To Do the Best with What We Have A Classic Michael Spencer Post From January 2008 The following incident is fictionalized from real experience. I look at my watch. It’s time for a counseling appointment. I clear my desk, bring in the extra chairs and wait. My appointment arrives and the conversation begins. This isContinue reading “iMonk Classic: To Do the Best with What We Have”
Category Archives: Meditations
A Thought for a Snowy Day
As I sit at home today watching the snow fall outside the window and anticipating the coldest temperatures we have seen around here for decades, I came across this thought that I consider worth contemplating. The reduction of faith to practice has not enriched faith; it has impoverished it. It has let practice itself becomeContinue reading “A Thought for a Snowy Day”
Simply Living
A man knows when he has found his vocation when he stops thinking about how to live and begins to live. – Thomas Merton Thoughts In Solitude * * * Most of my life, I’ve been waiting to live. The pattern has been like this: seasons of thinking about what it means to live and waitingContinue reading “Simply Living”
Adding Our Two Cents’ Worth
I had two things on my calendar yesterday besides my normal work day responsibilities: one was a dentist appointment and the other a church council (board) meeting. My visit to the dentist was just a cleaning and check-up (hallelujah). The council meeting involved dealing with our church budget for 2014. I’ll tell you right fromContinue reading “Adding Our Two Cents’ Worth”
A Sudden Burst of Light
So he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” – Genesis 32:27 * * * If you’re lucky, there comes a moment, a moment of clarity. At this moment, “the hopes and fears of all the years” find some resolution. It involves an unveiling. Heavy drapes of self-denial are rentContinue reading “A Sudden Burst of Light”
Today’s Mea Culpa
There I was, sitting at his bedside. This was a different kind of patient than those I normally see. He has been homeless. He has been in prison, convicted of a crime that disturbs me, one for which I can find little sympathy in my heart. I don’t know any details about his law-breaking, andContinue reading “Today’s Mea Culpa”
If You Are Not Afraid, You Are Not Human
Hello. My name is Mike, and I am afraid. I am afraid of life, and I am afraid of life’s end. I am afraid of being alone, and I am afraid of being with people. I am afraid of hatred and I am afraid of love. Truth and beauty frighten me even as I delightContinue reading “If You Are Not Afraid, You Are Not Human”
My Own Desert Places
They cannot scare me with their empty places Between stars — on stars where no human race is. I have it in me so much nearer home To scare myself with my own desert places. – Robert Frost, “Desert Places” One temptation is to think the wilderness is without — a place, a geography, aContinue reading “My Own Desert Places”
Enjoying an Abnormal Normal
When a friend calls to me from the road And slows his horse to a meaning walk, I don’t stand still and look around On all the hills I haven’t hoed, And shout from where I am, “What is it?” No, not as there is a time to talk. I thrust my hoe in theContinue reading “Enjoying an Abnormal Normal”
As I Have Loved You…
When he had gone out, Jesus said, ‘Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will lookContinue reading “As I Have Loved You…”
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