A friend of mine, Phillip is traveling the world to photograph and buy spiritual art. We had a really good conversation and he asked me "What about all the rules in Christianity?" I said that the point of new covenant was to change all that, that Jesus said the most important commandment was to "Love God with all our heart, mind, body, and spirit. And love thy neighbor as thyself" Philips redux which I really enjoy thinking about was, "Love thy neighbor because you are he."

Ok, at the risk of sounding proud, I have to say our life group really kicks butt. Yesterday we went ice skating and closed the place down. Cheryl showed me a trick about twirling and I got so dizzy that I ended up splayed out on the ice laughing uncontrollably. I felt like a 6 year old. Olivia gets the prize for guts since in one night she decided she was joining us for the marathon and went ice skating for the first time.
Don't believe that we have more fun than a barrel of monkeys? Check out the pics!

Tonight I gave my dog a message. I was reminded how important touch is in conveying love. As I have learned to reconnect with my heart, I have been struck over and over again how much I like a good hug. I have also been struck by how few men really feel comfortable with a hug. Maybe this isn't a men/women issue but I do seem to feel it more often when I am hugging men. It is a hesitance... a stiffness... a desire to be over with it.

From my personal experience I developed the following list as a test of how close you are connected to your heart:

Today was a truly blessed day for me. Church was fantastic. They played oh little town of Bethlehem on bells and I cried. Not because I particularly care for this song, but because the large bells had this strange resonance that made me feel like the whole universe was pure sound. For a moment, I forgot that I existed materially and just felt like a sound wave myself. Had a fantastic brunch at the Colorado Kitchen then Kris and I ran 5 miles. Truly a blessed day.

I have been reading alot on forgiveness. It is an amazing topic. I am struck by what happens to a people who don't have a real concept of forgiveness, and I think of the Tibetan Buddhists. Let me preface this by saying that I am not an expert on Tibetan Buddhism and I am not trying to make pronouncements about their faith that I am not in any way qualified to make. That said, I understand that Tibetan Buddhist monks transport earth worms and ants in their path to safety. I am reminded that as a child I would find all the worms drowning in puddles and repatriate them to solid ground.

Tonight in bible study I was struck how important it is to "do life together". Everyone in the room agreed to do a weekend run with me of 5 miles. We agreed to adopt a person, a local charity, and an international town to pray for each week. We decided that the person we would pray for would be Moses. So what is the story of Moses?

Love life? Love
Live life! Love
Love life? Forgive
Forgive Love, Live!
Love, forgive, live - Life!
Live life, love.
Live life, forgive love.
Live life, love.
Live Life, LOVE!
LIVE LIFE, LOVE!
LIVE LIFE!

The best thing about God is her creativity. She is the original artist. This world is her way of giving us a space to create. He gives us a box of crayons and a canvas and says "see how nice it is to make something on your own?

Ok, so I am finally getting around to putting something up here. You may ask yourself why? Well there is that whole story of the cobblers children not wearing any shoes, then that one about the lawyer that dies without a will, but alas I don't really have a good answer.