Finding our way to The Way one situation at a time. I don't know how great it will be, but I expect it will be interesting, and I look forward to it going on past all reason because wonder is just that way. Are you coming or not?
Sunrise 2012 — Thunder Hill Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, North Carolina
Next Sunday will be Easter Sunday. For forty years and six months I stood before some congregation and talked about the resurrection of Jesus.
What I said changed considerably over that time. I am proud to be able to say that, because the overriding trend is for it not to change at all over the span of 2,025 years.
Do you believe Jesus rose from the dead? Do you believe it matters whether he did or didn't? Do you believe it is important one way or the other? Should we care or not?
Here's what matters: Can you rise from the dead? Here and now? Do you know the difference between being dead and being alive? Are you mostly dead or mostly alive? How would you gauge the quality, degree and depth of your life? What killed you? When did you die? How long are you going to stay dead before you quit breathing?
I don't mean to get personal, but. These questions are the only things that matter. It doesn't matter what you believe about Jesus. It matters what you do about you.
It doesn't matter about what we say about Jesus. It matters what we say about us.
Are we dead or alive?
It doesn't matter what we believe. It matters what we do.
We are free to believe anything we want to believe as long as it enables us to do what is called for in each situation as it arises, in ways appropriate to the occasion, in the service of the gifts of our original nature, our innate virtues--the things we do best and enjoy doing most-- our inherent imagination and our intrinsic intuition, in light of what needs to be done here, now throughout the time left for living.
It would be right for us to spend a good portion of the time left for living in communion with ourselves, seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing what's what and what is called for and how we might best rise to every occasion using the gifts that are ours to do what needs to be done always and forever.
But. Our lives are built/designed to carry us away from these considerations. We let life get in our way. We let the way we live keep us from being alive. Keep us being dead, dead, dead
What are our gifts? We have to spend the time it takes to know, and to practice and develop our skills in serving/sharing those gifts.
Yogis don't just do a little yoga when they feel like it. They live to serve their yoga all their life.
What is our yoga? Our art? Our life? How alive can we be in the time left for living?
Can we rise from the dead? Will we? Jesus wants to know.
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, five granddaughters, one great granddaughter, and a great grandson on the way, within about ten minutes from where we live--and are enjoying our retirement as much as we have ever enjoyed anything.
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Alan Watts asked Joseph Campbell, “Joe, what form does your Yoga take?” Campbell replied, “I underline passages.” Our Yoga is our life, our LIFE. It is what we do that brings us to life, that fills us with life, that makes us ALIVE. What’s that for you? How often do you “do” it? How long has it been? Doing what brings us to life is the key to our resurrection from the dead.
Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 
Alan Watts asked Joseph Campbell, “Joe, what form does your Yoga take?” Campbell replied, “I underline passages.” Our Yoga is our life, our LIFE. It is what we do that brings us to life, that fills us with life, that makes us ALIVE. What’s that for you? How often do you “do” it? How long has it been? Doing what brings us to life is the key to our resurrection from the dead.
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