Autumn morning

Today The early morning is quiet Gone are the constant buzzes The unceasing hums Of cicadas  That for the last month or so Have announced The shortening of days The lengthening of nights The deepening of darkness Surrounding the golden moments  Of Summer’s ending light The lone chickadee Chirping the morning news From the branch … Continue reading Autumn morning

The Heart of the Wilderness: Third in a series for Season of Creation 2020

Like so many people, when I was in grade school, I had to memorize and perform poetry.  And like so many students along the way, in the fifth grade, I memorized and performed the words of Robert Frost, from probably his best-known poem, Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening.   Whose woods these are I think … Continue reading The Heart of the Wilderness: Third in a series for Season of Creation 2020

Held

Today the prophet Micah Spoke to me Asking me to consider deeply What it means to love kindness And all I could think about was  Holding the world Holding God’s people Holding you What does it mean to hold someone Or everyone Is it a form of mercy Or compassion Or tenderness If I am … Continue reading Held

From Doom…to Hope

Last week I encountered a feeling that I never, ever imagined that I could feel, and the encounter left me feeling shaken and uncertain in a time of uncertainty.  I felt doom.  Doom.  As Dictionary.com defines, I felt “unavoidable ill fortune” and for a moment or two or a hundred, I did not see any way or anything … Continue reading From Doom…to Hope

Extravagant Hospitality

A Sermon for June 14, 2020 First United Methodist, Parkersburg, WV Genesis 18:1-15 I remember very little about my maternal grandmother, Ruby Mae Arthurs Oliphant.  When I was quite young, she suffered several strokes and spent the last five years of her life bedridden, unable to talk or communicate.  My mother said that really, she had not … Continue reading Extravagant Hospitality

I Walked A Labyrinth

Yesterday, the news reports of the lynching of George Floyd filled my newsfeed and my head and heart. I longed for words to cry out, to demand justice, to scream STOP! NO MORE! I wanted words to proclaim that we cannot continue to allow this brutality to happen to our Black brothers and sisters. No … Continue reading I Walked A Labyrinth