November 10-B, 2022

**Terraces 09/27/2005 Oil Paint Rendered — Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming**

We are to be about
creating an atmosphere
conducive to life and well-being.

Why is that hard?
Hard to grasp?
Hard to remember?
Hard to do?

Good/right is helpful to that end,
bad/evil/wrong is harmful to that end.

This is not difficult,
why is it hard?

What is good/right interferes with
what is good/right for us.
What is good/right for us
is often bad/evil/wrong for others.

Whose side are we on?
How good is the good we call good?
Whose good is served
by the good we call good?

In what ways do we share the good?
The wealth?
The power?

In what ways do we hoard it?
Squander it
in trying to keep it all for ourselves?
Create evil "serving" the good?

Who are we kidding?
Who do we think we are kidding?
Talking good/right,
doing bad/evil.

Nothing works like a reckoning.
Like paying attention.
Like seeing who we are and what we are doing.
Like squaring up to the truth
of how things are with us really.
Like calling BS where BS needs to be called.
Like shedding appearances
and embracing/exhibiting
the task of creating an atmosphere
conducive to life and well-being
in each situation as it arises
all our life long.

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Published by jimwdollar

I'm retired, and still finding my way--but now, I don't have to pretend that I know what I'm doing. I retired after 40.5 years as a minister in the Presbyterian Church USA, serving churches in Louisiana, Mississippi and North Carolina. I graduated from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, in Austin, Texas, and Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana. My wife, Judy, and I have three daughters and five granddaughters within about twenty minutes from where we live--and are enjoying our retirement as much as we have ever enjoyed anything. View more posts