Fellow Brooders, Welcome!

Sometimes I brood over inconsequential trivia. Sometimes I wrestle with big questions, issues, and calling.

I cannot lead someone else's tribe. I cannot even throw stones at it or its leaders. I really will not because stones are always reciprocated back and forth and, as they fall, they only build walls.

I think we ought to be walking in the direction of more projectiles that can hurt us with nothing in our hands.

Authentic church is not about protecting ourselves from attack.

Authentic church welcomes outside criticism and neutralizes it with love and truth.

That takes courage and conviction.

Authentic church is about being the body of Jesus in the world the way Jesus was and is in the world. I can criticize my tribe because they are my stewardship, because they listen, because I love them, and because I believe in what they can be.

So --- I may have a word to say about decaying and declining elements of culture, but understand me --- they are the backdrop of our discipleship. We are not shaped into who we must be , we cannot be shaped, by our reactions to culture.

What we are becoming, by grace, if we are so becoming, is what we were becoming yesterday and the day before. The contrasts look different depending upon the shapes and colors in the background, but we are who we are becoming ... not just what we are and were.

We --- the people of God, individually and in community.

Now ... my brood :

How do I get that across and involve more people in being authentic church and shaping our lives by the example, presence, redemption, and life-giving power of God in Jesus Christ?

Easy answers --- not needed ... simple intention, affirmed .....

Fellow brooders, WELCOME!

I am feeling both frustrated and

Brothers and sisters, let us love God and ...

Let us love one another and .... Hopeful.

... our neighbors as ourselves.

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Some Quotes from Authentic Folks

God put me on earth to do a certain number of things.
Right now I'm so far behind I'll never die.
-- Calvin in Calvin & Hobbes, by Bill Waterson

Grace and healing are communicated through the vulnerability of men and women who have been fractured and heartbroken by life." -- Brennan Manning, Abba's Child

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.
-- Scott Adams

You can observe a lot by watching. -- Yogi Berra

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. - Mark Twain

How will I know what I think
until I see what I write? -Lewis Carroll

Sometimes I lie awake at night and ask, "Why me?" Then a voice answers, "Nothing personal, your name just happened to come up." -- Charlie Brown in Peanuts, by Charles Schultz

"We live in a busy world but there's a difference between empty fatigue and gratifying tiredness. Invest in the things you deeply care about." - Eugene Cho

"Small is the number of people who see with their eyes and think with their minds." ~ Albert Einstein

The best thing about the future is that it only comes one day at a time. - Abraham Lincoln

The best vision is insight. - Malcolm S. Forbes

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it. - Theodore Roosevelt

"Willingness implies a surrendering of one’s self-separateness, an entering into, an immersion in the deepest processes of life itself. It is a realization that one already is a part of some ultimate cosmic process and it is a commitment to participation in that process. In contrast, willfulness is the setting of oneself apart from the fundamental essence of life in an attempt to master, direct, control, or otherwise manipulate existence. More simply, willingness is saying yes to the mystery of being alive in each moment. Willfulness is saying no, or perhaps more commonly, ‘yes, but…’"

"But willingness and willfulness do not apply to specific things or situations. They reflect instead the underlying attitude one has toward the wonder of life itself. Willingness notices this wonder and bows in some kind of reverence to it. Willfulness forgets it, ignores it, or at its worse, actively tries to destroy it. Thus willingness can sometimes seem very active and assertive, even aggressive. And willfulness can appear in the guise of passivity. Political revolution is a good example." — Gerald May

"Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience." - Ralph Waldo Emerson