As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame; As tumbled over rim in roundy wells Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell’s Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name; Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: Deals out that being indoors each one dwells; Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells, Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came.
I say móre: the just man justices; Keeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces; Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is — Chríst — for Christ plays in ten thousand places, Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his To the Father through the features of men’s faces. ~Gerard Manley Hopkins “As kingfishers catch fire”
These first few days of spring are a reawakening of nature’s rebirthing rhythms, with increased activity of all the wild creatures and birds around us, and most importantly, God’s renewal of our weary wintery hearts.
Some late winter and early spring mornings still are pitch black with blustering winds and rain, even hail – looking and feeling like the bleakest of December mornings about to plunge into the death spiral of winter all over again.
What self-respecting God would birth Himself into recalcitrant hearts as dark as night?
This God would.
He labors in our bleakest of hearts for good reason. We are unformed and unready to meet Him in the light, clinging as we do to our dark ways and thoughts. Though we soon celebrate the rebirth of springtime, it is just so much talk until we accept the change of being transformed ourselves.
Though the woodpeckers are already noisily hammering on the bark, the birds singing their hearts out and the frogs chorusing in the warming ponds, we, His people, are silenced as He prepares for birth within us. The labor pains are His, not ours; we are awed witnesses to His first and last breath when He makes all things, including us, new again.
The world with its creatures, including us, is reborn — even where dark reigned before, even where it is bleakest, especially inside our healing wintery hearts.
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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God is within all things, but not enclosed; outside all things, but not excluded; above all things but not aloof; below all things but not debased. ~St. Bonaventure, 14th C. philosopher and theologian
Beauty, to the Japanese of old, held together the ephemeral with the sacred. Cherry blossoms are most beautiful as they fall, and that experience of appreciation lead the Japanese to consider their mortality.
Hakanai bi (ephemeral beauty) denotes sadness, and yet in the awareness of the pathos of life, the Japanese found profound beauty.
For the Japanese, the sense of beauty is deeply tragic, tied to the inevitability of death.
Jesus’ tears were also ephemeral and beautiful. His tears remain with us as an enduring reminder of the Savior who weeps. Rather than to despair, though, Jesus’ tears lead the way to the greatest hope of the resurrection. Rather than suicide, Jesus’ tears lead to abundant life. ~Makoto Fujimura
Everyone feels grief when cherry blossoms scatter. Might they then be tears – those drops of moisture falling in the gentle rains of spring? ~Otomo no Juronushi (late 9th century)
fallen sakura petals in Tokyo (photo by Nate Gibson)fallen sakura blossoms in Tokyo, photo by Nate Gibson
For four decades, as a family physician, I saw patients struggling with depression, some contemplating whether living another day was worth the pain and effort.
Most described their feelings completely dry-eyed, unwilling to let their emotions flow from inside and flood their outsides. Others sat soaking in tears of hopelessness and despair.
Their weeping moved and reassured me — it is a raw and authentic spilling over when the internal dam is breaking. It is so human, yet we also know tears contain the divine.
When I read that Jesus weeps as He witnesses the tears of grief of His dear friends, I am comforted. He understands and feels what we feel, His tears just as plentiful and salty, His overwhelming feelings of love brimming so full they must be let go and cannot be held back.
Our Jesus who wept with us became a promise of ultimate joy.
There is beauty in this: His rain of tears, the spilling of the divine onto our mortal soil like the unsettled petals of spring.
photo by Nate Gibson
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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More and more, the desire grows in me simply to walk around, greet people, enter their homes, sit on their doorsteps, play ball, throw water, and be known as someone who wants to live with them.
It is a privilege to have the time to practice this simple ministry of presence. Still, it is not as simple as it seems.
My own desire to be useful, to do something significant, or to be part of some impressive project is so strong that soon my time is taken up by meetings, conferences, study groups, and workshops that prevent me from walking the streets. It is difficult not to have plans, not to organize people around an urgent cause, and not to feel that you are working directly for social progress.
But I wonder more and more if the first thing shouldn’t be to know people by name, to eat and drink with them, to listen to their stories and tell your own, and to let them know with words, handshakes, and hugs that you do not simply like them, but truly love them. ~Henri Nouwen from The Practice of the Presence of God
For too many years, I was wrapped up in the trappings of the “useful” life – tight schedules, meetings, committees, strategic priorities – I forgot there is so much living usefully that I neglected to do.
There needs to be more potlucks, more “oh, by the way” conversations, more connections “just because,” more showing up whenever extra hands are needed.
If only I could invite you all over for breakfast. We’d have a wonderful time…
Actually, now that I think of it — you ARE invited for breakfast – Sunday, April 5, 2026 at 7 AM. Dress warmly. Wear boots. Come hungry and thirsty for the Word and ready for hugs.
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
Lyrics by John Donne Bring us, O Lord God, at our last awakening into the house and gate of heav’n: to enter into that gate and dwell in that house, where there shall be no darkness nor dazzling, but one equal light; no noise nor silence, but one equal music; no fears nor hopes, but one equal possession; no ends nor beginnings, but one equal eternity; in the habitation of thy glory and dominion, world without end. Amen.
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There is nothing else apart from God, There is nothing apart from His Breath and Being.
Not even death sets us apart in the already, but not yet.
Why then do we struggle to know Him and to be known?
Our DNA pulses His image ~ our very atoms designed to celebrate and worship Him.
So let us listen for a change, to our atoms blossoming richly with the Breath of His Spirit.
It’s time already.
Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit…” John 20: 21-22
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9: …to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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Six years a slave, and then you slipped the yoke, Till Christ recalled you, through your captors cries! Patrick, you had the courage to turn back, With open love to your old enemies, Serving them now in Christ, not in their chains, Bringing the freedom He gave you to share. You heard the voice of Ireland, in your veins Her passion and compassion burned like fire.
Now you rejoice amidst the three-in-one, Refreshed in love and blessing all you knew, Look back on us and bless us, Ireland’s son, And plant the staff of prayer in all we do: A gospel seed that flowers in belief, A greening glory, coming into leaf. ~Malcolm Guite — A St. Patrick Sonnet
Downpatrick Cathedral, Northern Ireland
I rise today in the power’s strength, invoking the Trinity believing in threeness, confessing the oneness, of creation’s Creator.
I rise today in heaven’s might, in sun’s brightness, in moon’s radiance, in fire’s glory, in lightning’s quickness, in wind’s swiftness, in sea’s depth, in earth’s stability, in rock’s fixity.
I rise today with the power of God to pilot me, God’s strength to sustain me, God’s wisdom to guide me, God’s eye to look ahead for me, God’s ear to hear me, God’s word to speak for me, God’s hand to protect me, God’s way before me, God’s shield to defend me, God’s host to deliver me, from snares of devils, from evil temptations, from nature’s failings, from all who wish to harm me, far or near, alone and in a crowd.
Around me I gather today all these powers against every cruel and merciless force to attack my body and soul.
May Christ protect me today against poison and burning, against drowning and wounding, so that I may have abundant reward; Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me; Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me; Christ to the right of me, Christ to the left of me; Christ in my lying, Christ in my sitting, Christ in my rising; Christ in the heart of all who think of me, Christ on the tongue of all who speak to me, Christ in the eye of all who see me, Christ in the ear of all who hear me.
For to the Lord belongs salvation, and to the Lord belongs salvation and to Christ belongs salvation. May your salvation, Lord, be with us always.
—”Saint Patrick’s Breastplate,” Old Irish, eighth-century prayer.
St. Patrick’s grave marker
On March 17, St. Patrick is little remembered for his selfless missionary work in Ireland in the fifth century.
When we visited his grave in Ireland years ago – a humble stone fixed upon on a hill top next to a cathedral overlooking the sea – I wondered what he would make of how this day, dubbed with his name, is celebrated now.
Patrick, in his prayer, urges us to rise up to meet God’s power of salvation in our lives, even in the toughest scariest times.
God is our Rock and our Redeemer. May we be fixed upon Him.
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
May the strength of God pilot us, May the wisdom of God instruct us, May the hand of God protect us, May the word of God direct us. Be always ours this day and for evermore.
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It is not only prayer that gives God glory but work. Smiting on an anvil, sawing a beam, whitewashing a wall, driving horses, sweeping, scouring, everything gives God some glory if being in his grace you do it as your duty.
To go to communion worthily gives God great glory, but to take food in thankfulness and temperance gives him glory too. To lift up the hands in prayer gives God glory, but a man with a dung fork in his hand, a woman with a slop pail, give him glory too.
He is so great that all things give him glory if you mean they should. So then, my brethren, live. ~Gerard Manley Hopkins fromSeeking Peace
Every happening, great and small, is a parable whereby God speaks to us, and the art of life is to get the message. ~Malcolm Muggeridge
I’ve banked nothing, or everything. Every day, the chores need doing again. Early in the morning, I clean the horse barn with a manure fork. Every morning, it feels as though it could be the day beforeor a year ago or a year before that. With every pass, I give the fork one final upward flick to keep the manure from falling out, and every day I remember where I learned to do that and from whom. Time all but stops.
But then I dump the cart on the compost pile. I bring out the tractor and turn the pile, once every three or four days. The bucket bites and lifts, and steam comes billowing out of the heap. It’s my assurance that time is really moving forward, decomposing us all in the process. ~Verlyn Klinkenborg from More Scenes from the Rural Life
He <the professor> asked what I made of the other Oxford students so I told him: They were okay, but they were all very similar… they’d never failed at anything or been nobodies, and they thought they would always win. But this isn’t most people’s experience of life.
He asked me what could be done about it. I told him the answer was to send them all out for a year to do some dead-end job like working in a chicken processing plant or spreading muck with a tractor. It would do more good than a gap year in Peru.
He laughed and thought this was tremendously witty. It wasn’t meant to be funny. ~James Rebanks from The Shepherd’s Life (how a sheep farmer succeeds at Oxford and then goes back to the farm)
It is done by us all, as God disposes, from the least cast of worm to what must have been in the case of the brontosaur, say, spoor of considerable heft, something awesome.
We eat, we evacuate, survivors that we are. I think these things each morning with shovel and rake, drawing the risen brown buns toward me, fresh from the horse oven, as it were, or culling the alfalfa-green ones, expelled in a state of ooze, through the sawdust bed to take a serviceable form, as putty does, so as to lift out entire from the stall.
And wheeling to it, storming up the slope, I think of the angle of repose the manure pile assumes, how sparrows come to pick the redelivered grain, how inky-cap coprinus mushrooms spring up in a downpour.
I think of what drops from us and must then be moved to make way for the next and next. However much we stain the world, spatter it with our leavings, make stenches, defile the great formal oceans with what leaks down, trundling off today’s last barrow-full, I honor shit for saying: We go on. ~Maxine Kumin “The Excrement Poem”
It isn’t unusual for a mid-March cold snap to sweep down from northern Canada, freezing daffodils in mid-bloom, withering berry plant and orchard branch buds, causing general mayhem in our region. After a few weeks in February of rain and temperate weather up to the high 50’s, the low temperatures felt cruel indeed.
Our barn is fairly draft proof, but in northeasters like this, the water buckets ice up and the manure sits in cold hard piles, like so many round rocks. It is a great temptation to put off the stall cleaning when the weather gets bitter cold; I push the poop to the walls for later pick up when it is warmer. After all, it doesn’t smell when it is frozen rock hard, and certainly loses its “squish” factor, so the horses seem to not mind too much.
So then I start the digging out process, with several days of accumulation to contend with.
As I wheel the loads out to the manure pile, and dig into the pile to tidy it up, the steam pours out into the frigid air–there is nothing left frozen there. It is hot and getting hotter–its destruction assured through the composting of so much organic matter. No wonder the barn cats find a nice sunny spot to stretch out next to this smoldering mountain of poop. It is as comfy as a tropical vacation spot.
How often have I similarly piled my own metaphorical “poop” in piles to deal with another time? Frozen it seems innocuous, inoffensive, not worthy of my attention, not enough to bother with. It is so tempting to pass on cleaning up my messes, by shoving mistakes and errors to one side or “under the carpet” – ignoring the growing mounds in my own nest, especially less-visible “respectable” sins like impatience, anger, pride, greed, gossiping, worrying, grumbling, etc.
Like frozen poop shoved aside and not dealt with, sin eventually warms up. It starts to stink, and generally becomes obnoxious and overwhelming. Once it gets big enough, it becomes its own steaming inferno, burning and destroying everything else within. The only safe place for it is to move it far away from where we dwell everyday.
We must dig ourselves out daily from our mistakes, ask forgiveness for the harm we cause, and prayerfully accept the tools handed to us that make possible the impossible job of getting clean. We cannot do it by ourselves. Our wheelbarrow is too small, our dung forks too inadequate, our muscles too weak. Good thing we have a Savior who is not put off by dung piles and our stench.
Blessed are the barn cleaners: by working together, we find hope and glory beyond the steaming pile.
my “city” nephews learning to muck out a stall
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. Isaiah 11:1
There are days we live as if death were nowhere in the background; from joy to joy to joy, from wing to wing, from blossom to blossom to impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom. ~Li-Young Lee, from “From Blossoms” from Rose
I drag the lawn chair to the center of the new lawn where you have warned it will ruin the delicate grass. From here I have a perfect view of the pink camellia, the one with rose-shaped flowers which you secretly think I have ignored. This is my camellia viewing platform I tell you, remembering signposts in Japan. … the camellia opens its flesh-colored petals with utter unself-consciousness, releasing its scent into the dangerous air. ~Linda Pastan from “Camellias” from Heroes in Disguise
In the midst of people dying in war-torn countries, as bombs drop and buildings fall to rubble –
we seek the peace of Someone who is both truly man yet very God – an impossible Blossom blooming purposely in the midst of our mess –
reminding us of Life and Light He shines in the darkness where we all dwell; this God who becomes a Man impossibly shares the sweetness of His glorious splendor, lightening our heavy load.
This gentle fragrant many-layered Bloom: given to the undeserving with joy and love without reservation without hesitation from joy to joy to joy, defeating death — our death.
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
Last Stanza: O Flow’r, whose fragrance tender With sweetness fills the air, Dispels in glorious splendor The darkness ev’rywhere; True man, yet very God, From sin and death now saves us, And shares our ev’ry load.
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Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness.
It took me years to understand that this, too, was a gift. ~Mary Oliver, “The Uses of Sorrow”from Thirst
Someone spoke to me last night, told me the truth. Just a few words, but I recognized it. I knew I should make myself get up, write it down, but it was late, and I was exhausted from working all day in the garden, moving rocks. Now I remember only the flavor – not like food, sweet or sharp. More like a fine powder, like dust. And I wasn’t elated or frightened, but simply rapt, aware. That’s how it is sometimes – God comes to your window, all bright light and black wings, and you’re just too tired to open it. ~Dorianne Laux “Dust”
On the stiff twig up there Hunches a wet black rook Arranging and rearranging its feathers in the rain- I do not expect a miracle Or an accident
To set the sight on fire In my eye, nor seek Any more in the desultory weather some design, But let spotted leaves fall as they fall Without ceremony, or portent.
Although, I admit, I desire, Occasionally, some backtalk From the mute sky, I can’t honestly complain: A certain minor light may still Lean incandescent
Out of kitchen table or chair As if a celestial burning took Possession of the most obtuse objects now and then — Thus hallowing an interval Otherwise inconsequent
By bestowing largesse, honor One might say love. At any rate, I now walk Wary (for it could happen Even in this dull, ruinous landscape); skeptical Yet politic, ignorant
Of whatever angel any choose to flare Suddenly at my elbow. I only know that a rook Ordering its black feathers can so shine As to seize my senses, haul My eyelids up, and grant
A brief respite from fear Of total neutrality. With luck, Trekking stubborn through this season Of fatigue, I shall Patch together a content
Of sorts. Miracles occur, If you care to call those spasmodic Tricks of radiance miracles. The wait’s begun again, The long wait for the angel. For that rare, random descent. ~Sylvia Plath “Black Rook in Rainy Weather”
Even when we open up an unwanted box of darkness, it too can be an unexpected gift:
it is no trick of radiance nor is it random when He comes to our window, waiting patiently for us to let Him in.
This descent to us is planned and very real: He seizes us and does not let go even when we are too tired to open to Him.
We wait, this long wait while moving rocks uphill; longing to feel His Light again. Rapt, aware, weary, yet awake and ready.
photo by Nate Gibsonphoto by Nate Gibson
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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The earth invalid, dropsied, bruised, wheeled Out in the sun, After frightful operation. She lies back, wounds undressed to the sun, To be healed, Sheltered from the sneapy chill creeping North wind, Leans back, eyes closed, exhausted, smiling Into the sun. Perhaps dozing a little. While we sit, and smile, and wait, and know She is not going to die. ~Ted Hughes from “A March Morning Unlike Others” from Ted Hughes. Collected Poems
March. I am beginning to anticipate a thaw. Early mornings the earth, old unbeliever, is still crusted with frost where the moles have nosed up their cold castings, and the ground cover in shadow under the cedars hasn’t softened for months, fogs layering their slow, complicated ice around foliage and stem night by night,
but as the light lengthens, preacher of good news, evangelizing leaves and branches, his large gestures beckon green out of gray. Pinpricks of coral bursting from the cotoneasters. A single bee finding the white heather. Eager lemon-yellow aconites glowing, low to the ground like little uplifted faces. A crocus shooting up a purple hand here, there, as I stand on my doorstep, my own face drinking in heat and light like a bud welcoming resurrection, and my hand up, too, ready to sign on for conversion. ~Luci Shaw “Revival” from What the Light Was Like.
This year, spring has been emerging early from an exceptionally warm and un-snowy winter, yet blizzard conditions last night closed the Cascade mountain passes with high winds causing extensive power outages in the Puget Sound region.
Our hilltop farm was spared overnight – we are grateful for light and heat this morning.
Up until now, all growing things have been several weeks ahead of the usual budding/blooming schedule when, like the old “Wizard of Oz” movie, the landscape suddenly turns from monochrome to technicolor with a soundtrack going from forlorn to glorious.
Like most folks, I too yearn for spring to commence, tapping my foot impatiently as if I’m personally owed an extravagant seasonal transformation from dormant to verdant.
We wait for the Great Physician’s announcement that His patient survived winter once again: “I’m happy to say the Earth is alive and restored, wounded but healing, breathing on her own but too addled by last night’s windstorm for you to expect much from her just yet.”
As we celebrate her imminent healing, we are reassured His Creation is still very much alive- we rejoice in this temporary home of ours. A promising prognosis for this patient coming out of the fog of winter: she lives, she breathes, she thrives, to bloom and sing with everything she’s got. So soon, so will I.
This year’s Barnstorming Lenten theme is Ephesians 3:9:
…to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God, who created all things…
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