Riding down the greasy slide toward the end of Christmas break. Haven't caved yet, but getting there; well into the yearly floor refinishing at the church; much recollecting about life and relationships and the richness I have within them all.

Family time at home was good, bad and just plain bonkers. Things change, but when you don't even know the how's, when's and why's of the changes that affect you and have no way to get to the bottom of them, then I surmise you're just plain out of luck. I don't know how to even be thankful at times for the impermanence of things in life I'd really like to be able to count on.

'Twas quite the birthday this year for this ol' codger- especially being able to share it with my people, since it fell on our gathering day.

They hit me up right too....pecan pies, roasts, biskits, korn, mooshed taters and various other sundries and delights. The Birchfield boys and girl utterly SURPRISED me with a wetsuit, enabling me now to push the river entrance to Wells Cave in Kaintuckee. I am modeling for you (and the Dana Community) in all my XXL glory below.

The best part was the kind and encouraging words and stories each of them shared with me....ways that I had impacted them, things I had said, done or even not done that built into their lives. It was a truly rich time and fed some starving places in my soul, especially in light of the history with some of these people for about seven years now. They spoke of Kingdom things, the sort of stuff over which I have really had no control, except in terms of making myself available, both to God and to these people I love and serve.

A big, fat mea culpa for the sedentary blog of late. There are bunches of things to do that are finding me not minding this discipline. My laziness, therein, is shameful, especially to those of you who had been checking in and out only to find the same collection of pixels. It would have been better if I had prefaced it with an "I'm-taking-a-break-from-blogging" caveat, but even in that, I'm not even sophisticated enough (which is still something maybe on the horizon). In fact, the more I think on it, the more I feel inclined to revamp this whole, whoa-whoah, sweet blog- o'mine, from the ground on up.

Trips a-plenty on the horizon too. After having been in Hotlanta (home of the Braves) and Orlando in October, I'll be in Dallas at the end of January; in the Dakotas to share with the Dakota Baptist Convention about our experiences in ministry amongst students here in Oxford in January or February and Salt Lake City in April to finish out our lay church planting task force gatherings.

So as things brew, and as I plod onward in search of a greater depth and discipline, I will continue on with things here.