The room of you, a small circle of goodness, lights in your faces that remind me of grace waiting, tentative scenes from your lives turning into a dozen gifts wrapped for us all.

The table cloaked with comfortable chairs, the package of cookies made by our leader’s friend and the ones Keebler made with dotted pecans, eaten and enjoyed.

The framed pictures of godly people, people who hopefully lived well, people who hopefully called upon others to do justice, love, and mercy, people whose ecclesiastical garments hopefully never blocked them from service.

The lightning, the thunder, the darkness from Ogden Avenue spilling over to us, framing our voices and reflections in the tones of divinity.  These were the images and sounds of our first meeting.  What a wonderful unit this will be!