Posts with the category “advent-2022”

What are your favorite Christmas Eve or Christmas Day traditions? Is there a particular cookie that you always eat first? Is there a certain tie that you wear every year to the Christmas Eve service? To spark a return to the eternal debate: do you open your presents on Christmas Eve, Christmas morning, or Christmas afternoon?While I have a variety of traditions that others might share, I also have...  Read More

As Lucy stepped around Xav’s toys and carried the old cardboard box into the dining room, she did not know that this would be the last year she would light the candles...  Read More

I’ve enjoyed working with the kids on every play that we have performed, but of course one play has to be my favorite...  Read More

When home begins to fill with the varied wonderful smells of baking cookies, Christmas memories come flooding back...  Read More

How do you rejoice? I often think of rejoicing as a musical activity, done by singers or instrumentalists...  Read More

You must sing your own song and rejoice. I can’t just copy, paste, I must sing with my own voice...  Read More

Advent is a preparation for Christmas, which is a time of celebration and rejoicing...  Read More

Arise, shine, for your light has come. It can be difficult to shine sometimes...  Read More

"Have you seen the box with the Christmas decorations?"  Read More

Let’s move on to 2019. For the second time, the kids chose to create a play that wasn’t just the Christmas story...  Read More

Creates the artist and next to them Fate, wicked, stands...  Read More

At 10 a.m. on February 15th, 1945, the sandstone support pillars that had been holding up the Frauenkirche in Dresden finally gave in...  Read More

It glimmers, distant, a far off lantern/Beyond the furthest mountain,/Nearly lost amongst the stars.  Read More

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowly state of his servant...  Read More

While singing in Christmas at Luther in my freshman year, I got the chance to experience a traditional part of the Christmas service from a unique perspective...  Read More

Lucy ducked her head against the cold wind as she trudged across campus to her dorm...  Read More

After a successful two years, the plays started to grow from just retellings of the Christmas story in a different setting, to fully embracing the weird and wonderful ideas of the kids...  Read More

I am the only one that can put the lights on the Christmas tree...  Read More

Our arrival in Chiang Mai in the northwest of Thailand highlighted how busy the city was...  Read More

Into the world we are sent...  Read More

We are encouraged to act with the spirit of the Lord that is with us, to not judge by what we see or hear, but to work for the goodness of all...  Read More

For the fifth time in a single day, I had to stand, silent and unmoving...  Read More

"Weef! Weef!" three-year-old Lucy shouted with joy. "Okay, just a moment," her mother carefully stepped around the excited child...  Read More

Each year, I work with the kids and youth to put together a kids Christmas play. Since 2010...  Read More

How much snow did you get yesterday? As adults, we see every inch for the work it'll take to clear off of our sidewalks...  Read More

It was a cold, rainy afternoon in Rouen, France. I was standing at an overlook on La Côte Sainte Catherine. Even just getting to the overlook had been a challenge...  Read More

Barren pines keep watch  Read More

Psalm 122 comes with the superscription "A Song of Ascents." This is likely in reference to pilgrims ascending up the hill to the sanctuary in Jerusalem.  Read More

Starting next Sunday, November 27th, each day will feature a unique piece of original writing every morning at 7am  Read More