Days 14-20 of 2024

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I have upgraded my website into a true "business site" where you can buy a book etc.  I fixed the SEO (tedious) and many other aspects. I hope I at least break even on this hobby of mine.

barbaragrahamtucker.net

All my posts will start with this from now on. 

This last week has been a journey through Matthew 13-19; a flurry of cold, ice, and work; and lots of reading. The Memory Police, for one. Quite interesting. And the baby, who is getting cuter and more attentive and a little less fussy but that will take a while. 

In the theme of "being realistic about the life of following Jesus" in 2024, I direct you to Matthew 18. The theme is forgiveness. It's not negotiable. I have to wonder how many of us do not practice it, harbor bitterness, and withhold grace, for both large and small grievances. We can hold the most for slights and forgive others for true betrayal. We are inconsistent about it.  Martin Luther said that the life of a Christian is daily repentance, and it is also daily realism about forgiveness, I think. Realism about accepting it (and not being too proud to do so), realism about our own bitterness and mulling over these offenses, and realism about how much it costs us not to forgive. 

And some of us forgive too easily. That can be a problem too. Forgiveness should mean something and be intentional, not just a "forget about it." Not that you have to make a speech or anything, but awareness and reminder to oneself of Jesus parables: every act of our forgiveness mirrors the depth of our own forgiveness by God Himself. 

A friend gave me a lovely mug with the words "Your story is too beautiful not to tell," and that is my new life aphorism. And I have decided that marketing is a story we tell, not an imposition.  I spend a lot of time on my books for people to dismiss them. I write and it is my story.  

Everyone's life story is too beautiful not to tell at some level; an acquaintance died this week and the woman was a disabled saint who lived life to the fullest.   I am not speaking of myself alone; we all have stories to tell.

 

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