Michael’s News

I had a quick visit for some photography in Tarrytown, NY,  to shoot a house, which was great to catch a taste of late summer in the North East, with it’s exuberant plant growth.

New Chaplaincy

This month I was asked to be the Chaplain for a homeless day center in Sarasota where I served as a volunteer up until covid started. It is wonderful to be ministering with that population because there seems to be no middle road, in terms of their beliefs. They are either hot or cold in their beliefs, very few are lukewarm. So it is a wonderful challenge and very different from the working with the elderly population who I have been immersed in for the last four years.

In the book of Revelation 3:15-16, Christ criticizes the church at Laodicea with these words, ‘Would that you were either cold or hot!  So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.”

Whenever I read those words they come as a wake up alarm going off again in my mind.

How easy it is to become lukewarm and not even realize it; not just in our walk with God but with everything we do. The longer we do the same thing the more likely we are to become indifferently warm about it. I know when I ask some of my coworkers how they are doing today, most likely the answer will be. ‘Same old, same old’, with a broad tired resigned grin.

Gratefully, doing a ceremony completely differently can help us reexamine what we are doing usually. I had a request to do a Celebration of Life Service for a family which had just lost their father. As so often happens, due to the various family member travel schedules, it needed to be done quickly. The father who had passed was not a church goer and had requested just a small gathering when he passed. The family booked a boat and via the canals of Anna Maria Island moored close to a former property of the family. Wine was drunk, memories shared, rose petals thrown into the water, a small ceremony spoken with Psalm 23 attached, a prayer for wood workers [he had been] and we were off to find dolphins and manatees. Which we did. The sun had set by the time we were returning to port and his wife asked me, ‘Do you think we will have closure now, will the pain go?’ There would be closure but the pain does not go, but slowly, I assured. But in my own mind I questioned, have I given this man a true commendation to the Lord? So now I recognize how unfulfilling being lukewarm for the Lord is. So when we do not push through, with a full expectation and a complete request of the Lord, we are unlikely to receive it. Being lukewarm is rejected and unrewarded by our living God.

I also made a short video, Christ Our Mediator, https://youtu.be/VPlWjWoIIJQ.

The inspiration for that came from two sources, one was a banana plant we have in a pot in our little kitchen enclosure started to bloom and make bananas. How incredible that whole process is and not something we usually get to witness up close. The other source was from my ESV study bible’s notes on the overall view of the Bible. Please take six minutes to look at it and pass it along where you can.

Christine’s News

Just as the Art Uptown Gallery closed its doors in August, an new opportunity came up with the Define Art Gallery, also in Sarasota, but this time on South Palm Ave.- a very nice part of town and just on the next block to our beloved Church of the Redeemer! What a great location and opportunity! Last night was the first opening and it was packed with well wishers and local art afficiandos.

At the Define Art Gallery opening with a friend and my painting “Celebration” on the right.

Also, I’m so blessed that one of my icons- “Archangel Michael of the Apocalypse”, was juried into an exhibition at the Sarasota Art Center , opening next week. Now I’m preparing for the advent Online Icon Writing Class that will be on Zoom, Dec. 5-8. We will be painting an Icon of the Nativity. Below is the first drawing for it!

Please pray for us to be on fire in our ministry and not lukewarm, and that we can spread the immense joy and love that God has given us for all the world to see and receive, through our ministries and art.

We love you all so very much, and you are in our prayers daily.

Blessings, Christine and Michael Michael’s Photography Christine’s Art and Icons