Yet here on the back porch, I am calmed. There is a feeling of nature here – even amongst the two and three story, minimal lot-line houses in the development they live in. As I look out, to my right is a section of woods on slopes so steep that I pray the developers never find a way to conquer and develop there. The tall trees line and overshadow the banks of a small creek that I cannot see except in my mind’s eye, but I know it is there for the manicured pond in front and to my right empties into it. The wind is blowing the 54 degree air causing the not yet fallen leaves to murmur with one voice. They speak loudly today, but even when they are silent, I know they are singing praises to their creator, to God.

In this place all is alive and bursting in song – in love and adoration – to the holiest of holies, God the father. In this moment, I close my eyes and drink Him in. I do not hear his voice, but I can feel his love and it warms me to my core.

Galatians 5:16

“So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature.”

Galatians 5:22-23a

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”

The leaves on the trees are just beginning to change. They are still mostly green, with those on the top and toward the south gradually becoming yellow, then orange, then a brilliant fiery red. It is, I am sure, no unplanned decision that the leaves facing the Sun are the first to change. Perhaps they are attempting to reflect the Sun’s brilliance, it’s beauty, it’s power. Or perhaps, this morning, just for my education, they are a visible demonstration of change I can expect when I focus on the Son.

So, here’s what’s been going on. Sonya and I have made several trips to Georgia to take care of her parents. They live north of Atlanta so it takes awhile to get there and back. On one of the trips we enlisted the help of a coupe in our small group. They were a huge help and we owe them forever. We do manage to eat ourselves across the town whenever we’re up there though, so I definitely haven’t lost any weight.

I have been reading. I know it looks like I haven’t but I have. I’ve stopped reading 12 books at a time; it seems my mind just can’t keep up anymore. I will change the Now Reading list soon – I promise.

Sonya site is coming along well. I fixed the problem with her images not showing up and now, hopefully, she’ll find time to post more too.

I’m not happy with the look and feel of the TAG site, so at some point soon I’m going to have to change it out. I’ve neglected it before and it bit me, but I’ll probably end up changing the CMS engine. XOOPS is a great engine, but lacks some ease-of-use and ease-of-upgrade I’m looking for. WordPress is easy. I wish they all were, but security is hard; if it weren’t everybody would do it. Feel free to comment if you have an opinion of what to use.

I’ve been testing Drupal for some time now, but the upgrade path seems to be a little dicey … “Don’t upgrade your database twice as it may cause problems.” OK, that scares me.

As far as the real premise of this site, I think it is evolving. This is still “One man’s journey to follow Man One,” but I feel as though I need to share more and less about me at the same time. My studies have become more deep and personal (hence why I haven’t published any lately). And quite a few could use more fleshing out.

So, I will be back, but I’ll be posting more about everything, though they may be shorter.