Month: July 2025

              Whenever you enter a town
              and they do not welcome you,
              go out into its streets and say,
              ”Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet,
              we wipe off in protest against you.
              Yet know this: the realm of God has come near.”
                                       —Luke 10.10-11


This is opposition without polarization.
We disagree with you.
But we do not take your opposition personally.
We don’t separate ourselves from you,
nor you from the grace of God.
Something greater than our beliefs,
even our precious struggle for justice,
holds us all together, holds us near.
We are still members in common
in the realm of grace.
Even if you reject us, you are still included
in God’s love and blessing.
We aren’t merely preaching about the Realm of God;
we’re living it.
God be with you.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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              “The dust of your town that clings to our feet,
              we wipe off in protest against you.”
                         —Luke 10.11

Here in your grace, God,
I wipe off the dust that has clung to me
from unpleasant encounters.
I do not need to take them personally:
the dirt of hurt feelings,
the smear of insults,
the slime of other people’s anger.
The grit of trauma, driven deep into my pores,
I wash clean. It is not me.
Even the dust of my own self-doubt
I wipe off.
Beneath the mud, beneath the stains,
I am whole and beautiful and capable.
I am blessed and beloved.
To other people’s bad energy,
God, help me be non-stick.
I’ll stick with your grace instead.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             “I am sending you out
             like lambs into the midst of wolves.”
                                      —Luke 10.3

My dear followers,
even as you bear blessing and goodwill,
you will enter unwelcoming places,
where they disdain compassion,
where they bully and harass.
You will not be respected, nor physically safe.
You will be shouted at, seized, detained, jailed.
When you resist evil, it will push back. But you will persevere.
You will learn to trust the grace that sends you,
the spirit who fills you, empowers you and accompanies you.
You will remember your belovedness
even as angry ones taunt you.
In the face of cruelty you will remain kind.
Beloved, you may be caught in a little eddy of evil
in the great River of Good, but the River flows on.
My dear little lambs, the wolves and their sharp teeth
may hurt you, but can’t reach your soul—can’t even find it.
They have only fear, but you have love and hope.
Do not be afraid to go among them; I go with you.
And in the end we will return whole.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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