The Second Gaze - C is For...

Now the natural thing might be to simply write "C is for Cookie" and be done with it. However, I realized there were some other Cs for the day.

Calm - My daily meditation podcast that starts most of my mornings

Cereal - My breakfast yesterday

Controller - What I used after breakfast for a little bit of Spiderman before anyone else woke up.

Cold - my chilly walk with Scout

Charge - Working out what I was going to say as a charge to a newly ordained pastor

Connection - Sending a message to one of the people from the church I serve and also finding some photos from some trips my dad and I have been on. 

Color - Continuing to receive messages from people about our newly reorganized bookcases.

Chicken - What we made for dinner.

Community - Most importantly...remembering the call to continue to work towards the dream of the beloved community lifted up by Martin Luther King Jr.  At the same time,however, I recognize how far we still have to go.  I am convicted by these words from Dr King in 1957 which ring true today 60+ years later...

But the end is reconciliation; the end is redemption; the end is the creation of the beloved community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opposers into friends. The type of love that I stress here is not eros, a sort of esthetic or romantic love; not philia, a sort of reciprocal love between personal friends; but it is agape which is understanding goodwill for all men. It is an overflowing love which seeks nothing in return. It is the love of God working in the lives of men. This is the love that may well be the salvation of our civilization.

from “The Role of the Church in Facing the Nation’s Chief Moral Dilemma

The second gaze for me this morning is a reminder that there are the many everyday things of our lives (cookies, cereals, chicken, etc) but we cannot lose sight of the big picture, the big work of which we are all a part... to be a part of the realization, transformation, and continuation of the beloved community.