Blog Archives - Page 6 of 11 - Dallin Malmgren

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY MARCH 21–27, 2022

March 21, 2022 #141 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sun­day, Feb­ru­ary 20, 2022 The intent, the pur­pose, the mean­ing of my writ­ing project becomes more clear to me every day. I have a rela­tion­ship with Jesus Christ, my liv­ing sav­ior. We inter­act day by day. His inter­ac­tions are sub­tle, but pro­found and joy­ous. He is teaching […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY MARCH 14–20, 2022

MARCH 14, 2022 #134 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Mon­day, Feb­ru­ary 7, 2022 This from my qui­et time: “The supreme Chris­t­ian insight is that God is love. The supreme Chris­t­ian expe­ri­ence, which can­not be sep­a­rat­ed from authen­tic insight, is to know this love in your own heart. All this is mere words–sounding brass and tin­kling cymbals–unless […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY March 7–13, 2022

March 7, 2022 #127 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Thurs­day, Feb­ru­ary 3, 2022 Look at my beloved live oak tree! There were three dis­tinct gaps in the branch­es that light would shine through, and I would think of them as Father, Son and Spir­it as I prayed on my back porch in good weath­er. Goes to […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY FEBRUARY 28-MARCH 6, 2022

Feb­ru­ary 28, 2022 #120 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 28, 2022 Tonight I watched a movie and felt good about it. I used to watch tons and tons of movies (I even wrote screen­plays), but in my lat­er years I only like to watch ones that make me feel good about human­i­ty. Of course, […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY FEBRUARY 21–27, 2022

Feb­ru­ary 21, 2022 #113 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Jan­u­ary 25, 2022 He is here. Right now. My oh so slow grow­ing aware­ness of that sim­ple truth has made all the dif­fer­ence in my life. It is true for me as I write this–it is true for you as you read this–it is true for […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY FEBRUARY 14–20, 2022

Feb­ru­ary 14, 2022 #106 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sat­ur­day, Jan­u­ary 15, 2022 St. Augustine’s infa­mous prayer, from ear­ly in his spir­i­tu­al jour­ney: “Lord, make me a good and chaste chris­t­ian, but not yet.” This from my read­ing: “We see from that exam­ple that it is not enough just to know the truth, to have clar­i­ty of […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY February 7–13, 2022

Feb­ru­ary 7, 2022 #99 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Mon­day, Jan­u­ary 10, 2022 A for­mer stu­dent shared a Face­book post with me from a Fed Ex deliv­ery­woman who deliv­ered a pack­age to a dis­traught woman whose hus­band was sick with can­cer. The deliv­ery­woman said a few niceties and then went on with her route. After about […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY JANUARY 31-FEBRUARY 6, 2022

Jan­u­ary 31, 2022 #92 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Decem­ber 21, 2021 I’ve dis­cov­ered anoth­er ben­e­fit of my writ­ing project. God will not only speak; He will some­times remind. After feel­ing out of it for four days (head cold), I med­i­tat­ed in my study this evening. I was moved again to one of those “state […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY JANUARY 24–30

Jan­u­ary 24, 2022 #85 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Wednes­day, Decem­ber 29, 2021 “Beloved, let us love one anoth­er, for love is from God; and every­one who loves is born of God and knows God.” (I John 4:7) I asked God how I can become a more lov­ing per­son, and He said: Prac­tice. Prac­tice on your […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY January 17–23, 2022

Jan­u­ary 17, 2022 #78 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Wednes­day, Decem­ber 22, 2021 I cried when I prayed with Karen tonight. It was kind of embar­rass­ing. Ear­li­er as I was clean­ing the kitchen, she was watch­ing the news. It was such a wave of darkness–the pan­dem­ic spread­ing out of con­trol; “nat­ur­al” events like tor­na­dos and earthquakes […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY January 10–16, 2022

Jan­u­ary 10, 2022 #71 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Novem­ber 30, 2021 “…with­out faith it is impos­si­ble to please God…” (Hebrews 11:6) If I stand out­side and con­sid­er this writ­ing project, it seems kind of arro­gant. Who do I think I am? So I have a spe­cial con­nec­tion to God? How do I know it’s […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY January 3–9, 2022

Jan­u­ary 3, 2022 #64 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sun­day, Novem­ber 28, 2021 Karen and I prayed tonight–her words were exact­ly what was in my heart. Hmmm…the two becom­ing one, per­haps? Keep us mov­ing, Lord. Jan­u­ary 4, 2022 Tues­day is a golf day… #65 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Decem­ber 13, 2021 I play golf with a senior […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY December 27-January 2, 2022

Decem­ber 27, 2021 #57 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Wednes­day, Sep­tem­ber 1, 2021 “For I deter­mined to know noth­ing among you but Jesus Christ and Him cru­ci­fied.” (I Corinthi­ans 2:2) This is the whole key to liv­ing spir­i­tu­al­ly. First, “i determined…”–this is the choice I made, I knew what I want­ed to do. Sec­ond, “…to know […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY December 20–26, 2021

Decem­ber 20, 2021 I first con­ceived of this writ­ing project in the mid­dle of August…on Novem­ber 1st I decid­ed to start post­ing on Face­book. This is what God said to me that day: #50 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Mon­day, Novem­ber 1, 2021 Some­times I wish God would just tell me what to do. I have been […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY December 13–19, 2021

Decem­ber 13,2021 #43 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sat­ur­day, Octo­ber 9, 2021 We went to a wed­ding tonight. It was an extreme­ly unre­li­gious wed­ding, only one men­tion of God that i can recall. But this, like most wed­dings, was a joy­ous occasion–Jesus turned water into wine at a wed­ding! I ful­ly believe God gave His […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME December 6–12, 2021

Decem­ber 6, 2021 #36 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Octo­ber 26, 2021 This one is very sim­ple and a lit­tle strange–it came in the after­math of a lit­tle squab­ble I had with Karen. I was on our back porch, look­ing up at my beloved live oak tree and pray­ing. I was beseech­ing God, rec­og­niz­ing that […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME November 29–December 5, 2021

Novem­ber 29, 2021 #29 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Fri­day, August 27, 2021 Our 44th wed­ding anniver­sary. God said “The two shall become one” and we are still on that amaz­ing jour­ney togeth­er. Novem­ber 30, 2021 #30 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Thurs­day, Octo­ber 28, 2021 “…in Him we live and move and have our being…” (Acts […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME November 22–28

Novem­ber 22, 2021 #22 As you can see, I chose option 2… HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Sat­ur­day, Octo­ber 23, 2021 I find it is more dif­fi­cult to dis­cern God’s voice when it comes to what I should do, i.e., spe­cif­ic choic­es I have to make. I am wrestling with what to do with this writing […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME November 15–21

Novem­ber 15, 2021 #15 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Tues­day, Sep­tem­ber 7, 2021 This was more of a class­room ora­tion: Richard Fos­ter calls them “the three great eth­i­cal issues of human life” — mon­ey, sex and pow­er. I think of them as the three great temptations–areas in which it is eas­i­est to think about what I […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME November 8–14

Novem­ber 8, 2021 #8 HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY Thurs­day, Sep­tem­ber 23, 2021 This from A.W. Toz­er in The Pur­suit of God explains exact­ly why I start­ed this writ­ing project. He begins with the quote “In the begin­ning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) An intelligent […]

HOW GOD SPOKE TO ME TODAY November 1–7, 2021

Novem­ber 1, 2021 When I was work­ing on my last writ­ing project, my son com­ment­ed “I wish you would­n’t write so much about spir­i­tu­al stuff.” As I get old­er, I find that’s all I want to write about. As Bob Dylan put it, “Then onward in my jour­ney I come to under­stand That every hair is […]

A message to all my former students: vote

I just fig­ured it out—if I was your teacher my first year of teach­ing, the old­est you would be now is about 59. (whew!) If you had me my last year of teach­ing, the youngest you could be is about 20. That means every kid I ever taught should be eli­gi­ble to vote. So do it. […]

Things I don’t understand

Per­haps this is an effect of pan­dem­ic fever. I am becom­ing increas­ing­ly aware of how much I don’t know. –How “real­i­ty” tele­vi­sion became so pop­u­lar. –How any race or eth­nic­i­ty of peo­ple can think them­selves supe­ri­or (or infe­ri­or) to any oth­er race or eth­nic­i­ty. Dif­fer­ent, I get. –How peo­ple can go their entire lives with­out acknowl­edg­ing that […]

Pandemic Fever

It’s get­ting to me—I find myself sinking—my qui­et times are labored—my golf game is muddled—my irri­tabil­i­ty quo­tient is on trig­ger-fin­ger mode—The Same­ness (see blog post 6/7/2020) is more deadening—the evening news is more depressing—the nation­al lead­er­ship is more absurd—my escape valves are less sat­is­fac­to­ry. Of course, I have a built-in excuse: the unre­lent­ing, oppres­sive, step-into-a-furnace-when-you-step-out-the-door, […]

The Stuck Nut

I got this from my qui­et time ear­li­er this week: “The main thing about Chris­tian­i­ty is not the work we do, but the rela­tion­ship we main­tain and the atmos­phere pro­duced by that rela­tion­ship. That is all God asks us to look after, and it is the one thing that is being con­tin­u­al­ly assault­ed.” –from My […]

Raspberries

I’m run­ning about 5–6 pounds heav­ier than usu­al since the time of coro­na. I’m not thrilled about it, but it could be worse. I’m def­i­nite­ly not get­ting as much exer­cise as I used to. My diet is more depress­ing than my weight. There are cer­tain pos­i­tives that I can’t seem to incor­po­rate and cer­tain negatives […]

Senior changes, part II

As I explained in the last essay, choic­es look dif­fer­ent as we age—especially in light of the virus. Every one of them, whether sim­ple or huge, has more grav­i­tas. The desire to appre­ci­ate life sweet­ens. The real­iza­tion that we have a respon­si­bil­i­ty deep­ens. Then there’s that hope to leave a mark, which flirts dan­ger­ous­ly with […]

Four generations of Malmgren women

Senior choices

I was going to say elder­ly choic­es, but I dis­like the word elder­ly. I think of some­one who can no longer take care of him­self. I pre­fer to be old, which I am. There are a lot of choic­es to be made regard­ing a num­ber of top­ics at my age. I tend to be one […]

Dowanee from scratch

She floats in and out of the vagaries of my child­hood mem­o­ry, omnipresent but insub­stan­tial, a tow­er­ing phan­tom. But she was always there. She lived in our house from the time I was born until we moved from Drex­el Hill to Floris­sant, Mis­souri when I was sev­en­teen. For all intents and pur­pos­es, she seemed to […]

The Covid War

You hear that phrase fre­quent­ly, but do you extend the metaphor? We use war as a metaphor all the time—football games, pric­ing com­pe­ti­tions, polit­i­cal issues, even fam­i­ly squab­bles. This is one time I like the metaphor. We are tru­ly in dead­ly com­bat. We need to come togeth­er and present a unit­ed front against an enemy […]