For All the Saints

..Who from their labors rest.

For Melanie and Fred and Lynn,
For Bonnie and Brian and Lyle,
For Ina and Arnold,
For Dorothy and Stanley,
For (insert names here of your Saints)

We remember this week, all those who have completed thier baptisms and gone home to Jesus.

Thanks be to God for their guidance and wisdom and strenght.

Thanks be to God for the promise of Eternal Life, and for memories.

Be with all those who are still here, and hurting because there are holes in our hearts where friends and family used to be.

Amen

Happy Haloween

Yesterday was October 31st. The spookiest night of the year, right?
Ok, my in-house kids are 2 and 4 so the whole trick-or-treat thing is still a mystery so we can get away with 3 (yes three) homes this year.
#1 is Great Grandma and Grandpa Morlock: in the nursing home, two boxes of raisins for three costumed cousins. Hey, it's always good to go to a nursing home!
#2 is Grandma's neighbor who is still raking leaves when we actually arrive. Tow small bags of M&M's for being the first of the night.
#3 is Alice the Gorilla. Alice appears for two hours each year and will provides scares and a Recees or two if, and only if, you bring canned food. Luckily Alice can tell the difference between a ten year old and an 2 year old and was just a little surprising, not scary.

So what did my kids learn? That dressing up and giving away food is better than getting a bunch of candy that mom won't let you eat anyway! We gave a washer and dryer away this afternoon, so reinforced the lesson.

I apologize if you don't celebrate Haloween, but it's hard to be in the world, not of the world, without dressing up one night a year.

I'd rather focus on giving (like the UNICEF boxes) and remembering those who have gone before. (latino Day of the Dead does this really well)

Jesus knew all about dressing up like a mummy and walking around: first his friend Lazarus, and then he did the same trick! He knows we need to just have fun sometimes, and that we do need to remember those who have died.

So, On this All Saitnt's Day, give, love and keep on Living!

Split wood

Psalm 24
A psalm of David.
1 The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.
The world and all its people belong to him.
2 For he laid the earth’s foundation on the seas
and built it on the ocean depths.

I helped my Father-in-Law split some wood this week. It struck me that this tree was so well designed to be used by us humans in so many ways.

Fruit, shade, a place for a swing.

Then, homes, boats, and a place to sit.

Finally, heat, which is going to feel more and more necessary in the next few months in Minnesota!

The logs that had been cut split into smaller pieces so neatly, it was as if it were made for that very purpose. It was just beautiful to see the inner structure of a couple old oaks that had seen so much, but had died in the yard.

God made us just as beautifully.

We each have our calling and our gifts to be shared with others.

How will you split?

Faith of a Mustard Seed

woman in mustard field
Originally uploaded by lily b

I'm preparing for a sermon this Sunday on the Mustard seed/servant reading in Luke 17:5-10.

I'm always stuck on the seed, the mustard seed, because I have held them in my hands when my mother was canning, and I know they are not as small as, say, a carrot seed.

But the plants do grow larger than carrots, or lettuce. It is, perhaps one of the smaller seeds grown as a crop. Flax is smaller, and slipprier, and a whole 'nother sermon could be written on that seed.

So what's the deal with the mustard seed, and faith?

The deal is you've got all you need.

God gave it to you as a gift. Remember "my grace is sufficient?"

The second half of the lesson reminds us that we don't even deserve what we've got.

The disciples asked for more faith please.

Jesus says, use what you have and you can do anything!

We are so wrapped up in more is biggering and biggering and biggering, that we forget that we have all we need, and more.

That slip of faith that you recieved as an infant at the font

The kernel of faith that you found in the darkness of life

that small spot of light in the darkness of this world is enough to share

So, spread those mustard seeds around. Share your faith, and your future