thought exercise on Aroma

Sometimes, of course, the sense of God with us becomes much more distinct. My oldest brother, J. I. Willard, served for over thirty years as a minister under the blessing of God. But his entry into th...

A student of mine called me late one evening after worship. He was really excited on the other end, and I had to ask him to slow down. So, he says, “Mother Kim, this strange thing happened to me today...

Sometimes, of course, the sense of God with us becomes much more distinct. My oldest brother, J. I. Willard, served for over thirty years as a minister under the blessing of God. But his entry into th...

A very old man lay dying in his bed. In death’s doorway, he suddenly smelled the aroma of his favorite chocolate chip cookie wafting up the stairs. He gathered his remaining strength and lifted himsel...

Have you seen The Good Place ? You should. The afterlife comedy TV show, starring Ted Danson and Kristen Bell, offers a quirky take on heaven and hell which offers plenty of grist for the mill fo...

The smell of freshly baked bread is enough to make people want to sit down, get comfortable, and enjoy several slices. The visible, aromatic, and tactile presence of a warm loaf invites sharing and co...

In the north of England, there's a beautiful garden. It's full of delicate wildflowers, extravagant blossoms, verdant climbing vines, and tumbling water features. Like so many gems of English ...

Every year at the end of November, my husband, Ike, and I load the kids in the car and drive to the nearest Christmas tree lot. We are committed “real tree” people—not to be confused with “fake tree” ...

On a trip to France during college, I (Cyd) was walking through a historic garden in Paris with my older sister. Rounding one of the reflecting pools, we both caught a familiar scent and stopped dead ...

In his excellent study of the famous Biblical passage on shepherds, ( The Good Shepherd: A Thousand Year Journey from Psalm 23 to the New Testament ) , scholar Ken Bailey provides helpful context t...

The framework of seven days is rich with divine intention. Certainly, in biblical numerology, the number seven symbolizes divine perfection. But perhaps it goes deeper than that. Echoing church father...

The Forming of a Memory Before we truly remember anything, it starts as an experience. It is a moment when our senses (sight, sound, taste, smell, and touch) interact with the world around us. Those ...

Christians should be as delighted in the things of sight and sense as God is himself, when at the instant of every creational act, he declares goodness to be observable, enjoyable and usable. Of all p...

The creation of food, tongues, and the human digestive system is the product of infinite wisdom knitting the world together in a harmonious whole. The symphony of glory that sounds from the triune bei...

Recently, I was working in my yard when the blooms on my gardenia plant caught my eye. I took off my gloves, laid my clippers aside, and allowed my mind to linger on those flowers. Inhaling the intoxi...

"God's joy," said by the Persian mystic Rumi, "moves from unmarked box to unmarked box, from cell to cell. As rain water down into flower bed. As roses up from ground. Now it looks ...

Presence is experienced as a unitary whole. Think, for example, about the experience of sitting on the top of a hill, far from the polluting lights of a city, gazing at a dark, starry sky. Unless you ...

There’s a story told in The Sayings of the Desert Fathers…Abba Lot said to Abba Joseph, “Abba, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far ...

Joy’s trick is to supply  Dry lips with what can cool and slake,  Leaving them dumbstruck also with an  ache Nothing can satisfy.

Have you ever met someone and known instantly, or at least guessed, that they were a fellow believer? When I was in college, I lived abroad for a year in Germany. We always had Fridays off so that we ...

I am among the minority of people who are hardwired (genetic science now demonstrates this) to loathe cilantro. I can’t stand it. I call it the adolescent of herbs: notice me, notice me, NOTICE ME! To...

There is a lovely disarray that comes with attraction. When you find yourself deeply attracted to someone, you gradually begin to lose your grip on the frames that order your life. Indeed, much of you...

J.M. Montgomery’s novel Emily of New Moon has a passage that conveys the attractive and terrifying aspects of the mystery of God: It had always seemed to Emily, ever since she could remember, th...

I once asked a circle of people from church, if Jesus is the “bread of life,” what kind of bread is He? Not a one of them said, “He’s that small round wafer we use at Communion.” I wrote down their an...

In a short story, Jhumpa Lahiri writes about Mr. Kapasi, a man who translates to a city physician what rural Indian people say about their illnesses. When Mr. Kapasi complains to a friend, Mrs. Das, t...

Anticipation lifts the heart. Desire is created to be fulfilled – perhaps not all at once, more likely in slow stages. Isaiah uttered his prophetic words about the renewal of the natural Creation into...

The world is full of presence. Every moment of life is crammed full of potential encounters with people and things that are present to us even though we may not be present to them: the presence of a c...

Harry Emerson Fosdick once told how as a child, his mother sent him to pick a quart of raspberries. Reluctantly he dragged himself to the berry patch. His afternoon was ruined for sure. Then a thought...

Every Communion is an embodiment of God’s grace. We hear God’s grace in the words that are spoken. But we also see it, hear it, touch it, and taste it in the bread and wine. God in his kindness, knowi...

[The] Puritans made good use of the Latin phrase omnis vita gustu ducitur -every life is led along by its tastes. They knew that each creature is piloted by an inner yearning for its favorite food. E...