reality blog

THE IMPORTANCE OF JOINING IN

/ joseph elon lillie / Leave a comment

I feel like our little community is experiencing and internal revolution.

We are a pretty eclectic town.

It has been very easy to allow our differences to create silos between the agencies that make up our larger community.

While there was a time when we let those difference keep us in our separate corners, I feel that is beginning to change.

As a community, we are not giving up our differences, after all our differences are what make us unique. They are the things that actually give us collective power. But, we are realizing that if we are truly to succeed in the face of all the challenges of our immediate future we must focus not on our differences but our similarities grounded in shared experience.

I believe God is pleased by the work our community is doing. I am waiting with baited breath to see what happens next in our little town.

THE IMPORTANCE OF SOLITUDE

/ joseph elon lillie / Leave a comment

I have learned that if I am going to have a healthy prayer life. I must learn a balance between the work of ministry and the place of solitude in ministry.

Not just that, prioritizing time to be alone is not just healthy but essential.

This work of ministry can steal a person from themself if he is not careful. An intentional solitude is healing balm from the rigors of the calling.

So I practice small solitudes throughout my days. In the midst of meetings and e-mails, phone calls and pastoral zooms I build small margins of time to withdraw and listen to Scripture and pray. I have my longer sessions too, but I think it is the more frequent “little solitudes” throughout the day that keep me on track.

DO YOU PRACTICE SOLITUDE? HOW DO YOU DO IT?

THE MAZE OF THE PINK TREES

/ joseph elon lillie / 1 Comment

The last two months….Wow! is all I can say.

Autumn arrived!

There was a carnival.

And a huge Irish Festival.

Youth ministry has gone into full swing.

Fall Fest happened.

We had our Cornerstone fall DLT mixer, which we call the crockpot cook off, and we baptized three people that same weekend.

We had a men’s conference, a women’s conference and two Volunteer outreaches with the town.

We have also done a fall clean up day at the church.

Meanwhile we have been managing to keep the projects at The Vicarage going.

Brenda started a painting project on the third floor of The Vicarage.

Meanwhile James and the girls have been working in the forest garden cutting away brush to what the girls are calling the maze of pink trees.