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Jury duty today. Not very convenient, but I’m grateful to contribute what I can for a fair and just process.

Amazing that I could video chat my brother in the DRC today via WhatsApp. So grateful. Family is important.

Okay, okay. I can get behind this.

🎙 The Daily Office from Trinity Mission for those days when you need say the Office on the go, or if you just want to hear someone else read the Scriptures! Here’s why I pray the Daily Office.

90 minutes of retreat

I stared at this
Fountain
And hanging flowers
For an hour.

I was glad and grateful
For the hummingbird
That hovered by for a drink.

I saw his shadow first.
When he appeared it was a shock
Of joy

And there was something healing in it.

Then I walked in sunshine
to sit with Our Lady,
Mary, who always comforts me.

There, I spoke to Jesus
and gave thanks
For the breath of
Fresh air.

Enough by @patrickrhone is free for Amazon Prime members right now. This book is so great if you–like me–are constantly struggling with the intersection of technology and a more considered life. Here’s my full review.

I do not regret checking out of the 24 hour news cycle.

If you grew up Christian in America there’s a very good chance you do not know the beliefs and practices of the people who followed Jesus in the first three to four hundred years after the resurrection. I’ll say it that starkly because I know many of you have given up on what you think Christians believe and practice, and for good reason, for what you have heard and seen is a distortion and sometimes an outright lie, and I want to tell you that there’s very good news: the God confessed by the first Christians is beautiful and good and the practices and rhythms and beliefs of those early Christ followers have not been lost. Keep seeking. Do not give up. Jesus Christ is worthy of worship and his way will teach you how to truly love the world and everyone and everything in it.

• Fr. Kenneth Tanner, Church of the Holy Redeemer, Rochester Hills, MI

Until Christ comes again, he has left us with his word. And so we, God’s people in the “time in between,” attend to it. We preach it. We proclaim it. We meditate on it. We share it. We do all this because God has put his almighty power in it. In its proclamation souls are saved, hopes are revived, sagging spirits are strengthened.

Saleska, T. E. (2001). Third Sunday after the Epiphany, Year C. In The lectionary commentary: theological exegesis for Sunday’s texts, volume one (p. 256). Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the church. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson and the great grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and through fear of being nonconformists.

• MLK