Five Minute Friday :: Noise

• Five Minute Friday :: Noise Linkup

Noise, sound, music, speech, (silence) or not your ears can detect, that your brain, body, and emotions can react to. Even if an individual is very hard of hearing or deaf, their person's body often picks up and reacts to noises in the vicinity.

I appreciated our host Kate's contrasting her spouse growing up surrounded with layers of sound, whereas relative quiet or silence remains her preference. I'm one that definitely prefers not silence. I often try to explain how traffic, a nearby radio or TV, conversation next door, and similar help me concentrate. Is it because I grew up in the inner city? I don't know. And I do know that when I've gone camping or on retreat to a more rural or countrified (bucolic, maybe?) location, it takes about a day to get beyond my anxiety over the lack of external aural stimulation and begin to appreciate not necessarily complete silence, but sounds of a different quality and caliber.

To find illustrations I searched my computer with keywords noise, sound, and music. My header turned out to be from the church in San Luis Obispo we visited during July 2017 as one of the almost a dozen stops in the Reformation Roadtrip the ELCA judicatory sponsored to celebrate Reformation 500. What a day! I won't mention how early we got up on that Saturday morning to drive 200 miles up the coast from Los Angeles to SLO (because I don't remember. Otherwise I would).

My original snapshot was full color sRGB. Technically, the gradient map overlay added some noise to the photograph. Speaking of gradients, I'm still stuck in the era when printing gradients was risky because even with high end mechanical presses (think Heidelberg, but not the catechism), they'd often end up banded. Adding some noise such as 15% Gaussian blur often solved that. Besides, sometimes adding the noise of a Photoshop filter changes an image just enough to make it more interesting. Then there's shadows and highlights that I'd describe as a sophisticated, nondestructive subtly noisy version of brightness and contrast.

These image editing-enhancement digressions closely pair with our human desire – sometimes it's a real need – for some amount of ambient music, sound, noise or related to help settle our senses, often to help focus if we're doing a thoughtful activity that requires intellect and brain power.

What's your own home, work, recreational, or outdoors noise preference? Is it consistent, or does it vary?
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Holy Holy Holy

Talk about synchronicity! Yesterday I just happened to watch and listen to a Trinity Sunday sermon I'd bookmarked a couple months ago. The Old Testament reading for this coming Sunday, Epiphany 5, also is the Trinity Sunday passage of Isaiah's call from Isaiah 6.

Although this is one of the scripture texts for Trinity Sunday (and relates to that favorite majestic Trinitarian hymn, "Holy, Holy, Holy") Holy, holy, holy in this passage is not a trinitarian proclamation—it's an artifact of Hebrew and other semitic languages that unlike English, don't have comparative and superlative adjectives, so you repeat the word once or twice. Instead of good, better, best, you'd say good, good, good.

Ligonier Ministries name came from its original location in Ligonier, Pennsylvania. The organization is an independent ministry and broadly Reformed; everything I've seen from them is on the conservative side. Scripture quotations in this book come from KJV, NKJV, NIV, ESV, and NASB. Their website explains:

Ligonier Ministries adheres to the ancient statements of faith (the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Creed of Chalcedon) and affirms the historic Christian faith as expressed in the five solas of the Reformation and the consensus of the historic Reformed confessions (Westminster Standards, Three Forms of Unity, and 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith).

For comparison, regarding the Three Forms of Unity, the PCUSA's Book of Confessions includes the Belgic Confession and Heidelberg Catechism but omits Canons of Dort. For another comparison, of the four church bodies / denominations (ELCA, PC(USA), RCA, UCC) that covenanted together in A Formula of Agreement, Canons of Dort are constitutive for only one—the Reformed Church in America.

You can find Proclaiming the Perfections of God on Powell's:

• Holy Holy Holy…

on Amazon:

• Holy Holy Holy…

The ten chapters originated as lectures at the 2009 Ligonier Ministries National Conference in Orlando, with "The Holiness of God" the conference theme. Chapter titles and subtitles are helpful for any Christian from any tradition to consider (I know, all the authors just happened to be guys), and make reasonable categories for a systematic theology class:

1. "I Am the Lord": The Only God by R. C. Sproul

2. "Hallowed Be Your Name": The Holiness of the Father by Sinclair B. Ferguson

3. "The Holy One of God": The Holiness of Jesus by Steven J. Lawson

4. "The Breath of the Almighty": The Holiness of the Spirit by Alistair Begg

5. "Cosmic Treason": Sin and the Holiness of God by Thabiti Anyabwile

6. "A Holy Nation": The Church’s High Calling by D. A. Carson

7. "Wounded for Our Transgressions": The Holiness of God and the Cross by W. Robert Godfrey

8. "You Shall Be Holy": The Necessity of Sanctification by Derek W. H. Thomas

9. "Train Up a Child": Walking Together with the Holy God by R. C. Sproul Jr.

10. "A Consuming Fire": Holiness, Wrath, and Justice by R. C. Sproul

The articles are well-written and very very serious. With many quotes and references from John Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, the authors feel stuck in a different era. Chapter 10, Holiness, Wrath, and Justice?

But if there is a God (and there is), and if He is holy (and He is), and if He is just (and He is), He could not possibly be without wrath. If you have not been reconciled to Him through the blood of His Son, the only thing you have to look forward to is His wrath, which is a divine wrath, a furious wrath, and an eternal wrath.

That quote is just plain sad. God is a holy God who calls a holy people (see chapter 6, "A Holy Nation," and chapter 8, "You Shall Be Holy"), but wrath of god is a human construct that Jesus Christ obliterates. The mainline world in which I live is welcoming and grace-filled, but I'm glad I glanced through this book to view a different perspective. There's a helpful index of scripture references at the end.

Five Minute Friday :: Second

• Five Minute Friday :: Second Linkup

Retail merchandise – especially clothing – isn't always exactly perfect. For one reason or another, the end product sometimes has flaws, and sometimes the usual input doesn't even result in a finished product. That doesn't mean they can't be sold, but they get various warning labels like second, irregular, or imperfect—there's even a category of thirds.

Humans aren't always exactly perfect in any endeavor or situation. Contests and competitions include first place (blue ribbon), second (red ribbon) and third (white) or fourth (yellow). An organization or sponsor even can go further down the line. Graduation classes get numerically ranked. First in your class! Valedictorian. Second? Salutatorian. Everyone can't be first. Or even second in everything.

Although I usually got good grades in school if I tried hard enough (good instructors helped), academically I've never been particularly rank or ratings conscious. However, those years I entered art in the San Diego County Fair the first place blue and the second place red ribbons I won always excited me, and I worked during the year for best results. (After writing that, I suddenly feel I need to enter the LA County Fair. It will cover the month of May with the theme Art Unleashed.)

Humans can get competitive. We tend to compare ourselves with other people, compare today's accomplishments with yesterday's and last year's. But in the end, first, second, irregular, or imperfect matters not because:

See what love the Father has given us
That we should be called children of God
and that is what we are.
1 John 3:1

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January 2025

• This month's rundown is brief, and because I couldn't figure out a new header, I've used a favorite called Winter Tree Sky from a few years ago. Why not? We draw or paint or photograph the same scene multiple times, play the same music, sing the same songs, wear the same clothes. And I use the same profile and banner pics on different social Media.

• City Paradise Lectionary Project for January

• Los Angeles has been experiencing worst ever wildfires that caused massive destruction of homes, buildings, and lives. We're thankful for the many out of state and out of country fire companies that have helped fight these fires. With aerial control being the default for this type of blaze, high Santa Ana winds were a major reason the fires spread so fast and far, because no one can fly any aircraft in a gale or hurricane..

• I attended the MLK Day celebration in Hawthorne again. It was exceptional! Here's the worship program cover and a couple of collages I made in google photos.

• The church treasurer gave me this bouquet on the last Sunday of January!!! Fresh flowers always are a treat, but these are exceptional. I don't know who got the other bunch.

Los Angeles 2025

I started this as a response to a social media post as Los Angeles wildfires 2025 destroyed many neighborhoods and put lives on hold. I wanted to expand on my reply because just as I did, the original poster had relocated to the city of LA from somewhere else.

LA has become my home, too.

Despite almost 10 years of unsettled housing, despite opportunities that haven't happened (yet) Los Angeles is the first ever time for me that home is here and not the last place I just left.

Maybe you create a social media ID that includes your place. "Leah in LA" or "suntreeriver design Los Angeles." Like Benedictines and others who aways name their community after their city or town of residence, we can do that, too. Do you attend Lazy River Presbyterian Church? Hillside CIty Lutheran? Streetside Methodist? The building or the campus and the people who gather there then have their place in a double sense: a location defined by longitude and latitude and where you almost instinctively know your place (role, function, job).

The USA and many other countries have been impacted with frightening political, social, and economic uncertainties. Unprecedented wildfires winds recently leveled Los Angeles area neighborhoods.

In the wake of destructive fires back in my previous place of San Diego, one Sunday morning our parish associate reminded us God does not have a preferential option for a particular dwelling, neighborhood, or structure over any other. Then why did we again see one or two untouched houses or businesses beside others that were total losses? God doesn't prefer certain houses or places over others, but God does have a preferential option for those whose homes and lives have been destroyed or upended, those whose expectations have been shattered or sometimes simply not met to the degree they imagined.

As Pastor Gordon said long ago, "We're not snake-bite proof. We're rescued after being bitten."

Peruvian Dominican priest Gustavo Gutiérrez first used the phrase "preferential option for the poor."

Early on this blog in Longing for Home, I wrote about home is always the place you just left: a memoir of restless longing and persistent grace by Betty Smart Carter.

Homecoming has been one of my relentless longings and after all this time it feels impossible. Impossible? But Possibility is my star word for 2025! Late last year, I longed for home in a Five Minute Friday ass I dared say what home could be:

…people who quote Philip Philips' song Home, "Just know you're not alone; I'm gonna make this place your home."

Deep in our hearts and with our entire beings, we long for the hugs and the smiles. The shared meals. Affirmations of our dreams, our calling, our gifts and preparation. Encouragement for our longing to use our talents and abilities. We long for and we need somewhere and someone to come home to at the end of the day, whether the day has been disappointingly short or agonizingly long.

Home is a spacious place. Space to breathe, to reach out, to grow, and to dream. A location and a people who take away my lostness, who help deliver me, because they delight in me.

My scripture reference was, God brought me out into a spacious place; God delivered me because God delighted in me." Psalm 18:19

Can home be in a place of blight, broken glass, fragile dreams, when there were any dreams at all? What name would we give that place? Is that the kind of situation we need to be rescued from? God would rescue us from?

From Revelation 2

• To him who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna
and I will give him a white stone
with a new name written on the stone
which no one knows except him who receives it.
Revelation 2:17

• And I will give him the morning star.
Revelation 2:28

1 Peter 1:8

Rejoice with unutterable and exalted joy!
1 Peter 1:8

2 Peter 1:19

And we have the prophetic word made more sure. You will do well to pay attention to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.
2 Peter 1:19

1 Peter 5:7

Cast all your anxieties on him for he cares about you.
1 Peter 5:7

1 Peter 4:10

As each has received a gift, employ it for one another.
1 Peter 4:10

Five Minute Friday :: Favor

• Five Minute Friday :: Favor Linkup

Luke 4:14-21

Then Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee. … He stood up to read in synagogue, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor."

Then he said to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."

• The year of the Lord's Favor!

Jesus was 30 years old and had been attending synagogue for a long time. He knew the texts of scripture well, so after the attendant handed him the Isaiah scroll, Jesus would have been able to pick and choose the passage he wanted to read that comes from the third section of the long book of Isaiah. But it's possible they had a set reading schedule, the way many churches follow the revised common lectionary.

Jesus combines Isaiah 61:1-2a
"The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners; to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor."

And Isaiah 58:6
"To loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?" (Jesus leaves out words about vengeance.)

• The year of the Lord's Favor!

This is Luke's version of Jesus public ministerial debut. Just as for John who opens Jesus' public ministry with a party (on the third day, because?), it's also in his Galileean hometown, a working class place full of thieves, robbers, petty criminals, and gentiles! This passage highlights Luke's themes of Holy Spirit, the marginalized, the underprivileged.

• The year of the Lord's Favor!

Jesus tells his listeners right now, today, this Isaiah text has been fulfilled. Jesus mentions the year of the Lord's favor, the Jubilee 50th year – 7 years times 7 – from Leviticus 25: debts cancelled, captives released; although the land kept sabbath every seven years, during the jubilee that's not only holy to the Lord, but "holy to you" (that's us, the Lord's people), no pruning or extra harvesting. Plus, although all the land belongs to God, in the jubilee year fields will return to their original stakeholders.

And why? Leviticus 25:38 explains, "I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan, to be your God."

During Advent we hear Mary's Magnificat, also from Luke's gospel where Jesus' mother announces great leveling and immense reversals of have-nots gaining essentials for life, with those who have-a-lot in a material sense losing some of their wealth in a massive re-distribution.

• The year of the Lord's Favor!

During Advent and at other times we sing Canticle of the Turning that paraphrases Mary's words. Jesus' announcement of himself as God's justice and restoration embodied picks up on Mary's themes of distributive justice and equality. Mary would have known Hannah's song from 1 Samuel 2:1-10 so well she could riff on it.

• The year of the Lord's Favor!

The year of the Lord's favor! A life that still would include usual stressors of family, work, decisions, disappointments, but it would be so much lighter because everyone would have enough money, no debts, enough good food and housing, reliable health care. Wouldn't the Lord's favor be a reason for a jubilee celebration?!

How does this gospel text call and claim us? To announce and enact the year of the Lord's favor?!

The Spirit of the Lord is upon us…

• The year of the Lord's Favor! Jubilee!

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Five Minute Friday :: Effort

• Five Minute Friday :: Effort Linkup

Sometimes "Just do it!" is the best strategy. Sometimes we need to "try, try, try." Some days we can finish tasks almost on autopilot and do them well. Other days our best effort – even bordering on superhuman – yields next to nothing.

I've created about a dozen versions of my header collage. The first featured a girl looking down with nothing in her hands. Today it's a pair of the most recent. On the edge of a wooden fence that maybe hides new construction, a renovation, or a future surprise, she's managed to gather scattered flowers whilst at the same time she deftly balances herself.

We've all been to school, done homework and housework, had workplace projects to start and often finish. In general a moderate amount of effort gets the best results. Try too hard? Most people get tied up in knots. You become so involved you almost don't distinguish between you (the doer), and the required job (that hopefully becomes the done). Don't make much effort or even sit back and snooze? Nothing happens because there's zero connection between you and what needs doing.

Back to my illustration. Do you think she tried hard, didn't try at all, or something "other" in order to gather all those flowers together and keep cool holding them? I don't recall the situation we were discussing, but it must have been something I had trouble beginning or finishing when my therapist advised me simply to "let it happen the way grace happens."

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Epiphany 2C

Intro

Tony Campolo, "The kingdom of God is a party." Not like a party, not some semblance of a celebration, but the reign of heaven on earth is the real thing.

This is MLK weekend. The USA and many other countries have been impacted with frightening political, social, and economic uncertainties. Unprecedented wildfires have leveled Los Angeles area neighborhoods. Wars and other armed conflicts simmer and explode across the globe.

John 2:1-11

¹ On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. ² Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. ³ When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, "They have no wine." ⁴ And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come." ⁵ His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."

⁶ Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. ⁷ Jesus said to them, "Fill the jars with water." And they filled them up to the brim. ⁸ He said to them, "Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward." So they took it.

⁹ When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom ¹⁰ and said to him, "Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the best wine until now."

¹¹ Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

Background

So far in this year of grace and season of revelation we've waited for God in our midst, we've been awed at the nativity of the infant Savior, we've met visitors from the East bearing gifts, we've joined a crowd alongside the Jordan.

After his riverside baptism by his cousin John the Baptist that all four gospels include, each gospel brings us a different version of Jesus' first act of public ministry. How can that be? Most likely they all happened around the same time, but each writer chose a particular one because it fit their perspective better.

The community surrounding John the beloved disciple writes about Jesus' signs rather than miracles. A miracle implies suspension of natural laws (which sometimes is the case, and sometimes there is a logical explanation), but a sign points beyond itself to a place, event, person, or idea—in this case, to Jesus. The Greek here is like our word semiotic that relates to signs, symbols, meanings. This gospel includes seven signs and seven "I Am" statements from Jesus. In Hebrew numerology, seven is the number of perfection or completion.


New Creation

In Matthew and Luke, after incarcerated John the Baptist wonders about Jesus being "the one who is to come," Jesus replies "go tell John what you see and hear: blind see; lame walk; diseased become clean; dead are raised! poor receive good news."

• Luke 7:20-22

• Matthew 11:2-5

These events fulfill John's signs.

John's gospel brings us the most explicit new creation.

• In the beginning … God –Genesis 1:1
• In the beginning … was the word –John 1:1

logos, word connotes both origin (where this came from) and immanence (what this might become). Does that sound theological?

On the seventh day God finished the work. –Genesis 2:2
"It is finished!" –John 19:30

• And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden… –Genesis 2:8

The garden of Jesus' burial and resurrection becomes the new garden of Eden

• Now there was a garden in the place where Jesus was crucified, and in the garden was a new tomb in which no one ever had been laid. And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there. –John 9:41-42

The first day of the week is the eighth day of creation, the first day of the new creation.

• Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. –John 20:1
• Supposing him [Jesus] to be the gardener… –John 20:15b

Of the four canonical gospels, John brings us the most fully realized eschatology (protology is the word about first things, about origins; eschatology is the word about last things, about conclusions)—the clearest right here and right now of the reign of heaven on earth. A wedding party perfectly fits that worldview!


Today's Good News

This reading begins, "On the third day." In that place and time, the third day – Tuesday – was considered the best day for a wedding. But as Easter people, we also recognize the third day as the day of resurrection that initiates the new creation. And back then and there, an extravagant wedding party where everyone gets more than the dayenu or "it would have been enough" of the Passover song would be a primary indicator of the messianic age.

Cana in Galilee was disreputable gentile territory known for thieves and petty criminals. This wedding was not at an elite venue or an aspirational destination. Jesus performed this sign among regular, ordinary, working class people. Most of the guests and reception attendants probably lived nearby; some may have worked in the vineyard.

A wedding is an occasion to party; a wedding brings families together and gathers a community in one place for a single purpose. Whatever is happening elsewhere in the world, a wedding hopes for and promises a future. The couple getting married trusts that a future will arrive.

This isn't the old band Canned Heat Going Up the Country singing about "where the water tastes like wine." This is water that has become wine, and "you have kept the best wine until now!" –John 2:10


Where We Live

At the start of his public ministry Jesus attends a party and makes the party even better, in a preview of the rest of his time on earth. But two thousand years after Jesus' death and resurrection, we still experience death, disease, destruction, deadly fires, nations at war, a threat of government that is not by the people, of the people, or for the people.

Evidently a recent article in The Atlantic informed readers we need to party more. It was behind a paywall and no one provided a summary, but I agree.

After the 911 attack on the World Trade Center, although we didn't exactly rejoice with a block party, two days later on Thursday evening several churches in our neighborhood gathered to celebrate Eucharist, a meal with the risen Christ. Here's one of my reflections about it:

• 911 :: 22 years later

Literally in spite of everything we glanced into all creation healed and whole. We briefly lived in that future moment God dreams of and calls us to help create. Did you know the chasuble the person presiding at Eucharist vests in is the wedding garment of the messianic feast?

To paraphrase Cornel West, "We are people of hope. Why do we party on Friday night? Why do we go to church on Sunday?"

Because the Kingdom of God, the Reign of Heaven is a party!

Gardenias

Five Minute Friday :: Satisfied

• Five Minute Friday :: Satisfied Linkup

Intro

Satisfaction happens after a meal so abundant and delicious it fills your body and your senses. A person becomes satisfied after discussing a problem or conflict in enough detail and clarity to resolve it and move foreword in the situation or relationship. A well-crafted durable item is satisfactory for the use we hoped it would fit.

This is the second week of a new year and the first Five Minute Friday of 2025. Readers of this blog probably know I'm a theology geek and a church geek. With a worldwide plethora of church styles, traditions, denominations, etc., with the confusion of how to interpret scriptural passages about polity, organization, and structure – even with different perspectives on the authority of scripture – how can we interact with churches other than our own, or does scripture allow us to do so?

Magisterial Reformers Martin Luther (especially via Philip Melanchthon) and John Calvin had simple criteria for the presence of the church in any place, in any time.

• "The Church is the congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered. And to the true unity of the Church it is enough to agree concerning the doctrine of the Gospel and the administration of the Sacraments. Nor is it necessary that human traditions, that is, rites or ceremonies, instituted by men, should be everywhere alike. As Paul says: One faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, etc. Ephesians 4, 5. 6." Philipp Melanchthon, Augsburg Confession, Article 7.

• "Wherever we see the Word of God sincerely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there, it is not to be doubted, a church of God exists." John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Vol. 4, chapter 1, section 9.

2025 :: Satisfaction

Augsburg Confession, Article 7, Satis est "It is enough; it is sufficient, it satisfies."

Cool church stuff. But at this start of another new year that will take us 25% of the way through what once was an exciting new century we loved to call Y2K, what satisfies me? What suffices for me? What amounts to a full life, not a simple broken existence? Or can I ever be satisfied?

In his struggles, the Apostle Paul heard the Savior's assurance, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." [2 Corinthians 9:12] But how is "grace sufficient" or satisfactory for Paul, for any of us?

Yesterday I wrote to my star word for this year, Possibility. We can go on and on about spirituality, about feelings and thoughts, but we live in bodies that contain and express spiritual, gracious, thoughtful, and emotional realities. Without those are bodies are incomplete, but without a body they don't have a home, a place to reside. This material reality of substance is so central, the biblical story of creation [Genesis 1 and 2] opens with veggies, plants, trees (sun and water) to nurture bodies of animal and human critters. Agriculture becomes the material foundation of everything! At the end of the bible we read about the New Jerusalem coming down from heaven to earth [Revelation 21:2] and the river of life, trees of life with healing fruit [Revelation 22:1-2].

In the creeds we "believe in the resurrection of the body."

I need, I seek, I want, I long for a bodily and physically abundant life. A life with people, buildings, places, activities, and pets. An embodied reality that welcomes feelings and thoughts and ideas.

News of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch. When Barnabas came and saw the grace of God, he rejoiced, and he encouraged them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast devotion. Acts 11:22-23

With his senses Barnabas saw the grace of God. He didn't hear a disembodied heavenly choir. It wasn't an imaginary apparition. It wasn't even a properly performed liturgy. He saw a caring community of people acting in Jesus' name to provide shelter, food, and other physical necessities. Practicing the forgiveness that generates new life.

Barnabas saw grace at Antioch.

When and where do you see, hear, taste, touch, and smell grace?

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Star Word 2025 :: Possibility

The alphabet (recolored by me) for my header
came from Birds&Plants by daria_miazhevich
on Creative Market in 2016.

• Pray • Remember • Imagine •

Choosing or being given a star word to light a path during the new year has become a popular Epiphany tradition. In the same way a star guided visitors from the East to the home of the infant Savior, a single word can help focus our journey.

After I asked for a star word on Twitter and on BlueSky; Heather on BlueSky linked to her church website that offered star words; Possibility felt inspired and just right.

Every time I read an article that reminds us it takes a village and often details how the writer got where they are today only because of people who supported them, who had their back most days, and who suggested and steered them to appropriate opportunities, again I wonder where's my village?

Other substacks and blogs talk about how people blossom and bloom and thrive when they have people who believe in them, encourage their gifts, celebrate their presence.

I still try to tease out some cause and effect for where I am and the realistic goals for participating and contributing I haven't reached, but whatever I did, they did, you did, or any of us neglected to do, unless I can find my village, my tribe, it will be more of the same, it will be more weeks, months, years, of a very occasional pickup gig.

Haven't I said people have come out on the other side of far worse than I've been through, yet many whose lives have been disrupted less than mine haven't made it back?

What do I want? Mainstream society and mainline church.

And I keep discovering I yearn for such routine aspects of everyday I never seriously thought about them before.

For one example, the longing I felt when someone on social media referred to a day as a "scorcher." Those used to happen during summers when life and people and ideas and possibilities surrounded me.

What's possible for 2025?

Settled housing—almost the least of everything. Music, art, and theology opportunities—but only if I find my tribe. Routine, mundane, everyday intensities like scorching hot days, body aching tiredness, lunches with friends, classes to teach, projects to design, rainy afternoons, early mornings and…?

I remember. I pray and I beg. I imagine it will happen. But hey, those pleasures that say I'm actually alive go along with mainstream society and mainline church.

Pray • Remember • Imagine