Change is permanent.  Change is constant.  Nothing can endure unchanged. This paradox is one that has confounded humans from very early in our history.  That does not mean every change is forever.  Time has a way of adjusting things and we have a choice: adjust with it or be left behind.  Even when we resist, that becomes a part of the change.  It happens.  There is no stopping it.  Sometimes we see advancement; sometimes we see regression.  The one constant is the change.  It's part of our identity.  Sunday we change from two worship services to one.  We come at 10am to gather as a community of believers to worship God and sing His praises.  We continue an ancient practice that ties us to the very first believers who began to trust the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  Our hearts will continue to receive the blessings of God and His mercy will continue to comfort us.  My prayer will continue to be one of hope and joy.  It will continue to be a prayer addressed to the One who has made promises to our human family.  Come with a heart ready to celebrate and give thanks and make known your love for Christ.

Hate is a poison to our souls our families our neighborhoods and to the world.  I'm not telling you anything you don't already know.  The Beatles reminded us in one of their hit singles "All you need is love."  I used to think that was true.  But it isn't.  If it were, they wouldn't have broken up.  Apparently they needed their own space and the freedom that goes with it.  If love is all you need we could save/cure the world.  Wait, the Christian Church teaches the love of God is awash in the world.  And Jesus is the savior of that world and yet, we need plenty more than love to make things work.  Back to hate.  The author Graham Greene is reputed to have said "hate is a lack of imagination."  By what the news reports every day, over and over and over, we might come to believe hate has taken over.  North Korea, Syria, London bombings, shootings at charity baseball games,  Our politics seem increasingly hate driven.  Our court dockets are jammed with people and businesses alleging grievances that have resulted in their diminishment to the point they want their opponent bankrupted or imprisoned.  Civility has a bad case of the flu.  In addition to love, we need to stop finding a place for hate to live in our hearts.  We need a better tuned imagination that thinks and believes there is a more creative solution to our grievances than hate and hostility.  No one counts to ten anymore.  I think I'll teach my grandchildren to count to twenty or thirty. At least it's a start.

It never ceases to amaze me the things that once were permissible to do that no longer fit in that category.  One such thing simply baffles me as to how it was ever permissible.  On this date, the 13th of June, 1920, it was no longer permissible to send a child via Parcel Post in the United States of America.  Are your teeth still in place?   It took an official act of the US Postal Service to ban such a practice.  Who in the world was doing such a thing?   Just imagine this.  Mid-morning, say around 10:38, a knock at the door arouses your attention.  There stands your only grandson; all smiles and desperately in need of a bath and a cookie.  All you needed to do was sign for him.  Would you?   What if there was postage due?   Could you be sure he really was your grandson?   Where were his parents?   Have the authorities been notified?   If all the paperwork was in order, what else was there for you to do?   1920 must have been a rather wild time in the good old US of A. After all, they were called the "Roaring Twenty's!"

Today is the 73rd anniversary of the D-Day Invasion.  On the beaches of Normandy tens of thousands of allied fighting men risked life and limb for freedom.  Many thousands of them died.  Thursday the voters in Britain will decide who controls the reigns of Her Majesty's government for the next five years.  Three deadly terrorist events will have an impact on that vote.  The dead and injured in those events remain in our prayers.  A frail and blind Bill Cosby is on trial accused of unspeakable crimes.  Our nation is entangled in partisan party conflict on so many levels it's hard to keep track.  Giant Pythons are invading Florida's Everglades.  Wonder Woman is enthralling theater patrons across the nation.  And Jerry Lewis is not well in Las Vegas.  Lots of news is of no consequence.  Some of it is life or death.  Here's a bit of news that matters plenty to Julia and me.  Tomorrow our daughter, Sarah, will be thirty years old.  That day, thirty years ago was Pentecost Sunday.   By this time tomorrow, we'll know if our next grand child is a boy or girl.  And then, the buying will begin in earnest.  And every penny will be well spent.  There are joys in life that cannot be measured.  Amid the horrors our world can place at our door, making ready for a baby is just about the best remedy there is.  Thanks be to God.