All Gods Creatures

As my daughter was driving on that road to a family gathering, she saw a little ball of fur in the road. She stopped to investigate.Here it was, a little kitten, still alive, but unable to move one leg as it had started to freeze. She picked it up, brought it to the family gathering, and discovered that it was very much alive.So the little kitty was cleaned up, fed, and given a once-over by the crowd. As she lay on my grandson's shoulder, cuddling in his neck, it was obvious that this was her lucky day!She began to play with my 3-year-old great-grandson, running up and down the hall trying to catch a blanket that he was pulling. You may also be disappointed to know that this little kitten is now at home in Baltimore, having flown with the family back home.Please in the future, either don't have any animals, or, if you need to part with one, take it to a place where people care, such as the Hawk Creek Animal Shelter.Maybe you will find a piece of black coal in your stocking this Christmas, or better yet, a new feeling in your heart for God's creatures, of which you are one. There is a song that talks about how "All God's Creatures Have a Place in the Choir."Something to think about. If you are not a "believer" there are still such attributes as kindness, decency, compassion, and just plain good old common sense.Irene WallinWillmar...

He was speaking with me, but his eyes were focused to his side, where he seemed to be studying a future that seemed much too stark. Sometimes people want to be consoled or at least do not resent it, yet they cannot take their eyes from the terrors they see coming.He was back in the hospital in what is sometimes called a swing bed. Aptly named because his future might go either way. Maybe he will get better and be able to return home. Maybe not. Maybe this room or someplace like it will be home for the rest of his life.AdvertisementWe talked about living day to day, about putting one’s trust and confidence in the Lord. I would have said that this is what our faith is all about. We ready ourselves for the coming trials, which no man or woman can avoid. We put our trust not in ourselves but in the Lord.My friend listened, but he also repeated a story, something that his friend Russell had said to him. They were visiting shortly before Russell had died of cancer but not long after the dying farmer had had to bury his son.“Father,” my friend said, “Russell came to see me, shortly before he died, and he said to me, ‘You know, they say that God never gives you more than you can handle, but I don’t know. I just don’t know.’ Father, Russell was as good of a Baptist as a man could be. I don’t know what that counts for, but it’s got to count for something. And if a Baptist, as good as Russell was, could ask that, well, it worries me. I’m not that strong. Maybe God does give us more than we can handle. Maybe not, but a person’s got to ask.”The Scriptures insist that no man or woman can grow so powerful, so rich, as to live securely in face of the future.“Yes, a person’s got to ask,” I replied. “And a person’s got to pray.”“But that’s my other problem. I can’t seem to pray. I can’t focus.”“St. Teresa of Avila said that those are our be...

It is given through the practice of singing the songs themselves. The defining practices of the Christian community and the defining nature of our humanness as expressed in the presence of God can be found in the sequence of Psalms 104, 105, 106, and 107. Psalm 104 displays the practice of wonder and awe that issues in exuberant praise. Psalm 105 displays the act of remembering God’s good actions that move us to glad obedience. Psalm 106 displays the act of remembering our own waywardness that situates us honestly in our need and hope for God’s rescue. Psalm 107 displays the act of gratitude that specifically names the occasions of God’s transformative fidelity and our response with material gratitude. The four liturgic actions—praise, readiness for obedience, readiness for rescue, and thanks (to which other like actions can be readily added)—together constitute a rendering of humanness as it is given in the biblical tradition and as it may be performed in worship. These dimensions of humanness, which are embraced as they are performed, amount to a world of gift that refuses the more conventional and pervasive world of commodity. The momentary departure from the world of commodity in worship requires a practice of imagination and emotional emancipation that together defy the tight calculus of market ideology. They also defy the kind of reasoned talk in which many Christians are wont to engage in worship. Singing is artistry that entails a kind of freedom that resists analytic control. Singing is, by the way of the world, quite unreasonable, and bears witness to an alternative reality. Thus, an answer to “Why do we sing?” is that in singing we may evidence and enact our God-given humanness, which is marked by bodily freedom, by uncensored articulation, and by full-person engagement. Israel has known this in its dancing and singing since Miriam defied Pharaoh (see Exod. 15:20–21). The early church knew this in Pentecost, whi...