Five Minute Friday: Community

Around here we write for five minutes on Friday--unedited, unvarnished.  Here is today's edition:






Community.


The state of communing together.


The situation of living in a sharing environment.


So, community is not a what, but a who.  A community is a group of sharing people.  But to share, they each have to have something their fellows need.  What do I have that others need?


I have information--lots of it.  I'm a veritable fountain, morass, bottomless pit of information, some of which is actually useful outside of game night or Jeopardy.


I have strategies.  After a lifetime, I've devised and adapted strategies for surviving every day in a fast-paced world.  I could share those.


I have musical talents.  They're more gifts than talents since I haven't officially worked with a coach in years.  I do share them, though, and the members of my community seem to enjoy them.


I have . . . what else?  I would have thought by this time I would have some wisdom, but, so far, I only feel like I have strategies.  So, what is wisdom?  


The Bible says, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding."  (Proverbs 9:10 KJV)


Perhaps that's where community starts:  communing together in the Lord, and, together, growing in wisdom.

I stink at communing, Lord, but I'm working on it.

END

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Five Minute Friday: Together

Around here we write for five minutes on Friday; here's the unvarnished result:

Together.

To get her.

Twogether

Two-or-more gether.

Any way you slice it, it's something I'm not this morning.  My brain is a clump of fuzzy drier lint:  unproductive, just there.

At the same time, I feel scattered, like tufts of a dandelion in a blustering wind, bouncing on the grass, burst apart by a gust.

It's a good thing I'm not alone.

Together,

Two gather,

Two get her,

and she's whole again.



Happy Friday!

Nancy

Five Minute Friday: Good-Bye

Around here we write for five minutes on Friday.  Here's the latest!



God be with ye.

That's what good-bye really means.  It's a blessing usually bestowed upon parting:  since I cannot, God be with you.  It's almost like a parting hug.

And it should feel like a hug because He is with me.  All the time.  To the ends of the earth.  Even when I forget it.  Even when I stumble around trying to work things out on my own because I forget that God is with me.

I can be a real dolt sometimes.

Why do I try to work things out on my own?  Um, well, I'm stubborn and independent.

But why don't I just do what He wants?  Double ummmm, could it be because I keep forgetting to actually listen??????

Could be.

Probably is.

Certainly is.

I can be a real dolt sometimes.

Thank you for loving me anyway, Lord.

I'm listening now, I promise.



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Five Minute Friday: Gift

Around here we write for five minutes straight on Fridays--no editing, no pre-writing, just raw writing.  Today's theme is gift and here's the thought of the day:

What is a gift?  In the secular sense it is something received that is not earned.  The spiritual sense goes further:  that gift given, but not earned, must be shared.  It is the paradox of the loaves and the fishes--the more there were to feed, the more the meager lunch stretched.  It is a bedrock of the faithful walk.

To each is given spiritual gifts to be used, alone or in congress with others, to be His hands and feet in the world.  Over and over again He promises me that He will supply all of my need; what prevents me from fully sharing His gift?

Disturb me, Lord, when I hide Your light within me beneath the basket of busyness, business, fatigue, ignorance, and selfishness.  Prod me, Lord, to remove the basket to let Your light beam.  Lead me, Lord, to those dark places that will be my mission field to share Your gift to me, and your one true Gift.

FINIS

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Five Minute Friday: Loud

On Fridays, we write along with our other Five Minute Friday wordsmith. Here's today's little offering:

For someone who like solitude, the word loud can be threatening. It intrudes upon the solitude; it drives away deep thought. It interrupts concentration. It is a preventer, a roadblock.

My mother, at times, used the word loud to describe visual things, too. A visual—fabric, picture, decorating scheme-- that was loud was colorful without regard to what matched. It was garish, and it fairly hummed with tension as well as harmony between colors. A loud visual always evoked emotion—either the strong desire to fix it, or the intense attraction to the life the colors created. It could not be ignored.

Maybe I should be loud more often.

Five Minute Friday: Brave

Brave? 

Sometimes brave is just putting one foot in front of the other--hoping and praying that things will be better with persistence. 

Sometimes brave is stepping out onto an unknown path.  What if it's rocky?  What if it's muddy and slows me down?  What if it's dim and hard to find?  What if?

But to be truly brave, I have to turn my face into the wind, into that which terrifies me, into that which pushes me back.  Like an airplane which takes advantage of the velocity of the oncoming wind to create lift, I must see the challenge as a means by which I can fly.

And so I turn my face into the wind.

Five Minute Friday: Empty

I'm tired of feeling bad about feeling empty. I'm developing a new attitude about it. Instead of seeing “empty” as the end of something, I resolve to see it as the beginning of something: a state of portent, of hope. And so I must set about filling the emptiness.

Shall I fill it with cheap trinkets, kitschy, flashy, and, in the end, shallow? I hope not, although that is certainly the easier path.

I would like to fill it slowly, with carefully selected, worthy treasures: things that feed my happiness, my intellect, my soul. Yes. Ah, yes. So how?

It is the quest of a lifetime.

Here I go.