MONDAY THOUGHTS -
Snow has begun to fall again, here. Light, tiny flakes that aren't yet sticking to the walkways or streets. It will, before the evening falls. Another arctic blast will descend and it will be bitterly cold. The sky is a light grey and we've had two days of sunshine, maybe three in the whole month of January.
One of our elderly homebound says the walls are beginning to close in on her! Cabin fever!
A reminder to me how important it is to stop in and check on folks within the congregation. To make the time for a visit. It doesn't always need to be a visit with deep theological discussion, just to be there, to make time for that person, to pray for them and with them, to inquire about how they're feeling, to break up the monotony of their day or week. To genuinely want to spend some time with them and to share news they hadn't heard through e-mail or because they weren't in church Sunday.
I feel several visits coming on this week. It is good for me and for them and keeps us all connected in a very personal way, which the computer can't do.
So the grace of these cold, snowy, icy days are the warmth of connections between one another and the maintaining of relationships within the fold. It makes the last weeks of winter more bearable.