Bees in My Bonnet

Living in shadows becomes my habit To shelter from life in murky grey I feel the in-between - Seeing visions of day I still prefer The hidden space, a comfort from blinding light Seeking to uncover, reveal, unravel Inner workings that would widen my sight Perhaps too far Too broad Beyond what I know. Bravely I step away from hiding - Boldly embrace the light of day - Cast off fear and donning courage Open my eyes and see there is more... A work to undertake, A journey to make - The pathway is for the bold, daring, foolhardy. All caution disdained I set my face like flint Embark to see, to know, to discover How light shall not frighten How Truth is a person How I can become free in the light Known in love Embraced in Truth. Living in shadows has its time, its space But its work is to shield what can't be seen Until such time as vision grows, heals And light invites the courageous to enter.

Three weeks ago, Caleb and Priscilla were baptized. I was privileged to share a few thoughts beforehand. Here is what I said: Two words sum up what I am about to tell you: Legacy and Royalty.  Each of you getting baptized today has been handed a legacy of spiritual commitment. None of you were born with faith in Christ, but you were taught it: shaped by it.  This is your spiritual  legacy .  But mere exposure does not make a Christian. The Queen of England was eligible for her role because of her royal birth.  But sometimes one who might become King or Queen decides to go after something else – they choose to step away from the calling to the throne, and pursue their own desires.  It was over a year between the time the queen became officially queen and when she was publicly crowned in a coronation ceremony.  You have been a child of God since the day you put your trust in Jesus.  But today you are making it public – you are dedicating you...

This is what I wrote just a week ago, on Dad's 77th birthday. Tuesday, 3rd January, 2017 Today Dad would've been 77 years old - and he would tell me that he had attained perfection eleven times over (7 being the number of perfection)!  The grief and missing him comes in waves - tears cannot be restrained and emerge when I'm alone, driving to pick up kids or wishing I could watch him blow out candles on the traditional Crutchfield birthday cake. Last year I decided to form my year around 3 words - to orient me, to clarify where I was at or what was/were going to be my theme(s).  I found myself with an uncanny (and unusual, for me) drive to clean - toothpick clean - and found cleaning to be both therapeutic and frustrating at the same time.  The word "CLEANING" emerged for me as a picture of much needed backlog of internal soul-work that had been left untouched. I had prayed for God to lead me to the three words I needed for the year.  And on the threshold of...

One day the Streammaker decided a certain mountain needed a stream.  He opened up the heavens, poured down the rain and soon enough a great torrent was rushing down the mountain.  As it was a new stream, things were not as they should be, as far as streams go, that is.  The water was dark and murky.  The stones were very sharp.  Big clumps of earth and mud and roots and grass got in the way of things.  No matter.  The Streammaker knew how to make His stream, so He did. At first it was very exciting.  The stream was exuberant at all the new adventures and discoveries to be made.  Each day he welcomed the sunshine with glad splashes and a happy rush - the flow itself disbursed its own joy of simply being, of moving, of reflecting and of singing. But as the new stream needed to be settled, some things were rather disturbing.  Once in a while, a big clump of leaves and dirt would dislodge and go tumbling away.  The stream felt he w...

At Church we are doing a series on Jonah.  And so my mind has wandered, straight to the text, of course, and I have begun to think I can be just a bit inside Jonah's head.  With smug arrogance, I often (too often, I admit) have told my kids I can read minds.  And here I am, centuries after Jonah lived, and thinking I can somehow get inside his mind.  So, pardon my over-confidence here, but I'm just going to take a stab at what was going on with him. I'm going to use some sanctified imagination, and go out on a limb and fill in the gaps with my musings. I imagine that Jonah was raised by godly, somewhat rigid, well-meaning, devout, circumspect, righteous people.  He was probably a first-born: cautious, wanting to please, high-achieving, with keen insight and greater burdens of responsibility.  He took his upbringing well, I suppose, as we can guess because he went on to invest himself in full-time kingdom work as no less than a prophet.  I'll bet h...

Once upon a time there was a girl and she loved her father very much.  That girl was me, and I'd like to tell you about the man I called, 'Dad.' But, what can I tell you about my Dad?  You know him - have heard so much already.  But you can tell something about a person by what moves him - to tears, to anger, to action and where he finds joy. You know about Dad and his work - the stuff he did 'out there' (and sometimes it was way out there ).  But let me peel back the curtains a bit for you now - a behind-the-scenes peek into what it was like to be his daughter.  To many of you he was 'Sheldon the missionary' or, as I like to say, 'Sheldon, the pillar of Hong Kong' or 'Sheldon, Mr. Beautiful' (as he often introduced himself this way)!  To me, he was simply my Dad.  As a kid, I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the stuff he did outside our home.  It can be tempting to over-focus on ministry to the neglect of family; thinking the ...

I'm not going to start off by telling you any reason why I have the right to tell you these things.  My thoughts should prove helpful regardless, I imagine.  If I were talking to a group of parents who are struggling with the challenges of raising a child with A.D.D. here are some of the things I might say to them: Before I get into all the nitty gritty, I want to begin with a basic premise - seemingly so obvious that it might be redundant to state it, but I believe it is a foundational starting point from which to parent any child - or even to interact with any human being, and it is this:  Your child was created by God, with His very fingerprints all over them.  God stamped His own image, His own self, into the very person you deal with on a daily basis.  Your child is created imago dei  - in God's image, by God Himself.  So we can all agree, God wanted your child to exist, and was intimately involved in the process of making and shaping this chil...