week of Dec. 27 devotional

Sunday-Ps.148 is part of the closing collection of praise. This one sounds like Hark the herald Angels sing in its evocation of all creatures great and small,all elements of creation joining in voice, wordless and noisy, to praise God.What christmas decorations help you to praise god?

Monday-All of life is gift, and our most fitting response to this is gratitude for what Romano Guardini calls "all the hidden and holy bonds between the Creator and ourselves."'

Tuesday-We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It's easy to say, "It's not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem." Then there are those who see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes.- Fred Rogers

Wednesday-"When we begin to think 'I know how this will be,' or 'I’ve done this before with always the same results' we are not open to the process. Our expectations have shortchanged the journey before we even began. In the process we must rest with our discomfort."  Christine Valters Paintner,

New Year’s Eve-"Transformation is a slow journey, in fact, conversion teaches us that it is the journey of a lifetime. We are never “done.” We continue to unfold and grow and stretch and change."--- Christine Valters Paintner,

New Year’s Day we ask, even plead with God not to leave us alone, for when God leaves us to our own choices and turns us over to our own ways, we are certain to drift from him ... If we would break away from a spiritual life growing cold and a Christ who is becoming distant, we must be attentive to our spiritual discipline and long for God to break in on us with new life. When we do this, we experience the true meaning of...spirituality.- Robert E. Webber,

Saturday-"I don’t believe in a deus ex machina—a god who swoops out of nowhere to fix things. I do believe in a God who works in, with, and through us—through the labors of those who have learned to love peace as much as God does, who have chosen to eschew violence in their own lives, and who work in small and large ways to end violence in our world.", Rev. Dr. L. Roger Owens.