• Bethlehem Revisited,  Life on the Farm,  The Gift of Community,  The Gift of People,  The Gift of Vision,  The Presence of God

    Bethlehem Revisited

    Ah, life feels more typical these days! Last Sunday, a menagerie of people from young to elderly filled our living /dining area. All of them with vital roles in the planning and execution of Bethlehem Revisited. Shut down for a year; once again, we are planning our annual Christmas event. Bethlehem Revisited is central to much that goes on here at the farm. Our grandchildren have grown up living through all of the stages:  planning meetings, workdays, the days of the event, which usually begin early in the day with preparation for that day and into the late hours of closing down for each day, and the final clean-up afterward.…

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    “Wokeness” on Kitten Creek

    The weather in Kansas can be fickle. Countless times this year, we have watched the threatening clouds bear down on Kitten Creek and then watch in amazement as the storm circles left or to the right and totally misses us. Sooner or later, though, we get the storms. So we prepare. Presently, we are watching the threatening thunderstorms forming in our larger, cultural surroundings. We are not naive. Inevitable cultural pressure is coming (and presently seeping) into the area that surrounds our community. We are preparing. One of the storms forming around us is a “woke” culture, filled with judgment for anyone who is not “woke.” What does a “woke…

  • Bethlehem Revisited

    The Barn Doors Open (continued from last post)

    The audience quieted as the knock came on the large, rolling barn door.  Joseph was standing in the darkness.  The innkeeper appeared in the large doorway, and Joseph, motioning to a pregnant Mary sitting on a donkey close behind him, began to explain their plight:  “Please, sir, can you give us a room for the night?  My wife is about to deliver, and we have nowhere to stay.” “Can’t you see,” shouted the surly innkeeper as he turned and waved with a sweeping arm across the audience, “we are full tonight.” Ah, we were finally on track.  What was to be an experience of remembrance and worship was beginning to take…

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  • Bethlehem Revisited,  Uncategorized

    Oh Holy Night?

    Where is peace? Where is it hiding, when our world is overwhelmingly disjointed and we feel the need to hold it together?   I was feeling the need to hold things together one December in the early 90’s. Using the land for our Bethlehem story had been a vision  of my heart for years.  It seemed that God had given us land with the story written into its very geography. I was directing the “performance” of our not-named-yet nativity once again. My gifts do not necessarily lie in directing, but I determined to do my best.  Judd, the behind-the scenes’ director was loyally helping me. The majority of our cast that…