Serve by Design

Every day we are hearing various suggestions related to how we may cope with the necessary restrictions that have been put in place due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. These are confining days of unprecedented and mandated social isolation. It has been hard on all of us, yet predictably we are helping each other to find ways to make this temporary "new normal" manageable and even instructional. The Keppler's have been maintaining our schedule. Those of you who know me well know that I love my routine! I can hear Monique shouting out, "Amen to that!" We have been getting up fairly early to get our day going and then getting to bed just after the conclusion of the early version of the late night news. The day for me starts while viewing the broadcast news with a forty-minute workout regimen downstairs involving the recumbent bicycle (1 mile at 13 mph), 31 minutes of walking (mostly 3 mph) on the treadmill with light weights ("wimpy" 5 pounders) and concludin...

I can't think about coming out to Albuquerque and not think about my favorite condiment... green chiles! New Mexicans love their chiles and debate the merits of "red" versus "green." These are variations of the same chile pepper. The red are ripened from the green. I love the green chile and when it is perfected in a delicious roux, I think, "It is to die for!" I can remember my first experience with chiles and I was lost in the experience. I had come out to New Mexico for a church growth conference at Glorieta twenty-years ago and took an afternoon to go into nearby Sante Fe for lunch and a walk around the downtown area. I stopped at a restaurant on the way in and ordered what I thought was going to be a Tex Mex kind of entree' but was shortly confused by the server's question, "green or red?" I was too embarrassed to admit my ignorance. I think I said, "No thanks!" And I wished today that I could recall her surprised rea...