Sometimes I don’t post on my blog because I’m too busy, we’re traveling, the Internet is down, or I simply have nothing to write about. Then there are days like today, when my only excuse is playing golf.

Unlike our Brandon home, we’re not actually on the golf course here. But the second tee is still less than a half mile from the new Maul Hall.

The course is called Paschal; it’s the old Wake Forest University layout where Arnold Palmer played his college golf. Nowadays it’s a bare-bones budget public course with slow greens and “somebody please mow me!” fairways. But it’s a beautiful tract of land and a very interesting design. I loved the tall pines, the views, and the steep changes in elevation.

So far we’re really enjoying how life in a small town makes everything so accessible. Downtown – 0.9 miles; Post Office – 0.7 miles; town hall – 1.1 miles. Once the hot weather passes I can see us walking all over.

CUTENESS! There’s not much I can write about this photograph of the grandchildren that will add anything it doesn’t already say.

I think it’s fairly obvious that Naomi and Craig make beautiful children. And the image brings back memories of Rebekah and me propping our two up on the sofa for a rare shot of “togetherness.” Typically the result was some kind of disaster along with extended wailing and tears.

So I look at David and Rebekah (“Beks,” as Naomi’s been saying lately), and I can’t help but do two things – smile and pray. I smile because, well, that kind of amplified cuteness just makes smiles happen. And what do I pray for? It’s all very simple; I pray that they will both grow in the knowledge and the experience of love, and that they will both grow to become practitioners of the kind of love that can only flow from an intimate and committed connection to the source of life, light and love.

 I pray that they will both grow in the knowledge and the experience of love, and that they will both grow to become practitioners of the kind of love that can only flow from an intimate and committed connection to the source of life, light and love.

BRIGHTNESS: Sometimes that light shines beyond brightly, and that’s what I think Naomi has been capturing so well and expressing so eloquently in her art this week.

A couple of days ago we talked about what creativity means, and the fact that creativity points to the divine in all of us. Well, today’s selection captures the buoyancy and the luminosity of how the Spirit of God resides in our daughter Naomi’s soul.

There are many expressions of God’s presence, but Naomi, ever since she was a small child, has seemed to have an extra light inside her, one that couldn’t be contained and could never be extinguished. I believe this painting of a sunflower does a great job of communicating some of the way that life, light, and love have settled on Naomi’s spirit.

If I could name that quality, I’d call it irrepressible.

In him was life,and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:4-5)

Light, life, and love – DEREK