The Watchful Beholder - Moment to Breathe
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
Release Date: 11/12/2019
I Think I Need 100 Days Like This
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
This cool breeze by the river bank. A great blue heron feeding in the shallows. The pilated woodpecker serenading the forest with its haunting song. I think I need one hundred days like this! Slowly, ever so slowly. Here. Now. This! Bit by bit and little by little, I feel a twinge of what may be life. A steady erosion has happened in me. It’s taken time to do this damage. It will take more time to regain what’s been lost. The locust have ravaged much I feel now. Sad stories, and far too many of them, have layered my heart with deep grief. I think I need one hundred...
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Blessing for the Brokenhearted
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
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Allison's Story
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
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The River of no Agenda
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
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Discernment: Finding Our Way, Part 2
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
Discernment is the process of gaining clarity on finding direction for the next step of our journey. SHOW NOTES Today’s podcast is part two of a discussion between Steve and Spiritual Director Martie McMane. Martie is a retired minister, artist, and spiritual director who used a collage process with Steve & Gwen to help them make some crucial life decisions during a period of repositioning. They continue the conversation today about how the collage process can work in each of our own lives Thank you for joining us in today’s conversation! ABOUT MARTIE MCMANE ...
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Ep 146: Discernment: Finding our Way, Part 1
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
Discernment is the process of gaining clarity on finding direction for the next step of our journey. SHOW NOTES Last year Steve and Gwen went through a period of repositioning: changes were on the horizon but any clarity about what to do next was clouded by the realization that they were not on the same page. They reached out to a trusted Spiritual Director for help and the result was what they called a “Discernment Retreat.” They needed clarity. They needed discernment. Today’s podcast is a discussion between Steve and the Spiritual Director they called on for...
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Ep 145: Walter Brueggemann's Prophetic Imagination
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
I am simply humbled at this stage in my career, to have the privilege to tell Walter’s story and to help amplify his amazingly relevant voice. Getting to know Walter has been a healing and restorative experience for me as a former pastor and a professor deeply committed to social justice when so much of the church and society has forgotten what the biblical text says about God’s care for the marginalized. — Conrad L. Kanagy SHOW NOTES Steve’s chats with Conrad Kanagy, the author of coming soon book Walter Brueggemann's Prophetic Imagination: A Theological Biography....
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'Kindavangelical' With Guest Pete Briscoe
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
I came to the conclusion that I could not stay in that role and be healthy. So I chose to be a healthy person over a megachurch pastor, and it was an incredibly hard choice. — Pete Briscoe SHOW NOTES In today’s conversation, Steve talks with Pete Briscoe about why Pete no longer calls himself an “evangelical.” You’ll hear Pete’s story, filled with pain and struggles, as he discovers more beautiful ways to live the Christian life. While you may not agree with his path, we think there’s something here to learn in his story. Thank you for joining us in today’s...
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Scripture & the Spiritual Journey
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
I have learned to prize holy ignorance more highly than religious certainty and to seek companions who have arrived at the same place. We are a motley crew, distinguished not only by our inability to explain ourselves to those who are more certain of their beliefs than we are but in many cases by our distance from the centers of our faith communities as well. Like campers who have bonded over cook fires far from home, we remain grateful for the provisions that we have brought with us from those cupboards, but we also find them more delicious when we share them with one another under the...
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Steve's List For Summer 2023: Ep 12 - Cultivating Daily Shalom: Using The Daily Examen
Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations
Note From Steve: We are living in a day and age of distractions. We are bombarded with choices, options and desires. This podcast lays out the way to to cultivate peace and contentment. It's about practicing the daily Examen. This is an ancient practice developed by Ignatius of Loyola. He said this ONE spiritual practice would change your life for the good. It's true. My life has thoroughly changed by learning to incorporate this one spiritual practice. It's my final recommendation for the summer. SHOW NOTES The art of reflecting on our day is almost a lost art in our busy and...
info_outlineTaken from Potter's Inn Soul Care Conversations Episode 28 - Beauty: The Hospitality of God
“Dad.” Pause. “Daddy.” Shorter pause. “Dad!” Almost imperceptible pause. “Daaaadddddyyyyy!”
My eyes remain locked on my computer screen.
In other words, I first respond to my youngest son, Quinn, the way most of us respond to most of life—with distraction. Life is asking us to look at it, but our eyes remain locked on our screens, our minds remain locked on the past or the future, and our hearts remain locked on our nagging obsessions—food and drink, shopping and media, gossip and gripe.
Eventually, though, Quinn surpasses a decibel threshold that gets my attention. I finally lock my eyes on him.
“Dad,” he says, a little breathlessly, “come see the bathroom.”
I immediately picture an overflowing toilet or toothpaste smeared on a mirror or a trash can torn asunder by the dog. I sigh heavily and ask with trepidation, “What’s wrong? Is it a mess?”
My second response to Quinn is dread. When life finally gets a little of our attention, we tend to be reluctant to look at it. After all, in the daily news, everything seems to be falling apart, so everything everywhere must be falling apart, right? We pay attention to the problems, and then we come to expect them. We start dreading life instead of looking at it.
But Quinn responds, “No, Dad, it’s not a mess. It’s beautiful.”
We walk into the bathroom. The toilet isn’t overflowing, but there is trash on the floor and the cap has been left off a leaking tube of toothpaste. I see nothing particularly remarkable, let alone beautiful. Quinn steps back. Crosses his arms. Smiles. And says, “The light, Daddy, look at the light.”
Slowly, I begin to see what he’s seeing. The bathroom is subtly illuminated by slanting early morning summer sunlight. I’m no longer distracted or dreading, and I can see what I would have missed only moments before: the bathroom is glowing.
It’s luminous.
Beauty, it turns out, isn’t in the eye of the beholder; beauty is in the eye of the watchful beholder. Unless we are present, even beauty becomes invisible. But if we watch this life attentively, which is to say beautifully, we might just experience the beauty that has been there all along.
Written by Dr. Kelly Flanagan - www.drkellyflanagan.com