them for the next trash pickup. When one of the workers went to tell the woman we were finished, her response was "God bless you." What a blessing to be able to do yard work for someone who cannot. Then we gathered for a cookie swap and hot chocolate.

My heart was warmed by the experience of working with a group of neighbors who I know for a fact disagree with each other about many issues, especially in politics and theology. But we all agreed that our neighbor needed help. What a blessing to be able to play a small part in providing that help and to know others felt the same.

Each year I wait for that moment in Advent when God's kingdom breaks through the gloom once again to shine in my heart. This year I was blessed to experience that moment early, when neighbors came together with shared purpose. And the "thing without feathers" perched in my soul once again sang "the song without words." Thanks be to God that will be enough to see me through the new year until Advent once again arrives to remind me of God's eternal hope.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Giving Thanks

2007-11-22T06:40:00.000-08:00

I am totally bummed at the moment. We were supposed to be on our way to San Antonio early this morning to celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow with our middle son and his family and in-laws. I'm sorry my husband has been stricken with a virus that has left him highly contagious, though I'm grateful he's not seriously ill. The timing is terrible. Time will tell if we can gather with our imnmediate family on Saturday. So I'm watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV (I do love parades), and writing this as an exercise in gratitude even though at the moment I am as my husband noted, heartbroken. It's not often that we are able to get our family, so the prospect of missing that has me feeling really sad.

But, enough on that. I'm grateful to be here with my husband with a day to relax. I'm grateful for a warm, dry place to spend the day and for food to prepare an unplanned Thanksgiving dinner later. I'm grateful that I can see and hear and walk around this morning, and that while my husband is ill, we are both generally in good health. I'm grateful for my wonderful sons and remarkable daughters-in-law. I'm grateful for our beautiful grandkids. We are blessed with good health, good relationships and work to do that we find rewarding. I'm grateful that we live here in peace and safety. Too many of God's children in this world have none of these blessings that I too often take for granted. Thanks be to God for all the ways my life has been blessed. May you find time this day to thank God for your blessings as well.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Nearing the end

2007-11-15T12:44:00.000-08:00

I once again find myself stumbling toward the end of the semester. I'm not sure who is the tiredest at this point, me or my students. It has been a great run, but it's almost time for the hardest part of the semester for me--saying goodbye. But before we reach the end, I have to write a few more exams and grade a lot more exams and papers. I was told this week that the policy had changed and finals could no longer be optional, so I'm going to have another two dozen exams to grade than I had counted on. At the moment with Mount Everest in front of me, I'm not all that disappointed that I will not be teaching next semester. But I will be when January rolls around, and I'm not getting prepared for another semester. Hopefully in the future they will find another class for me to teach. I do love the interaction with the students. They are an immense blessing.

But God has been not so gently calling me to "honor my gift," and I'm still sorting out what that means. After much prayer it has become clear that whatever my gift may be it is no longer being a lawyer. It was hard to give up teaching business law, but I know I made the right decision to pass that baton on to another lawyer who is excited about a new opportunity. I think part of what I have to do to honor my gift is to pick back up with the writing. My class seemed intrigued this morning when I told them I was going to go back to my research on Christian vocation and professional ethics and finish the book I started. One student wanted to know if I'd already written it. I still have that part to do. Bob reminded me of my plans for the book, which I will tackle next semester, when he commented that one good way to judge your ethics is by what your mom would say about your actions. Wise advice, and not surprising as he is a wise man. So I shared the title I've come up with for the book: What Would Your Mom Say About Your Professional Ethics? Now I just have to write the essays to live up to the title. I wonder what my mom would say about this project? Unfortunately I'll have to wait until the next life to ask her.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue

Travelling to the Dark Side of the Moon

2007-11-03T05:43:00.000-07:00

This past month has been way too busy, with classes, volunteer obligations and a bit part in the Sound of Music at my church, followed by a mission trip to Cuba from which we returned earlier this week. Now I find myself in the grudging stage of knowing I need to return to my life here, but resisting leaving behind the people and the memories of our trip to Cuba. The mission on this trip was to demonstrate to our Christian sisters and brothers in Cuba by our presence that they have not been forgotten.

It was not easy to obtain the required religious license from our government to travel there, and as that license expires the end of this month I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to see these new friends in this life again. I hope so. For in Cuba I saw once again the churches aflame with the Holy Spirit as they proclaim God's kingdom in the midst of poverty, both physical and spiritual.

A familiar Bible text from the prophet Joel was on the lectionary while we were there, and I realized I was seeing it lived out before my eyes, for God's spirit has been poured upon them and their sons and daughters are proclaiming God's message, their old people are dreaming of the kingdom and their young people are seeing visions of a future blessed by God. Once again, as at the end of my first trip to Cuba a year and a half ago, my heart wants to be both there and here at home.

Please pray for all of those Christians who proclaim the reason for the hope they have by their lives and their actions, as the pastor preached last Sunday at the Presbyterian church we attended in Havana. We proclaimed that hope by our presence worshipping and sharing communion together, those of us from the U.S. and the Cubans. I pray one day soon we will be free to travel easily from one country to the other. I want them to come and share their remarkable faith with my fellow Christians here, and I want to be able to return and see the people I have come to know and to love.

Grace and Peace,
Donna Sue