by David Anderson
This morning I was on the phone with a colleague. As we were winding down our conversation I mentioned that I had just returned from my annual family reunion. “Oh,” he said, “you know what my family calls those annual get-togethers? Dysfunction Junction.” We had a laugh. Families and their awkward attempts at reunion are […]
by David Anderson 3 Comments Filed Under: Conflict, Family, Forgiveness, Grace, Identity, Love
Life each day presents us with the unknown. What will happen? What will not happen? Our great fear is simply not knowing what comes next—and our ultimate fear is of the end. What happens when we die? The big fear—of death—is expressed in all the little fears that roil our hearts, the hundred things each […]
by David Anderson 7 Comments Filed Under: Awareness, Death/Dying, Faith/Trust, Fear, Heaven, Hope, Letting Go, Love, Now/ the Present, Reality--trusting it
Today is my 35th wedding anniversary. Pam and I were married June 3rd 1978 in Panama City, Florida. After 35 years, my marriage is blessedly the most important thing in my life. But it wasn’t always. We all marry a fantasy, an idealized image of the perfect husband or wife. A few months or years […]
by David Anderson 20 Comments Filed Under: Change, Conflict, Family, Forgiveness, Grace, Happiness, Love, Surrender
This week was a rattler. The bombings at the finish line of the Boston Marathon sent a ripple through our nerves, through our families and communities. I heard from people whose children were there, a block or two from the finish line, heard the explosions, ran for dear life. Walked miles and miles to get […]
by David Anderson 7 Comments Filed Under: Faith/Trust, Fear, Forgiveness, Freedom, Grace, Love, Mercy
What happens to you when, a few minutes after delivering your baby, you are told there is something wrong? Yesterday I heard Amy Julia Becker speak. She had lived that scenario. Her husband, who had spoken with the doctor, came back into her hospital room, his eyes glazed with tears. “They say our baby may […]
by David Anderson 7 Comments Filed Under: Family, Fear, Grace, Identity, Love
We just don’t argue anymore. I spent the weekend with my six brothers and sisters—along with all our husbands and wives, except for my brother-in-law Larry in Kuwait. We were in Knoxville for a late celebration of my father’s 94th birthday. And we didn’t argue or fight. Which is saying something in this family. Twenty […]
by David Anderson 5 Comments Filed Under: Conflict, Family, Forgiveness, Gratitude, Love
I found out today that the church I grew up in had been torn down. Calvary Baptist Church in Yankton, South Dakota. My cousin Tom, who still lives in South Dakota, sent a link to a story in the Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan—or the P&D, as we called it, the newspaper I used to […]
by David Anderson 18 Comments Filed Under: Change, Community, Family, Love
You know that holiday music staple, taken from Jerry Herman’s Broadway musical Mame. In the show, the song comes just after Mame has lost her fortune in the great Wall Street crash of 1929. Mame decides that she, her little nephew Patrick and the two household servants need some cheering up. For we need a […]
by David Anderson 1 Comment Filed Under: Grace, Happiness, Love, Now/ the Present, Reality--trusting it