View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. We break out the jackets and enjoy walks in the woods in the autumn air, so crisp and clean. Fall is filled with amazing colors. The leaves turn from their green to golds, reds, and oranges. Fall also signals a time of change. The leaves gradually fall to the ground and soon the branches will be bare again.
Change is hard but the seasons remind us that change is a part of life. With Christ we can not only have change but we can have transformation. There is no need to fear the winter if we allow God to renew our minds. The cycle will repeat. Seasons of our lives come and go. Yet we have hope no matter the season for we worship a God who is alpha and omega one “who is and was and is to come.” Prayer God Who Never Changes Guide us through seasons of change so that we become transformed by your mercy. Show us the good, perfect, and pleasing will you have for us this day. Amen
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View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project Shout for joy to God, all the earth! You can hear them before you see them, the cool mountain streams of summer. They flow through a deep, verdant green forest. If you take the time to sit quietly beside one it is like you can hear the water singing joyous songs of praise. Summer reminds us of seasons of joy; those little gifts of time when we sit in awe in your presence. All that we can do is join in the song of the stream and sing our songs of praise to Creator God who loves us beyond all understanding.
Prayer Great God We join the world you created in songs of praise to you. May our lives this day bring glory to you and share joy with those around us. Amen View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. This single daffodil stands alone as a herald of spring. It is alone under the protection of the tree but nearby a whole host of daffodils raise their heads. There will still be cold snaps to come, for this is East Tennessee after all, and another month before most of the other wildflowers break through the ground. As I look at this daffodil I am reminded of the day when Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, the day we call Palm Sunday. There was great joy in the crowd with people shouting his praises. I wonder what we would have seen if we could have seen Jesus’s eyes that day. He knew what was coming. He knew that these crowds would soon call out Crucify Him! So in one way he was alone in a great crowd of people but in another way he knew that he was doing the task the Father has given him. He knew that he would step out alone to bear the world’s sin. He also knew the true joy that was coming of a new heaven and new earth. He knew we would never have to be alone again.
Prayer Suffering Savior Thank you for standing alone, dying alone on the cross so that we can stand in your presence filled with joy at your unfailing love. Amen View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project We wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and our shield. The first sign of spring in the mountains are the daffodils. They come when the trees are still bare and the grass is still brown. Yet here they are almost standing at attention, waiting. For me the daffodils are signs of hope. We will still have to wait a little and waiting is hard. Sometimes we find ourselves waiting on the Lord – waiting for him to reveal himself in his world and in his word. But we know like these daffodils that stand attention and bring me so much hope and joy that God’s unfailing love will be with us.
Prayer Lord God, Father of All Seasons We wait silently and expectantly in your presence. We put our hope in your unfailing love. Amen View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project, Seasons If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. One thing I look for when I go to the mountains in winter is how the cold temperatures change the water. I am amazed by intricate ice formations along the streams and waterfalls. The interesting thing about water in the winter is that while part of a stream or waterfall may freeze, there is always a part of the water that is still moving. Moving water creates heat that will keep some of the water flowing even when the temperatures are below freezing.
When we stop and take a cold hard look at our lives, we can be overcome with our own sin and failure. In these times after looking at ourselves we need to turn and look at God. His forgiveness never freezes. His love always is moving underneath purifying us and bringing us to him. Prayer Loving God, We confess the times this day that we looked to our own selfish desires, times when we failed to serve you. Forgive our sins and unfreeze our cold hearts. Amen View the post for February 14 for an explanation of my Lenten Project, Seasons Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. In the cold, hard days of winter the branches lay bare of all their leaves. As with winter there are times when we all must lay our hearts bare before God. Yet as sure as we are that spring will come, we can be sure that God will take the bare branches of our lives, our hearts laid bare and open before Him, and fill them with forgiveness and love.
Prayer All-Seeing God We lay our hearts bare before you trusting in your love and forgiveness. Amen There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens. It was a gift to sit quietly under this tree in the early morning. Wherever we can find such a quiet place we need to have these times to sit in the silence with our hearts and hands open before Christ. The season of Lent is a time set aside to do just this. For many Lent is a time to give up something, but it can also become a time of considering change, of letting go. Seasons speak to me of change and change is not always easy or welcomed. However seasons of change provide an opportunity for us to reconsider what it means to follow Christ in the season where we find ourselves. So beginning today, Ash Wednesday, I want to explore the idea of seasons and what we can learn from them during this season of Lent.
I pray my words and my images will provide time and space for you to think about seasons of your life, past and present and the ways that God speaks to us through the seasons of our lives. Prayer Lord God, Giver of Seasons We sit before you this day with our hearts and hands open waiting for your presence and guidance in our lives. Amen When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” As the sun rose on my early morning walk, shafts of light broke through the trees to light the path ahead. By the time I got to the end of the trail all the shadows were gone and everything was bright. Jesus spoke these words to a people who were walking in the shadows of oppression from a foreign power, poverty, and despair. Still he invited them to follow him out of the darkness into light. He didn’t promise to suddenly take all their problems away. Instead he promised that following him meant that they would always have his light to guide them. No longer would they walk in shadows but now they could walk with him in the light. Jesus still calls today for anyone to walk with him out of the darkness into the light of life. His promise is still true, when we walk with him we no longer walk in darkness.
Prayer Lord of Light and Life Help us to accept your invitation to follow you. Give us clarity of purpose today to follow where you would lead us. Amen Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. He called that place Bethel, though the city used to be called Luz. Jacob was on the run in fear of his life due to his deceitful actions. During the night Jacob had an amazing vision from God that is called, “Jacob’s Ladder.” Before he continued on his journey the next morning, he wanted to mark the place in a special way. For him the place had become sacred because it was here that he had an encounter with God.
There are times when we encounter God in special ways. We don’t have to be worthy to have these times. We just have to be open to them. Remember Jacob was running away because of things he had done that were wrong. The times we encounter God may not be in a glorious dream but in the quiet presence of the Holy Spirit standing in front of a tree. So the image of this tree and this place have become a sacred place for me. I still remember the day that I took this picture. It was Sunday, January 22, 2012. I had just gotten a new camera and wanted to learn how to use it. After church on a very cloudy day I took my new camera to the dam and took this image. It isn’t a very good image but still I keep it as a marker, a sacred place. It was here that I began a journey with my camera that led me to times and places I couldn’t have imagined. I have had many more encounters with God with my camera and many of them in front of a tree. Where are your sacred places, places where you have encountered God? Prayer Holy God Thank you for sacred places and times when we encounter you. Break into our lives today. Amen How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! This is the path I walk as many days as possible. It is isn’t a famous place, just a walking trail close to home. Sometimes I walk it with a friend and sometimes alone. I walk in all seasons and a few times I have even walked in the rain. Each time I walk I see new things - foggy days and clear, blue skies, beautiful colors in the fall, wildflowers in the spring and summer, and frost crystals on the grass in winter. I didn’t use to notice these things. My camera has taught me to see amazing things in my everyday world. The more time I spend in nature, the more I stand in awe of God Creator.
It is interesting to me that as I have come to have a deep desire to be in nature I have also developed a deeper desire to study God’s word. I don’t think that it is a coincidence. I know that as the Holy Spirit used my camera to show me God’s world he has also put new scholars in my path. My view of the scriptures has grown and now I have learned to read them with awe and wonder. I have learned to see the intricate patterns of the writing and the art of the Biblical authors. I have learned to value the importance of story and how the Bible is God’s story of redemption through Jesus Christ. And in the midst of all the wonder of nature and the Scripture is the most amazing thing of all, God walks with me. In the words of David who I think must have first learned about God through his time as a shepherd, “when I awake I am still with you.” Prayer Creator God Keep me filled with awe and wonder of your world and your word for wonder is the beginning of worship. Amen This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. I have come to see light as a mystery. Before becoming a photographer I didn’t know that artists describe light as having the properties of color, intensity, direction, contrast, and quality. It was just light, bright or dark. The more I learned about light the more I wanted to know. Sometimes I can have a guess about what the light will be like at a specific place at a specific time but I can never know for sure. On the morning I took this image I thought there was a chance for some spectacular light but I stood in awe of how the light made everything glow in shades of gold and red. The dull brown grass that was at the place the previous day was transformed by the light.
John writes that God is light and light is a mystery. The more we sit in God’s presence and read his word the more our perception of God grows and changes. Mystery requires humility, for God is infinite and we are finite creatures. We have to be able to let go of concrete understandings and be willing to open our eyes to seeing God in new and beautiful ways. So we walk in the mystery of God’s light and love. Prayer Infinite Mysterious God, Shine your light into our world today so we can walk just one step further towards your beauty and love. Amen The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. As I sat on the lakeshore in the early morning, I saw Mt. LeConte rising above the clouds. I have only climbed halfway up the mountain to Alum Cave. I want to climb all the way to the top one day. It will take work and the help and guidance of a friend who has climbed to the top.
“Further up and further in” these are the words of C. S. Lewis from the Last Battle book of the Narnia Chronicles. They are spoken as the children follow the great lion, Aslan, as he leads them into his country. In these beautiful stories Aslan is the character who represents Jesus. As the children follow him further up and further in they find and experience beauty all along the way. I have come to love these words as they have become a description of what I want my life to be - one who follows Christ further up and further in. Unlike my desire to climb Mt. LeConte, which might not happen, I know that the LORD is faithful and he will lead me further up and further in - and along the way I will see and experience his beauty. He hears me and he will bring me near to him. In your own way will you join me as we go further up and further in? Prayer Lord of All Things Lead me further up and further into your love. Amen The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. In the golden light of early morning sat these two chairs. They seemed to be inviting someone to come and sit by the lake - so still it reflected the beauty around it. The amazing thing is that each and every morning, whatever the season, Jesus still invites us to come and sit with him. He dwells with us. In this busy season of Christmas, just stop and accept Jesus's invitation to sit with him for he is truly God with us.
Prayer Emmanuel Full of grace and truth we sit in your presence in awe of your love for us. Amen When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought me joy. I have photographed many amazing things - beautiful sunrises, crashing waves, high mountain overlooks. I am grateful for these times. But I have also photographed along familiar trails with no spectacular scenery. It was one of those trails that I walked last week. It is not a busy trail, especially late in the day this time of year, so it was a quiet time. As I walked on the trail my focus was gradually shifted from worries and cares to the beauty of the woods. With the quietness of the woods came a sense of peace. And after the peace came a quiet joy.
Many times when choirs sing the chorus of the Christmas carol, “How Great Our Joy,” the choir alternates between singing the same phrase loudly and then softly. I think joy is like that. Sometimes joy is crashing waves and amazing sunrises. We just want to sing out loud. There are other times when joy is quiet like a simple walk in the woods. Wherever you walk this day, spectacular vistas or quiet walkways, open your heart to God’s love. Feel the joy only He can bring. Prayer God, Joy-Giver, Make us aware of your presence today. Fill our hearts with your joy. Amen When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let's go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” On my morning walk around the campground I came upon an empty campsite, empty except for one thing. There was this jar filled with fresh picked flowers on the picnic table. No one around, just the flowers on the table in the glass jar. This is not something you expect to see. Still it filled me wit joy.
The whole story of Jesus’s birth is unexpected. No one expected the Messiah to be born to an unimportant family, much less to a mother who was pregnant before being married. The shepherds, also unimportant and even looked down on, didn’t expect to see angels telling them, that the Messiah had been born in their town. During this season of advent open your heart to the unexpected. Be like the shepherds and go look for Jesus. And don’t be surprised if you find him in unexpected places. Prayer Lord Jesus Open our hearts to the unexpected to day, to the hope of new life in you. Amen The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet: For many years putting up the Christmas tree was a celebration for our family. We had special friends over and prepared a special meal. Each year we bought a special ornament for each child. The other ornaments were gifts from students or friends. So each ornament is a memory. After the children grew up and had their own families in distant cities it was harder to find a time to have the traditional celebration. The artificial tree and ornaments were heavy and too hard for us to bring down from the attic, so we just stopped putting up a tree.
As I thought about Advent again I decided that we need the tree, the celebration. We bought a smaller tree and just got a few of the ornaments down. Even though it was just the two of us and I am glad we did the work to put up the tree. It reminds me that we need to prepare for Advent. It will be work because it will mean taking a long hard look at our hearts. It will remind me each day that Jesus came down to earth to live with us and to open our hearts to his coming. How are you preparing for Advent this year? Prayer Emmanuel, God With Us Prepare our hearts for your coming. Amen Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, spoke up, “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” Jesus had been teaching the crowds and the day was getting late. He asked his disciples about where to get the bread to feed the crowd. Peter’s response was we don’t have enough money to buy that much food. Then his brother, Andrew, replied, here is what we have. Sometimes I wonder how Andrew knew that someone in the crowd had those loaves and fish.
Sometimes I also wonder how I write this blog and take these images. The words are hard to come by on my own for I was never a writer - and a lot of my images still need work. Yet they are offered to God who can make them into something that someone needs to hear and see. And then sometimes I get an image I didn’t expect or plan for - like this sunrise from our motel on the Blue Ridge Parkway. And sometimes there are words that just come. You need to remember the rest of the story - Jesus fed the crowd with those loaves and fishes that Andrew found. I am grateful for the unexpected gift of photography, something that I would have never planned to do or become. I am grateful for images like this one that speak to me of peace and hope for a new day. What will you give and trust to God this day for his service - even though it may be small and insignificant? It may not feed a crowd of thousands, (only about 15 people read my blog) but trust it to God to feed someone who needs to be fed. Prayer Lord Jesus, We offer our lives to you this day to use how for your glory. Amen One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan. Wildflower season was over. The excitement for finding that rare specimen was waning. Instead of taking all the famous wildflower hikes I just took a walk on the nature trail in the campground where I saw this trillium with the petals and leaves loosing their color. I had never seen a trillium in this state. Even though most would just pass it by, it seemed to be calling my name - offering me a chance to see its special beauty. I am so thankful that I got to see it.
At times I think we all feel small, unimportant, and past our prime like this trillium. We need to remember that we are so loved. Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem when some men, outcasts because of a skin disease, called out to him. He told them to go show themselves to the priest and they would be healed. They all ran to new life and new hope, except one. One who was the Samaritan, a double outcast, ran back to Jesus praising God and thanking him. He was loved and healed and he just had to go back before he went to the priest. When those feelings of being small, unimportant, and past our prime, come back to us, we need to remember that we are so loved by God. Then we need to remember to run back and thank him. Prayer Loving God Help us to be the one who does not forget to thank you - for loving us, for healing us, and for beautiful wonders of your world, especially the small and unnoticed ones. Amen Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Expectations for interesting photographs were low that day since the weather forecast was for mostly cloudy skies. Yet when we stopped at the first overlook the sky put on a show. The sun broke through the clouds like a search light opening up the view in front of us.
God’s love is like that search light into our hearts. In our darkest hour when we have no idea what to pray, the Holy Spirit is there translating our hearts to the One who searches our hearts. With that light comes clarity, a way for us to step forward according to God’s will. Prayer Heart Searcher Search our hearts today. Show us your way through even the cloudiest day when we have no words. Amen For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. It was the edge of the day. The sun had set behind the hill and darkness was coming. But for the last few seconds the trees seem to have a golden, red spotlight on them. It was like they were praising God for the beautiful light as they would wait now for the morning light.
For me that light at the edge of darkness was a reminder to hope. It would be dark soon, a time when sight would be hard. We have times like that in our broken world. We also have a hope that will shine through darkness and brokenness. The light may not come exactly when we want it; but that is what hope is like. We have the love of Christ always there to give us hope at the edges as we wait patiently for the light. Prayer God of Hope Meet us today at the edges and shine your light on us as we hope in you. Amen |
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Soli Deo Gloria,
1 Corinthians 10:31
© 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 Karen Milligan
1 Corinthians 10:31
© 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 Karen Milligan