Our friend Dan Chun, the people at Hawaiian Island Ministries, and many wonderful churches put together this video during the pandemic. To our beloved Maui Ohana who now grieves, we too grieve with you and as you seek to recover from the devastating fires, we pray and sing. Let this Hawaiian Blessing wash over you with comfort and hope. We cry and ache, yet we have hope in the blessings of our Lord.
-Church Life
August 16, 2023
July 03, 2023
December 19, 2022
A Penetrating Christmas Poem by Christopher Fry
The poet, Christopher Fry, articulates a question suggested by the Christmas drama of the Gospels:
The darkest time in the year.
The poorest place in the town.
Cold, and a taste of fear.
Man and woman alone.
What can we hope for here?
More light than we can learn,
More strength than we can treasure,
More love than we can earn,
More peace than we can measure.
Because one child is born*
As through a single flake
Of snow touching the earth
Would all our thirsting slake
And turn all death to birth
Bidding our spirits wake
To what makes many one.
The deep solicitude
Which bred both star and bone.
Claiming, by stable and rood
God’s will to be our own.
(Christopher Fry)
December 17, 2022
Christmas Vision
A woman captured my attention at Rotary Club. “I’m a mutant,” she said. “Most people have three color receptors in their eyes. I have four. I see 99 million more colors than the average person.”
I goggled Concetta Antico. Her story seems legitimate. Concetta said, “I consider my mutation a gift.” Her vision acuity is called tetrachromatic. She uses her ability in her profession as an artist. “But sometimes my vision gift can become a challenge,” she acknowledged. “The riot of colors in a supermarket aisle, can be a bit overwhelming.” I wonder how Concetta does with Christmas tree lights.
Tetrachromatic vision has its benefits, but super-human vision is not needed to see the beauty of the earth and the glory of the skies. Much more important than an additional receptor in the eye, is the focus of the mind. Consider Vincent Van Gogh. He covered his canvas with brilliant colors, and some scholars now believe he was missing a color receptor. They suggest that he was colorblind.
Whether we have two, three or four color receptors, we humans have the ability to choose how we focus our mind’s eye. Will we decide to look beyond the horrid sights that sometimes fill our screens when we flip a channel or click the mouse? Will we envision an alternative picture of hope?
The Christian scripture teaches that while mad kings were doing their dastardly things in days of old, God was bathing a little town of Bethlehem in light. God still imparts to human hearts the blessings of heaven. I have found that when my head gets to the heart of this message I have better potential to become a receptor and reflector of God’s beauty.
