Articles from March 2017

Today’s calendar word is ‘plant’. I’m thinking it was meant as a verb. O well, nouns are words too!

It appears that today’s word ’empower’ might need 2 photos.

The sciency part of me thinks about the fact that the sun is the source of the vast majority of the energy we need and use – plants, animals, wind, solar, rain, hydroelectric, even petroleum can all trace their origin back to the sun’s energy. Hence the sun and tree silhouette shot.

And the humanities part of me ponders the power of a centered mind, a strong spirit, will and determination. Hence the well lit yoga mat.

What actually empowers us to live, and grow, and change?
Maybe the sun is the easier one to grok, and the mind and spirit are the surprising one…

“Never-the-less, she persisted!”

When I think of ‘praise’ in a religious context, it seems to be a about singing, worship, prayer, music, stuff like that, directed to God. But when I think about ‘praise’ otherwise, like praising a child, that seems to be about paying a compliment, celebrating an accomplishment, observing a gift, or offering some kind of encouragement to another, which hopefully lifts them up in some way. It is an act of friendship, support, and encouragement.

If I think about ‘praise’ in this second way, does that not better describe how God treats me than how I treat God?
So wait! Who is praising who?

And if that’s not enough to perplex you, this short church video should be plenty confusing if you recognize the tune!!
(And no, I didn’t record this video today, but it works for today’s theme. I make the rules here.)

Thus spake I.

I was cutting up dried apricots for my granola and thinking about today’s word “share”. So I divided my fruit into two nice even piles, you know, for sharing. Then I thought “the word is not ‘even’ or ‘fair’, it’s ‘share’. Maybe there’s good sharing and less good kinds of sharing. What would sharing 10% look like? So I rearranged the apricots like this, to keep me pondering for a while.

“to sleep, perchance to dream”
My night time view. From left to right: Sunrise alarm clock, charging watch, old clock radio. Phone would be there too, but it’s taking the picture.

I’m not sure if it’s brilliant or ridiculous that making mistakes is one of the best ways of learning. 

Today’s word is “Reflect”, which I’ve taken very literally. This is a small room with a mirror, no photo-shopping or image editing performed. I found the reflecting rather disorienting. Does reflecting often do that?

Today’s calendar word is “appreciate”. It seems I could have gone a lot of ways with this, but I’ll choose just one direction. I have great appreciation for the Meewasin Valley trail system, which I can get to just a few blocks from our home. In Saskatoon, and extending out from Saskatoon, there are over 80 km of trails, along both sides of the South Saskatchewan River, making the river and it’s environs accessible to the public. Probably I should choose a lovely photo of some wooded stretch or other photogenic location, but I’m choosing a photo that includes steel structures, partly to highlight the lengths the city has gone to make our trail walking and riding possible. The stairs in this photo take the walker up to a high train bridge with a pedestrian path over the river.

So that’s the photo I took today for the word “appreciate”. But please allow me to add 2 more photos from along the Meewasin trail. I actually took these several years ago, and took them months apart, which will be obvious. I like the contrast between these two “identical” shots.

Today’s calendar word(s) is “Be True”, which left me unfocused. What does that even mean? I thought of Shakespeare’s “to thine own self be true“, or of the fraud warning about something being “too good to be true“, but I settled on the idea of being true to your calling. So this picture is our church semi-annual membership meeting, where I would argue we discuss and decide what it means to be true to our mission and calling.

So many of layers of today’s word “Decide” going on here, but for a change, I’m not going to explain them all. Or any of them. 🙂
Location credits to Create Cafe. Model credits to Wes Froese.