What are our motives? In our home we have a new puppy who often I wonder what her next move will be. I am not as young as I once was and not able to leap tall buildings and scale furniture as once I did - maybe I never could but love thinking that I once had the potential to do so.

There is such hope and delight in her delicate puppy spirit. She bounds around taking secret treasures to hide and later devour when her puppy parents are not looking. We may call it her little POW camp of toys, pieces of paper, food, socks, shoes, and the occasional missing set of keys under the bed or table but she sees it as hope.

What some in the church call hopeless do others see hope? I was a bit discouraged to see that our synod and national church took press in the Cedar Rapids Gazette. It may be a win for some but I fear it is a loss for the church. When the very essence of the Gospel would compel us to move forward and onward in ministry together these actions move us back to the decisions already made in August. (CR Gazette Newslink here)

If we have the inability to work together for a common mission being the Gospel of Jesus Christ then we can no longer be a church - honestly. How can two groups or more work against each other and somehow advance the cause of Christ?

Some to think about on the eve of the largest storm in Iowa history - or close to it.