A Wind River Early Morning this past month
Photo by Jeffrey Louden
This coming Sunday the Gospel is about bread. Bread is both literal and metaphoric, i.e. we all need bread to sustain us, the bread made from wheat and the bread of human community, the bread of grace. Bread gives hope. Its texture and substance sustain a community. Communities, even St. Matthew's, need fresh bread. Not the white flimsy Wonder Bread made, but homemade bread, with body and taste, kneaded with love.
I spent the past month in the Wind Rivers of Wyoming, from where some of my bread has come the last fourteen years. I worked for 30 days on an expedition in the wilderness with eleven strangers as an instructor with the National Outdoor Leadership School. We persevered, saw beautiful country, completed the expedition successfully. We performed one evacuation. We lived simply. It was bread for my body and soul.
See you Sunday, as we continue our expedition of faith. May you have the bread you need and enough to share with others who are hungry too.
Peace,
Pastor Jeffrey Louden
I go among the trees and sit still.
ReplyDeleteAll my stirrings become quiet
around me like circles on water.
My tasks lie in their places
where I left them asleep like cattle.
...
After days of labor,
mute in my consternations,
I hear my song at last,
and I sing it. As we sing,
the day turns, the trees move . --W. Berry
welcome back to the west side