Canadian Thanksgiving Starts Or Month of Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to our Canadian readers. We hope you are enjoying day.

For this month we are focusing on giving thanks. This seems an appropriate topic between the Canadian and United States Thanksgivings.

For this week I'm thinking about relationships and covenants, and finding myself thankful for both. Perhaps this is in part due to participating in two weddings in the weeks. Healthy relationships and covenants help us to grow, stay honest to ourselves, and strive to be the best we can be.

How are you thankful for the relationships and covenants in your life?

Blessed be
Joel

Sabbath Time

On our boat, lately we have had conversations about time management: how do I not over extend myself so I have some down time? Sound like a familiar conversation?
So imagine our surprise when we show up at church song the following hymn by William Henry Davies "What Is This Life." (Words below).

What a reminder that we are all paid in sun rises and sun sets, if we but take a moment to appreciate them. What a reminder that Sabbath Time is so important for our well being, for our souls.

Blessed Be,
Joel

What Is This Life
What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare - no time to stand beneath the boughs and stare as long as sheep or cows;
No time to see, when woods we pass, where squirrels hide their nuts in grass - no time to see, in broad daylight, streams full of stars, like stars at night;
No time to turn at Beauty's glance, and watch her feet, how they can dance. A poor life this if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare.

William Henry Davies (1869-1941)

When Has Night Ended

Perhaps this is a better story for the spring, but with kids now needing to rise at dawn (which will quickly become pre-dawn) in order to get to school, I think it is appropriate for now. This was shared as apart of Sunday's service, so I don't have a citation. Anyone know where the following story comes from?

Is it still night?
Am old rabbi once asked his students how they could tell when the night had ended and the day begun.
"Could it be" asked one of the students,  "when you can see an animal in the distance and tell whether it is a sheep or a dog?"
"No" answered the Rabbi.
"Could it be" asked another student, "when you can look at a tree in the distance and tell whether it is a fig or a peach tree?"
"No" answered the Rabbi.
"Then when is it?" They demanded.
"It is when you can look in the face of any man or woman and see that it is your brother or sister. Because if you cannot see this, then it is still night."

So here is to see those around us add our brothers and sisters.

Blessed be,
Joel

Hope: Fry Size

Two weeks ago I mentioned the plight of the star fish and my concern regarding their seeming demise. I still have concern about the ecosystem without star fish. However, this morning these guys and gals gave me a bit of hope for the future. This school went as far as I could see into the water and just kept coming.

Blessed be,
Joel

Sailing Community

We've been watching (and participating) in the ways the boating community not only helps each other but extends care and concern. For instance,  down our dock we (and others) have been helping a couple who has been struggling with his diagnosis (and very rapid decline) die to a rare brain illness.

Community comes together for celebratory reasons, too. What better way to share this wonderful way of life than helping a young family. Connie McBride shares such an experience on her Simply Sailing Online site this week: Friend Ship. Enjoy.

Blessed be,

Joel

Where Have All the Starfish Gone

Change is an inevitable part of life. As we grow our bodies change. As toddlers,  we bonk our heads on counters and tables we could pass underneath the day before. As teenagers, we grow fast enough we don't know where our bodies end. Entering mid-ages our hair turns a different color and becomes sparse (if we continue to have any).

But perhaps we don't expect the world around us to change all that much. After all, what is our four score and ten in the geologic timeframe?

When we started this ministry of Winds of Grace, one of my family's favorite activities was looking to see what we'd find at low tide. In particular, we'd marvel at the purple sea stars on the pilings. We'd even shake our heads at an empty crab pot, save for a huge orange sea star that was still eating our bait.

Last year or so I read about the wasting disease affecting the sea stars in the Pacific Ocean. At the time, scientists didn't know what was causing the problem.

This year, since about February, we haven't seen any of our sea star friends. Have you?

With concern, but still sending blessings your way,
Joel

Renewing One's Spirit

How do you renew your spirit? What do you do that allows the Spirit to move through you and renew you? Where are those times in which you are surprised by this renewal?

This had been an emotionally intense summer: one that has been full of great joys and sadness. When the people of one's ministry also become one's friends, the joy is greater and the sadness deeper.

The above questions are ones I've been asking those who find themselves moving into the roles of caretakers. They are questions I've been asking myself, too.

My suspicion is that for many of us, being on the water renews us. Watery activities are the places we are reminded of our baptism, as it were.

And it was upon the water yesterday afternoon, in a small boat, with the challenges of sailing in almost no wind, and hearing the bow "chuckle" as we moved through the water, that I found myself unexpectedly, gracefully renewed.

May you, too, find these moments of renewal and grace.

Blessed be.

Joel