No, as much as I loved their music, this post won’t focus on the Grateful Dead band and their fans. Sorry to all the deadheads, but the allusion is unavoidable for a 60s child! A few years ago, we prepped our house and yard for an overnight visit from my sister, her husband, and her friend, and I got the task of “deadheading” our Iceberg roses in the front yard. Icebergs produce abundant white roses, but flowers die and need to be pruned for new blooms to blossom. Hence the name “deadhead.” The process is to…
Read MoreMidnight Whispers
Possibly like some of you, my spiritual state moves up and down. Oh, I always believe in Jesus as my Savior and Lord and follow and serve Him, but the sense of closeness ebbs and flows. And frankly, I usually have no clue why, but I have learned some about the process. Two months ago, I was riding high spiritually. The last several weeks, not so much. God was there, I had no doubt, but the sense of intimacy wasn’t there. Then, after an excellent family Christmas and a marvelous Christmas worship service, God wooed me back with whispers in the night. It came with…
Read MoreGod's All-Seeing Eye
Some of us see distances well, but not up close. Others see the opposite. This past June, our Gray Hogs group rode the Sierra passes, and one particularly struck me: Tioga crossed the mountains from Yosemite to Lee Vining, because it demonstrated our need for multiple perspectives. The pics above show the massive domes of Tioga, and the delicate wildflowers along the road. We best got the sense of the domes and rocks from a distance, and had to get up close to the wildflowers. We tend to be limited to one perspective at a time. But God…
Read MoreMix Christmas Up a Bit!
We can so easily get into a rut, especially at Christmas. We know what we want, and keep doing it until it becomes a habit, and habits tend to dull our senses. We react automatically. Well, maybe we should mix Xmas up a bit and expand how we celebrate it. Like, with palms as Christmas trees. After all, I don’t remember seeing Douglas Firs in manger scenes. 😉 We had a nice discussion on Facebook about changes…
Read MoreFree Will?
Let’s flip the coin. Last week, we began to explore God’s role in daily life with a story of how he overwhelmingly directed a major change in moving me to Taos. One repeated response by readers dealt with the rarity of such clear direction. Though seldom for many of us, it does happen. But my time in Taos ended in a radically opposite form. I’d spent a year in youth ministry a few years earlier, and upon getting fired, declared I’d rather…
Read MoreDeterminism?
We all face critical change points, events that significantly shape the rest of our lives. What puzzles me, though, is life determined for people of faith? Simplistically, some, like Calvinists, lean toward God choosing all. Arminians blend free will into the mix, and deists acknowledge that alt hough God created the world, he has little involvement in daily operations. For me, one of the three greatest change points came with my move to Taos NM in 1974. I’m absolutely clear that God
Read MoreGive a Little
Some of the best experiences of my life have come when I knew enough to compromise. A ride from four years back with Rich Klinsky, above at Michael’s Restaurant in Taos, provides an example. We go back a long time, growing up at the same church in Long Beach CA, and began riding together as soon as I got a bike 51 years ago. He usually rides a Harley, I usually ride a Honda, but we’re close. Honest. But…
Read MoreBrushy Stream Lessons
From his grandfather, Dad learned the art of catching trout on the Weber River in the Utah mountains, and passed it on to me in the Sierras, beginning on Shepherds Creek, just south of Independence in the Owens Valley. Featuring a narrow stream with a lot of brush and few trees, Shepherds doesn’t favor beginners, especially with the 9 ft. bamboo fly rod Dad wielded. Now, you can’t…
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