"Beautiful Anyway"

Now seems just as good a time as any to share this. This is posted as an 'amen' to Trailady's post on 18 Jan 2007, "The Miracle of Mistakes...".

To give you some context I'll introduce this by saying that I occasionally tell stories--the term "adult parables" maybe more descriptive (NOT SUITABLE FOR ALL AGES). I like stories because they allow listeners to see themselves as opposed to just hearing about themselves.

This is one from a collection of Tales from the Village Half-wit inspired by an often forgotten poet, Sterling A. Brown, a post-Harlem Renaissance writer. Brown begins his poem, "Revelations," with the exchange, "Why do folks call you revelations?" "It used to be because I preached from that Book. But now because I reveals." (I love that!)

Each Village Half-wit tale is narrated by a fictional character named Sentinel "Sent" St. Common, affectionately known to some as Revelations. Revelations strives to give those who dare hear him the tools to imagine new possibilities in their world.

"Beautiful Anyway" is from when Revelations was still senior pastor of a prominent fictional church, the Ralph David Abernathy All Kindreds Cathedral, in the West End of Atlanta, GA (where I currently reside). Though it is a hypothetical continuation of a story found in John 8, it is based on Revelation 21:4b, "For the former things are passed away."

I've divided the story, originally told as a 'sermon' at my former church, into 3 parts:
Segment 1 (13 min; 15 MB), featuring "Anyway" by Nichole Nordeman from her Wide-eyed CD as invocation at the worship gathering where this story is told.
Segment 2 (12 min; 14 MB)
Segment 3 (18 min; 21 MB), featuring "Oh Lord Your Love" by Caedmon's Call from their In The Company Of Angels: A Call To Worship CD as benediction.

May you be blessed.