New Shoots

Posted on July 9, 2015 by Tom Bolton

A new letter from Mineral Street:

Mineral Street Programs and Services, Inc.

Cultivating healthy individuals, healthy families, for a healthy community.

Offshoots

July 2015

Dear Friends,

My husband and I recently bought a house and moved back to Wisconsin. For the first time ever I am able to have a garden. Sure, I helped my mom weed her garden while growing up, but this is the first time for me to have my own garden. The problem is, while one of the beds looks really great to plant in, one other bed is full of rocks and another full of weeds. I started working on the garden by slowly removing some of the rocks and weeds. I soon found that some of the weeds were too close to the scallions that I had planted and I had to leave the weeds in for fear of pulling out the growing scallions. Then a pesky rabbit ate my bean sprouts! So I put up a fence to help keep them out but I will not have beans this year. My cucumbers, on the other hand, seem to be doing very well. I can’t wait until I have fresh cucumbers to eat!

All of this sounds familiar. The planting of my garden sounds like the parable found in Matthew 13:3-9. And the weeds that I can’t pull sounds like the parable found in Matthew 13:24-30.

And all of this is also true of Morning Glory. We are sowing God’s word one meal at a time. Some hear and want to learn more and some do not. Some of the guests are difficult but we keep trying to work with them just the same. But each person who comes thru the door is taken care of and is being touched by God. It is up to them how they want to receive God’s love that is never ending. We will continue working in this garden until it is harvest time.

Matthew 9:37-38 says Then he said to His disciples, “The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.”

Will you come and work in the “garden” with us?

May God Bless this Ministry and You!

In Christ,

Lisa Hernandez

Morning Glory Director

MSP&S President

 

Donations can be made to MSP&S and sent to Tri-City National Bank; 4295 West Bradley Road; Brown Deer, WI 53209; ATTN: Penny Tillman

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Free to Donate Blood

Posted on July 7, 2015 by Tom Bolton

A highpoint of my Independence Day was that I was able to give blood at the Blood Center of Wisconsin. I always feel good when I do that.

Last year after having kidney surgery for kidney cancer, my surgeon said I would not be able to give again. But because I have gone over one year without recurrence or more treatment, I can donate again. What a great feeling of freedom!

I felt so energized after my dual red donation Saturday.

 

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Freedom

Posted on July 4, 2015 by Tom Bolton

I am planning a new series in July, on freedom.

John 15:5-8 from The Message:

“I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can’t produce a thing. Anyone who separates from me is deadwood, gathered up and thrown on the bonfire. But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon. This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples.

On the Path

Free of Self-Concern

I would be free of my own nothingness.
There is new freedom and everything of God.
Oh, for a relationship intimate and organic,
productive, mature.
Here are my hopes; bless them.
My aspirations are deep in this journal; bless them.
My plans are organized in this ledger; bless them.
My abilities are deep within me; bless me.
My future, so clear, is lost in me; bless me.
All my resources, not really mine, to be blessed again,
take into your hands!
May I be free of my own concerns, or will
they continue to anchor me?
Bless me.
I surrender all this.
Bless me to be a blessing.
Will I stay in prayer today?
Will I be in missions today?
Let my day flow from the love of Christ.
Bless me.
Free me.
Keep me.

(c) Tom Bolton, 28 April 2013, Milwaukee

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Peace Yet found

Posted on July 3, 2015 by Tom Bolton

From a long walk in 2014:
On reading 2 Peter 3:11-14

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We Know When there is Peace Yet Found

Upon morning routines and walks here and there,
upon reading words open and inviting,
we seek this holy place.
How long shall we search for peace not known?
Have we known it somewhere in lives yet to live?
With new blemishes seen, we seek our place.
We seek the peace of Christ,
exhorted to a holy life.
There may be heavens here,
places scarcely known or imagined.
We seek this home here.
We seek this home where we know it may be.
Here we seek a home of peace.

(c) Tom Bolton, Bay View, 8 July 2014

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In the Quiet

Posted on June 15, 2015 by Tom Bolton

(Again, I’m reflecting on Galatians and reading Bonhoeffer still.)

Today I look in a mirror, and I see there
Brother Dietrich behind me at ten o’clock,
and I’m learning to listen, and
I’m joyous in this community–even when disappointed in us–
and I see too John Wesley and
others who teach me now and across time.
Solomon teaches me too and I wonder if he had the lessons deep inside him, and outwardly he taught us in sound bites.
Was the kingdom firmly in his grasp?
In silence, I listen, and now my friends
question my silence.
Walking beside those who hunger and ache,
I listen, and briefly boost them up.
They seek answers from me, but I have
only a few answers, and I am simple.
Paul is by me too, and he has polished his arguments.
I am simply here, simple in argument.
Like those around me, I love the carols;
all through each year, I love these carols.
God worked extraordinary miracles through Paul.
He spoke extraordinary truths through
these around me, and through Jeremiah and Job.
I do little:
I listen,
and I sing praises of God all my life.
He upholds the oppressed and the lonely
all the time.
He feeds the hungry and visits the prisoners.
How many kinds of prisoners may we find here?
With Teresa, he teaches us to smile
and to give blessings to the blind and hurting.
He loves the lonely, the poorest of the poor.
He is with us in these lowly places, preaching on a mount.
God blesses us in our silence and our listening.
God blesses His servants!
He offers us grace and peace when we listen.
Grace and peace:
Are there any better gifts?
If I were trying to please neighbors,
I would no longer be Christ’s servant.
Let me listen and serve in this
community, this blessed community, this day.
In my fogged mirror, let me see still those who
guide me, and listen and serve.

(c) June 28, 2012, Milwaukee

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Yet Struggles

Posted on June 13, 2015 by Tom Bolton

fish

Are There Yet Struggles?

It sounded easy at one time.
Filled with hope, I knew it would be.
My struggles over, my face glowed.
And yet the battles with my flesh showed.
Peace behind me, and peace ahead,
my life seemed ready for new ease.
Did I know fully the direction of my life?
Did I know new ease and freedom from strife?
Sin crowds in sometimes,
countered in a constant battle.
Faith leads us to glorious hope,
but doesn’t end life struggles–Nope!

(c) Tom Bolton, Milwaukee, 17 June 2014

 

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In That Week

Posted on May 19, 2015 by Tom Bolton

Another Repeat
Quadruple combination opened to the Book of Is...

In that One Week, in the World

In that one week,
there was an anniversary party,
with 60 years remembered and celebrated and re-lived,
and friends found and met and recalled.
There was cake and movies and photos.
There were children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren too.
There was joy.
We were sent there, and Christ filled us.
We celebrated parents.
In the world, with all that is there,
we were filled with Christ.
Dinner and hugs, laughter and audio squeals,
chances for stress and moments for what-ifs,
We were awed by the love.
In that one week,
there was Billy in the park,
sober and thinking of coming in,
in appreciation and thoughtful,
hugging us.
There was solemn joy there too.
We were sent into the world,
and Christ filled us in that week too.
In that one week,
we texted a missionary in Michigan,
and he texted back, and he inspired us.
We shared words from Isaiah, and
domestic, routine words too.
In that one week, I connected with a son,
And Christ was there.
In that one week, we shared pillars at work,
and heard each other and calmed each other,
and Cared for each other,
and Christ filled us when junk crept into us.
In that one week,
we shared what we could.
We shared cash and Spirit-filled fruits too.
In that one week, we saw that we
were sent into the world,
and we shared with servants planning and supporting
Head Start.
We knew at each turn,
We are sent into the world.
Christ filled us at each turn,
And there was room for no more.

© Tom Bolton, Milwaukee, 2 July 2013

John 17:18 New English Translation (NET)

Just as you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world.

1 John 2:16 The Message (MSG)

15-17 Don’t love the world’s ways. Don’t love the world’s goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.

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