Shabbat Inspiration with Diane

  Sid and I recently returned from a cruise which included visits to some amazing places – Ephesus where we walked through Mary’s house and on the actual streets where Paul preached, not to mention the Great Synagogue of Rome and the Barcelona Jewish Ghetto. The days were full, enjoyable, educational, uplifting, relaxing . . .   Yet as the cruise neared its end, thoughts of the many connections in my life that are land-ho began to enter my consciousness. My neck and shoulders began to feel strained. My sleep was disturbed, my thoughts troubling about all that would be waiting undone on my to-do list upon my return. Sid has recently teased me that my life’s... Read More →

The release of the hostages. This has been such a part of our lives for the last two years that there is no need to identify which ones or from where for our hearts spring with joy at the mere mention of the words. Last week I read an amazing story about a discovery in Toronto. Over a century ago in the late 1880s the city of Toronto was being urbanized. To do so more than 25 feet of dirt and gravel had ended up on top of vast areas of peat bogs and wetlands. In the 1920s the Don River located there was “re-engineered” by construction of a concrete channel which decades later resulted in costly flooding of the surrounding area. Solutions for the overdevelopment were sought.... Read More →

  What a morning. . .   These truly have been Days of Awe, the time between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. I actually wrote the rest of this Shabbat Encouragement last Friday morning and I can only say each day since has been bursting with the manifestation of His Presence. _______   Today started with me wanting to share Erika Kirk’s eulogy with my cousin who the day before had shared some troubling comments with me about her understanding of Charlie Kirk. I am not going to get into any of that here for that is not relevant nor productive to the point of this writing.   I suggested she listen to Ms. Kirk’s comments with no preconceptions, without judgment from... Read More →

  Being a fair-skinned blonde of the Coppertone ads era I now see my dermatologist regularly. Several years ago while waiting at one of my checkups, I had been on the phone with a Ruach member discussing her son’s upcoming bar mitzvah. Overhearing my call as I was finishing when the doctor arrived, just to make conversation, he asked me about Ruach Israel, and so his journey to find Yeshua began. . .   At that time we ended up in a lengthy conversation about Messianic Judaism, his first encounter with the concept of our understanding of Yeshua as the Messiah of the Jewish people and of the world.  He was intrigued by the concepts of Yeshua’s Jewishness and the ability to not... Read More →

  When I went to sleep last evening my ankle was so painful from an injury that day that I had been unable to walk on it at all. Based on the injury I was anticipating several days, if not longer, of recovery time. I took two Ibuprofen and went to bed.   This morning brought a conversation that inspired this writing. I was looking forward to my morning jog to work on it with God as is my routine. As I sprang out of bed excitedly and prepared for the run, I remembered the injury. No pain! My ankle was completely healed! Having just finished my jog as I write this, inspired, I can only say the thoughts keep flooding.   I hope you will soften your hearts to accept the... Read More →

  This writing is not about Charlie Kirk’s viewpoints. No matter where you stand on those, I hope you can hear the deeper promptings.   I seem to be the only person who didn’t know who Charlie Kirk was. Actually it’s quite embarrassing. I’m educated, well read, and keep current with the news. I even go out of my way to follow news coverage from multiple sources different than my views so that I am aware of the hearts of my fellow life journeyers. Yet I was unaware of Charlie Kirk until yesterday.   A very public, cold blooded, pre-meditated murder of a high profile person. . . The loss of one of God’s creations, a husband, a father. . . What a worrisome state of our... Read More →

  It all started with Tom Jones. . .   I’ve already confessed to you my love of Tom Jones’ voice, from my teen years through now too.  So yesterday as I was listening to him on Spotify, his version of “Danny Boy” came up. His voice on that song is amazingly beautiful and it is my brother’s favorite song. Although “Danny Boy” is an odd choice for Tom to be singing, though Danny could be a son I suppose, and Tom takes major liberties with unusual riffs, I sent it to my brother. I was so thrilled when my brother’s reaction was as blown away by the beautiful rendition as I was.   That experience got me to share Tom’s version with Sid on a speaker device. It’s one where you... Read More →

Who would think that when I wrote this Shabbat encouragement on Tuesday morning that the “Oh God” title would have such a different meaning then than it does this morning, the day after the Mass/mass shooting in Minneapolis. On Tuesday morning the words welcomed His peace as I was settling in to give prayers of thankfulness and praise. Now, just a couple days later, they are a plea for His help. Such is the nature of prayer and of our dynamic relationship with our Creator.   The tragic, yet real world ironic timing of the writings is not to be ignored. News of the shootings sent me reeling, knocked from that place of peace. All the more reason to send the intended encouragement, to... Read More →

  Sid and I are so blessed to be able to live at my sister’s house when we come down from our home in Maine to be with family here and with our Ruach family. Our GPS when we say “Home” always has to ask which one since we are at home as much here as at our own home in Maine. As I looked out the window this morning at the deck at  my sister’s house, the scene revealed so many truths by which we live our lives, or by which we aspire when making life’s choices.   The deck itself, like ours in Maine, is always a challenge. Sid paints ours in the fall and inevitably by the next spring the wear begins to show. It looks so great that first season until the hardship of winter weather... Read More →

  Parenting . . . What a journey. . .   Even if you haven’t had children, we all have experienced the relationship, either as a child, as a parent, or as in loco parentis – those times when we need to act as if we are the parents. Sometimes we are counselors, teachers, mentors, aunts, uncles, grandparents. The list is endless of possible nurturing relationships, not to mention those times we are really blessed to be “parenting” our four legged fur babies. Well that’s for another time. . .   It’s hard to believe Sid and I were still at camp just last week. It seems like a lifetime since then. With all the travel and company this week, today has really been the first chance... Read More →

  Having just returned from Camp Or L’Dor and now expecting house guests at our home in Maine for the next ten days, I have been a bit preoccupied. So I decided to look at my collection of writings and share again the reflection below, as timely now as it was then over a decade ago.   Perhaps at this time I would add that the truth of God’s nearness is also as comforting now as it was back then. No matter what is happening far or near, the comfort we feel when we allow ourselves to take a deep breath and sink into the shalom that comes from feeling our Abba’s embrace is indescribable. It is life affirming.   How is it that we can conceptualize holy wings and a holy... Read More →

  In our lives we experience seasons of trial and sorrow, challenges seemingly beyond endurance. This is a reality that all of us, all of mankind, know is true. Yet we often lose our perspective and think that we have it worse than everybody else. During these times, if we are fortunate to be reminded, we are bolstered by community, and most importantly by our faith. We are not in this alone in the flesh nor in the spirit.   Camp Or L’Dor this year so far is the best that I can remember. It is the result of many factors, including fantastic infrastructure led by Rabbi Nathan and Cheryl, with Doxia, Tammie, Mary, Raina, and new volunteer Autumn tirelessly making it all work,... Read More →

  For many of you who have been on my Shabbat encouragement list for years, you know that this is the time that Sid and I are at Camp Or L’Dor, the Messianic Jewish teen camp founded by Sid and Rabbi Nathan seventeen summers ago. Next year will be our Chai year! Can’t wait!   Typically I share with you the amazing camp experiences we have with our teens and counselors who travel to camp, this year in the Poconos, from across the U.S. and sometimes farther. In years past we have been blessed to have youth leaders from Israel and some of our teens have made Aliyah after being enriched in their faith through camp and their other life experiences.   I was a little late to... Read More →

  Last week we kvelled about Hal Slifer’s visit to Ruach Israel and how much we enjoyed him and he us. We went on to noodle my Bible study experience of the Jewish attendees seeing Yeshua with new eyes, and touched on the miraculous times of the late ‘60s and ‘70s.   As part of that conversation in the Bible study group the subject of miracles generally came up. The inevitable statement by one person that miracles don’t happen in modern times opened up the group to share other perspectives on this point. I was even able to share my testimony which by its very nature demonstrates the reality of modern miracles!   Can we really doubt that miracles are still happening even... Read More →

  For those of you at Ruach on June 28, you must have noticed how at ease Hal Slifer, the host of Chagigah Radio, his wife, and our other guests were with our Ruach community. Our Ruachites were not only welcoming, but also were able to fully engage in Hal’s presentation and one-on-one be in a comfortable relationship with him to further discuss the fascinating topic he presented.   Such intimacy, comfort with another, typically grows over time, or can be accelerated by experiencing the character of the other. It is also not to be taken for granted, but rather, fostered with kindness. Hal and our other guests felt loved by our community. Our openness and sincerity fostered... Read More →

  Last week had been overflowing, with health challenges on the one hand, but with joy beyond measure by Chagigah radio host Hal Slifer’s presentation at Ruach last Shabbat. It was “Wow” and “Wow”! Not only were we blessed by a wonderfully entertaining event but he, too, felt the love of our community. It was palpable.   So as a result of my attention elsewhere I let slip dealing with the change of password I needed to do in order to do my work. What’s worse I thought even though I hadn’t updated the password for my computer that my work messages on my IPhone were still current. (Stop laughing, Ralph.) So I would check my work messages each day on my cell phone but didn’t... Read More →

  As I write this Shabbat encouragement on Monday I am in the middle of a surgical procedure to remove a basal cell carcinoma from the side of my nose. No, I’m not under the knife at the moment! Rather, I’m in the nerve racking waiting period for the doctor to check the margins to see if he got it all or if he needs to go back in further. If so, I will return to the operating procedure for the next removal, additional waiting time, and so it will go for the afternoon. I already know I need skin from near my ear for a graft so I’m here for a while.   I had started the morning with a jog, my time with God to listen, talk, and pray. Even though we’re in the middle of a heat... Read More →

  Several days ago I was listening to an NPR show about Amanda Ewing recognized as the first Black woman luthier in the U.S.  It is a bittersweet title as she recollected for the listeners how violins and fiddles have been part of slave history for centuries and yet no written account of this information exists. She noted that other Black and brown violin makers, though male, came before her but they could only sell their instruments if the buyers thought the maker was white.   She shared how rather than using dark wood she makes her violins out of light wood to be evocative of sunlight to bring a feeling of light to the instrument, “It’s golden sunshine,” she says. “I wanted... Read More →

  It’s a beautiful spring morning. Our home in Maine is by the sea and in view of the working waterfront. Watching the lobsterman (now only one since the winter storm last year wiped out the majority of the lobster pound wharfs) loading his traps brought a poignant sadness to the beauty. The 91-year-old owner of the property, despite the devastation of the business, still comes down every day to check the building.   Our neighbor across the street has been dying of cancer for the last two years. He spent the winter at a nearby hospice not expecting to make it to spring. He had even rehomed the love of his life “Puppy” to another neighbor. Yet here he is, all 100 pounds of him,... Read More →

    For the past few weeks we’ve been pondering antisemitism, grief, loss, acts of hatred as we process the difficult world events teeming with such actualities. There is no lack of such suffering even as we reel again this past week from the antisemitic violent attack in Boulder which even seriously injured an 88-year-old Holocaust survivor. All those targeted were doing were walking in support of the hostages still held by Hamas from the October 7th attack. They were not even participating in a political protest. They were just as Jewish people feeling the pain of other fellow Jews and their families.   The Boulder march participants were being co-sufferers. They were... Read More →

  How do we find hope in these times? So many places in Scripture describe days just as we have experienced and give us this answer for we know our God is with us and there will be days ahead when suffering will stop. We are to forgive too but it is so hard when not only must we face upside down times in so many ways, we personally as Jewish people feel rising antisemitism running rampant. We feel it not only currently in the world, but also, in our souls generationally through millennia and personally through stories of our grandparents of the Holocaust as well as by ourselves having experienced such treatment. Hatred just for being who we are is palpable, and so, we struggle with... Read More →

I had just finished writing this week’s Shabbat Encouragement when I heard the horrific news of the murder of young Israeli embassy staffers Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim outside the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. last evening. No words can describe the flood of emotions personally, and worldwide, in reaction to such a blatant act of religious hatred in our Nation’s capital. Cruel, callous, cold blooded, hatred based on antisemitism, poorly masked behind political jargon. These crimes are the next level of hate-filled actions which we can only hope will embolden vast majorities worldwide and governmental leaders to stand against, as at least has been the reaction of... Read More →

  It was the Nova festival in Israel, the date October 7, 2023. She heard gunfire and took refuge in a concrete bomb shelter at the side of a road with 50 or more people crammed in, lying on top of each other. There was no escape as she heard uncountable gunshots being fired into the mass of bodies, then the hand grenades following.   She called her dad in tears as she pleaded for him to call the police. She was being crushed by the weight of the dead bodies. “Be quiet, my daughter. . . breathe deep. . . hide. . .  Play dead,”  he advised. “Bye”, she said as she assumed she would die.   This is the story of Yuval Raphael who was one of only 11 people to survive from that... Read More →

  I have been grateful over the last several years to have developed a wonderful working relationship with Hal Slifer, host of Chagigah on WERS every Sunday morning. This is a show dedicated to three hours of playing Jewish American, Israeli, and Yiddish music, Jewish humor, and sharing fascinating backstories about many of the songs played on the program. Since WERS is also a downloadable app and can be heard nationwide the show has an average listening Jewish audience of 5000 each week so its reach is significant.   With that as background, Sid and I have been blessed to schmooze with Hal over meals, go to events with other Chagigah listeners, and even be guest DJs on the... Read More →

  I know illness, suffering, and death are real.  That is the reality of life in this realm. Yet within this realm we are also given the opportunity to witness and experience the healing power of God’s Love. I capitalize the word “Love” for it is of a divine nature that is beyond our comprehension to understand but not beyond our ability to know.   So many examples. . .   Love powers our individual acts of selfless sacrifice seemingly beyond our ability to know how we can do it, taking care of another through their hardship, not even noticing hours have passed without our eating or noticing the sacrifice on our own part. This intense sacrificial love is fueled by our... Read More →