“Don’t be anxious from morning to evening and from evening to morning, about what you will wear.” – The Gospel of Thomas
My Friends and Neighbors,
If you open the pages of the magazines of today, you’ll see page after page of “New Looks” and “Spring Fashions.” We are told that to be a person of substance, we must have the crispest collar, the finest suit, and the most fashionable hat. We’ve become a community of workers and homemakers who spend an awful lot of time standing in front of the mirror, adjusting our ties and smoothing our skirts.
But I want to share a piece of timeless wisdom that is far more durable than any fabric found at Anderson’s General Store. The word tells us: “Don’t be anxious from morning to evening and from evening to morning, about what you will wear.”
Now, isn’t that a striking thought? To be “anxious from morning to evening.” That is a heavy burden to carry. It’s like carrying a sack filled with lead pipes. We wake up wondering if we look the part for the office, and we go to bed fretting over whether we’ll have the means to keep up with our neighbors tomorrow.
When we fret over our garments, we are essentially saying that our worth is something we put on in the morning and take off at night. But the Divine does not look at the label on the inside of your coat. The Divine is interested in the quality of the soul that inhabits the suit.
Think for a moment of the natural world that the Divine has created. Consider the wild flowers that bloom in the meadows beyond our town limits. They don’t have sewing machines. They don’t have charge accounts at the local tailor. And yet, the sheer elegance of their petals puts our finest Sunday silk to shame.
If the Divine provides such exquisite care for a flower that is here today and gone tomorrow, how much more care is extended to you? To worry about our “outer shell” is to doubt the very providence that keeps our hearts beating and the planets in their orbits.
Let us consider the “attire” that actually matters:
The Cloak of Kindness: Which never goes out of style.
The Shoes of Peace: Which carry us through the roughest terrain.
The Girdle of Truth: Which holds a life together when the winds of adversity blow.
When we stop pacing the floor at midnight worrying about our social standing or our physical appearance, we finally clear enough space in our minds to hear the quiet voice of the Divine.
As you step out your front door and back into the hustle and bustle of the work week, take a deep breath. Look at the sky. Look at the trees. Remember that you are a child of the Divine. Your value is not woven into your sleeves. It is etched into your eternal spirit.
Go home. Sit out on your front porch, and be at rest. For the Divine who clothed the world in such splendor has certainly not forgotten you.
Amen.
The bus stop had become Ethan’s personal purgatory. Every afternoon, he saw her. The woman with the radiant, angelic glow. Each time, he managed to get one step closer, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird.
“Miss!” he would call out, but the hiss of the Greyhound’s air brakes always swallowed his voice. She would step onto the bus, the folding doors snapping shut like a definitive period at the end of a sentence. He asked everyone on Main Street if they knew her. He questioned the regulars at the Lunch Box Cafe. No one knew her. Even Pastor Dzef remained cryptic, offering only a vague promise to watch for her at Saint Helga’s.
As the date for his rehearsal with Tommy Melk and the Melk Duds approached, Ethan’s world began to tilt. He practiced until his fingers bled and his shoulder ached. The “rusty” screeching was gone, replaced by a tone that was rich and haunting, drawing neighbors to their porches to listen in hushed awe. But inside, Ethan was a wreck.
The pressure of the upcoming practice triggered a dark, familiar symphony in his head. He could hear his father’s voice, sharp and berating, mocking his musical choices. Calling his passion a waste of time. The overthinking overflowed into his work at WRYL. He missed cues, fumbled his words, and was chewed out by the station manager twice in one week.
Then, the hallucinations started.
As he walked to work, the vibrant, 1950s life of Royal would suddenly flicker. The bright, cheerful storefronts would grey out into a ghost town The people would become translucent. Fading like old photographs left in the sun. He felt himself losing his grip on whatever reality this was.
That afternoon, he stumbled into the studio, his mind a storm of anxiety. But the moment he opened the door, the storm ceased. A hauntingly beautiful melody was playing over the airwaves. It was an accordion, the lead instrument weaving a soul-stirring web of sound. Ethan froze. He knew that touch. He knew that vibrato.
It was his grandfather.
The song was “The Shadow of Yesterday,” the very last piece Ethan had heard his grandfather play. As the notes filled the room, the anxiety evaporated. Ethan’s breathing slowed, his heart rate settled, and a profound peace washed over him. He closed his eyes, letting the music bridge the gap between his two lives.
When the song ended, Ethan opened his eyes. Royal was back, vibrant, alive, and solid. The doubt was gone. He performed his afternoon show with a flawless, effortless grace.
That evening, Ethan walked down Main Street with his violin case in hand. The town felt welcoming. The Lunch Box Cafe glowed with a warm light, and Pastor Dzef tapped on the window, offering a knowing smile as Ethan passed.
The rehearsal was held at the Royal VFW. The hall was mostly empty, save for a few guests Tommy had invited, who sat nursing drinks at the bar. Tommy greeted Ethan with a stack of sheet music and pointed him toward the stage.
Ethan walked to the stage, heart racing, and began to set up.
“Hello, my name is Paul. Nice to meet you.”
Ethan’s jaw nearly hit the floorboards. He looked up into a face he had loved his entire life. But it was a much younger face, vibrant and full of strength. It was his grandfather. He was wearing the same accordion he would eventually pass down to Ethan.
“Hi… I’m Ethan,” he managed to stammer, his voice trembling. “Nice to meet you, too.”
Paul smiled warmly. “A word of advice, Tommy is a perfectionist. But if you play the notes with your heart and soul, you’ll do just fine. Here, let me give you an ‘A’ so you can tune up. Looking forward…”
As the violin and accordion found their pitch together, the room seemed to hum with a secret energy. Paul winked at him, a gesture so familiar it brought tears to Ethan’s eyes.
“Let’s start with “The Shadow of Yesterday”,” Tommy announced, holding his clairinet. “Grace, are you ready?”
A young woman rose from a barstool in the shadows and stepped toward the stage lights. As she moved into the glow by the microphone, Ethan stopped breathing.
She was the woman from the bus stop.
She smiled at Paul, then turned her gaze toward Ethan. Her eyes were deep, knowing, and as radiant as they had been under the Greyhound awning.
The town’s long held secret finally began to stir. As the first notes pierced the air, Ethan realized this wasn’t just another rehearsal. It was an invitation to something much larger than he had imagined. Ethan was standing at a threshold he didn’t yet understand, waiting for the next note to show him the way.
“Why do you wash the outside of a cup? Do you not know that he who made the inside is also the one who made the outside?” – The Gospel of Thomas
My Friends.
Take a look around you this fine morning. We see a congregation of pressed suits and Sunday best dresses. We take great pride in our appearances. Do we not? We scrub our doorsteps. We wax our Buicks until they shine like mirrors. We ensure our lawns are trimmed to the very inch. There is a certain comfort in a clean exterior. It tells the neighbors, and it tells ourselves, that we have things under control.
But let us lean in a little closer to the Word this morning. Consider, if you will, the simple coffee cup sitting in your cupboard at home.
Imagine a housewife hosting a bridge club. She brings out her finest china, shimmering under the parlor lights. The outside is pristine, decorated with delicate painted roses. But if that cup is filled with the residue of yesterday’s bitterness, is it fit for a guest? Of course not.
Today’s scripture poses a piercing question to us today: “Why do you wash the outside of a cup? Do you not know that he who made the inside is also the one who made the outside?”
We spend our lives frantically scrubbing the “outside.” We polish our reputations. We curate our smiles. We make sure our public testimonies are beyond reproach. We are terrified that someone might see a smudge on the porcelain of our character.
To honor the Divine only with our outward manners while harboring resentment, greed, or pride within is a hollow gesture. It is a biological and spiritual contradiction. You cannot claim to love the Divine while neglecting the very workshop where the Divine works.
Your heart. Your soul.
My friends, the “outside” is a fleeting thing. The finest house-paint will eventually peel. The brightest silver polish is destined to tarnish with the passing years. But the “inside”, that sacred, internal vessel fashioned by the hands of the Divine is the only thing truly built to endure.
This week, as you go about your business. In the shop. In the office. In the kitchen. Ask yourself this, “Am I merely rinsing the surface to impress my neighbor? Or am I inviting the light of the Divine to scour the hidden corners of my soul?”
Let us stop living as two-dimensional cutouts. Let us be whole. For the Divine not only fashioned the stars. The Divine also fashioned your soul. And the Divine desires to find it clean, sweet, and ready for service.
Amen.
Dear Shirley,
My husband has insisted on purchasing one of those “TV dinners” for our Wednesday evening meal. He says it allows us more time to enjoy our favorite programs, but I feel like a failure as a housewife serving peas from a foil compartment! Am I being a “stuffed shirt,” or is the kitchen table becoming obsolete?
Flustered Franny
Dear Flustered Franny,
Don’t let a little aluminum foil rattle your pearls! While a home-cooked roast is the gold standard, even a general needs a night off from the front lines. Consider the TV dinner a “technological holiday.” If the guilt is too much to swallow, serve the Salisbury steak on your finest china and keep the television off until dessert. A happy husband is a well-fed one, even if his gravy comes in a pre-measured square.
Shirley
The Wit And Wisdom Of Horace B Miesner
The early worm gets the bird… eventually.
WRYL – The Voice of the Great Up North
The heavy front door of the VFW groaned shut, sealing out the amber light of the late afternoon. Peggy sat in the passenger seat of Eleanor’s battered Chevy. Her mind spinning faster than the gravel under the tires. Clutched in her arms, the “For Ethan’s Eyes Only” envelope felt heavy, a physical weight of secrets and skipped heartbeats.
“You’re awfully quiet, sugar,” Eleanor said, her eyes fixed on the winding blacktop. “Those old warhorses in there can talk your ear off, but they don’t mean much harm. Mostly just bored.”
Peggy looked at Eleanor’s profile. The woman’s hands were steady on the wheel, her face a map of small-town resilience. “Harold mentioned a woman named Grace. He said she stayed in Royal after everyone else left. After the power was cut.”
Eleanor’s foot hesitated on the gas for a fraction of a second. The engine hummed a lower note. “Harold always did have a soft spot for a ghost story. But Grace… she wasn’t a story. She was real enough.”
“Did you know her?”
Eleanor sighed, a sound like dry leaves skittering across pavement. “Everyone knew the girl who waited. She lived in that little Victorian house near Royal Park. The park with the gazebo. The house was a beautiful place before the quarantine. After? It was like the world just forgot to keep turning for her.”
Peggy’s breath hitched. The gazebo. The image from the puzzle, the image on the sheet music. It wasn’t just a romantic illustration; it was a landmark of a tragedy.
“She had a child, didn’t she?” Peggy pressed.
“A boy,” Eleanor said. “Born a few years before the ’59 outbreak. Grace was… different after that. Fiercely private. When the sheriff put up the roadblocks for the measles quarantine, she didn’t complain. Some say she liked the silence. But then the quarantine lasted too long. The measles story started to smell funny to folks in Oakhaven. People stopped getting sick, but the guards stayed. And when they finally left? Royal was just a shell.”
“Why didn’t she leave with the others?” Peggy asked.
“She told my mom once that she’d promised someone she’d be there when the music started again. Can you imagine? Waiting in a town with no lights, no mail, just the wind whistling through the abandoned town.” Eleanor shook her head. “She stayed until 1964. By then, the boy was school-age. The county finally sent a social worker in to force them out. They moved her to a state facility over in Chippewa Falls. The boy… well, he went into the system.”
Peggy gripped the envelope. “What was the boy’s name?”
Eleanor turned the blinker on, the rhythmic click-clack filling the tense silence of the car. “I really don’t remember. Maybe after his father. But Grace never would say who the father was. Just that he was a traveling man. Or something like that. Some said the father was a musician. He might have played in the Tommy Melk band”
The realization hit Peggy like a physical blow. Tommy Melk and the Melk Duds? Ethan’s grandfather? The family friend she told the old men about wasn’t just a friend. Could it be…?
As they pulled into the driveway of a small, neat house in Black River Falls, Eleanor turned off the ignition. The silence was absolute.
“Peggy,” Eleanor said softly, “that puzzle those old men were working on? It’s been in that VFW hall for years. No one ever finishes it because one piece is missing. Just like the truth about Royal. Some things are better left lost in the woods.”
Peggy looked at the dark silhouette of the trees against the twilight sky. Somewhere out there, past the highway and the history books, the ghost town of Royal was waiting. And she knew, with a terrifying certainty, that she held the missing piece in her hand.
“Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” – Matthew 25:40
Good morning, friends and neighbors. We live in a time of great prosperity. We have new cars in the driveway. The refrigerators hum in our kitchens. Our future looks brighter than a June morning. But in the midst of this Great American Century, we must be careful not to let the glare of our own success blind us to the person standing in the shadows.
There is a profound mystery at the heart of our faith. A teaching from the Divine that turns the social ladder right on its head. It is this: Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.
Now, we often go looking for the Divine in the high places. We look for majesty in the cathedral spires, or we look for power in the thunder of the clouds. But this morning’s truth tells us something different. It tells us that the Divine chooses to wear a humble disguise.
Think of the least of these in our own town. The man sitting on the park bench who’s fallen on hard times. The widow, struggling to keep her garden tidy. The child from the wrong side of the tracks with a hole in his shoe.
When you offer a handshake to the forgotten, or a hot meal to the hungry, you aren’t just being a good citizen or a decent fellow. You are actually reaching out and touching the Divine. Every act of kindness to the lowly is a direct gift to the Divine.
Friends, we often worry about how we stand in the eyes of our community. We want the boss to think we’re industrious. We want the neighbors to see us as respectable. But the real audit of our souls happens when no one is watching, except the Divine.
If we are important people who treat the unimportant with indifference, we are missing the point of our existence. If we tip our hats to the Mayor but turn our backs on the vagrant, we have turned our backs on the Divine. You see, the way we treat the person who can do absolutely nothing for us is the truest measure of our character.
As you go back to your tidy homes and your busy offices this week, I want to challenge you. Look for the least among us. Don’t look at them as a burden or a social problem to be solved by a committee. Look at them through the eyes of the Divine. Treat the delivery boy with the same respect you’d show a bank president. Keep an eye out for the lonely soul who doesn’t get many visitors. Remember that when you serve others, you are being served by the peace that only the Divine can provide. Let us not just be a community of good neighbors, but a community that recognizes the sacred in every face we pass on the sidewalk.
Amen.
“The merciful, kind, and generous man benefits himself for his deeds return to bless him, but he who is cruel and callous to the wants of others brings on himself retribution.” – Proverbs 11:17
Dear Brothers and Sisters. I’d like us to reflect on a law of nature. Not a law of physics like those our scientists are studying in their laboratories. But a law of the spirit. We live in a world that prizes the self-made man, the go-getter, and the one who climbs the ladder of success. But tonight, I want to talk to you about the true economy of the heart.
There is a rhythm to this life, established by the Divine, that dictates a simple truth: The merciful, kind, and generous man benefits himself, for his deeds return to bless him. But he who is cruel and callous to the wants of others, brings on himself retribution.
Consider, if you will, the man who lives with an open hand. When he sees a neighbor in need, perhaps a family struggling with a medical bill or a youth who has lost his way. He does not look the other way. He acts with the mercy of the Divine.
Now, some might say, “Isn’t that man losing something? Isn’t he giving away his own security?”
I tell you, the Divine has orchestrated a marvelous thing. Kindness is a boomerang. Kindness is peace of mind. The generous man sleeps soundly, his conscience as clear as a summer morning. When the winter of his own life arrives, he finds a community ready to wrap him in the same warmth he once provided. By showing mercy, he becomes a mirror for the light of the Divine, and that light warms his own house first.
But then, friends, we must look at the alternative. We all know the man who keeps his heart under lock and key. He is callous. Think of that word. A callus is skin that has become hard, thick, and unfeeling. The man who ignores the cry of the poor or treats his subordinates with cruelty thinks he is winning the game of life. He thinks he is protecting his interests. But he is actually building a prison. Retribution is not always a lightning bolt from the sky. Often it is the natural consequence of a life lived without love. The cruel man lives in isolation. He eventually finds himself in a room where the only company is his own bitterness. His heart is hardened. By refusing to feel for others, he loses the ability to feel the joy of the Divine for himself. You cannot sow seeds of thistles and expect to harvest wheat. If you plant indifference, you will reap a desert.
As we head back to our homes, let us remember that every interaction is a seed. When you choose to be the merciful man, you aren’t just doing a favor for your neighbor. You are performing a service for your own soul. You are aligning yourself with the generous nature of the Divine.
Do not let the world harden you. Do not let the pursuit of things make you callous to the people around you.
Open your hearts. Extend your hands. Watch how the blessings of the Divine find their way back to your doorstep.
Amen.
Dear Shirley.
I have been “keeping company” with a steady young man for nearly two years. He is hardworking, polite to my mother, and never forgets a birthday. However, he has yet to mention a “ring” or our future together. My friends are all sporting diamonds and planning June weddings. Should I give him a nudge, or am I being a “Nervous Nellie”?
Waiting in Royal
Dear Waiting in Royal,
Patience is a virtue, but silence isn’t always golden. Sometimes it’s just a lack of direction! A man who appreciates a home-cooked meal should also appreciate a woman’s need for security. Don’t “nudge” him like a stubborn mule. Instead, have a heart-to-heart. If he’s still whistling in the dark after two years, you might want to stop waiting for a spark and find a man who’s ready to build a fire.
Shirley
The Wit And Wisdom Of Horace B Miesner
I’m not a morning person, or an afternoon person, or an evening person.
WRYL – The Voice of the Great Up North
