Author: Leslie Scoopmire

“In the face of loss and grief, resilience is a powerful form of resistance. In our words from Jeremiah, resilience and an embrace of the future is exactly what is being urged. What is being urged by God is not surrender. Rather, God is encouraging the people to stay strong, to keep their culture alive, in hope for tomorrow.”

“To everything there is a season,” muses the Teacher in Ecclesiastes, “and a time for every purpose under heaven: a time to plant, a time to pluck up what is planted; ​​a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and time to dance….”

“It seems hard to imagine that now, but the truth is that each leaf releases its hold on the branch because there is already the dream and anticipation of spring gathering itself up so that, come spring, new leaves will be born again from that same branch.  The tree doesn’t shed its leaves only from a posture of giving, but so that it can receive new blessings, new life, new growth.”

“But while we’re accepting that love and that freedom that pours over us like a balm, we are also called to ourselves embody the generosity and empathy that Jesus does. That’s the privilege and essence of discipleship. Our healing NEVER stops with us. Our healing empowers us to be agents of healing in the name of Jesus for the sake of the entire world—no exceptions.”

“Faith enables us to move forward and live our lives without certainty. Trust is an act of will and of hope, a decision we make to account someone or something trustworthy even in the face of uncertainty.”

“As it is, in the version we have, Abram receives the promise, he sacrifices as God commanded him to do to seal the covenant, and he falls asleep into “a deep and terrifying darkness,” then suddenly there is a smoking fire pot and torch going in between the pieces of the offerings.”

“May we welcome Christ in each person who is a stranger to us, as Jesus welcomes the outcast and lost.”

“Perhaps Jesus is like the aperture in a camera obscura. He is the opening between two worlds and two truths. He shows us things that are outside our perception, things which we have walled ourselves off from. He is the means through which we can see that which is eternal.”

“Perhaps it means to carry forward with determination, to establish and re-establish a base for yourself, to recognize and treasure the holy spaces when you encounter them, to feel the ancient song of God in your bones, calling you forward despite the obstacles.”