Saturday is a post-race exhale when the week behind you fades and time ahead hasn't yet awoken. The past few weeks have been on blaze. Days end and begin and blur by with a furious shuffle. I can only go at life in this way for so long until things within begin to pull apart and break. It's not healthy to live so fast. It's unholy and unbecoming.
Last night was the push to the finish line of another week gone by too fast. The push to end was well worth it. For the first time we opened our home to host new friends. As our family slumped low into the cushions on the couch worn tired and thin, we waited to play hosts. Friends began to arrive in twos and threes and soon our home was filled with a crowd, no, a community of mixed faces and varying hearts. We sat huddled discussing grace's undoing of moralism through the Gospel. I faded in and out sharing my own struggles and experiences. Our night together ended in confessions that opened our hearts vulnerably so that we could be found and kept. And then I stretched my hand forward, reached for the finish line and breathed out relieved. I knew the week was done and enough. The group left except for two, a beautiful husband and wife who seem well fit to be good friends. We greeted the morning together going further into each other's lives, as if the welcome wasn't enough - we began to feel at home. Goodbyes were exchanged at 2am, and then, the bed never felt so good. This is an exceptionally good Saturday morning. Here's what poked around at with a cup of coffee. I do hope you enjoy!