Happy New Year! Click HERE to listen to the Podcast version on Spotify instead . Click HERE to listen to the Podcast version on SoundCloud instead.   Today, I’m going to tell you a story, a true tree tale I call “Ashen Hope.”  At the end of it, I’m going to ask you what lesson you learn from it.  Ready?   We looked at the house in late spring.  It was perfect.  Oh, it had way too much wallpaper and needed to be updated, but the layout was perfect.  It was in the right school zone.  And the price point was right where we needed it to be.   We didn’t expect it to be perfect.  The pictures on the listing were, frankly, poor.  You couldn’t see the space, just walls.  The gentle slope of the backyard looked like a steep hill.  It didn’t look great in photos.  But in person, it was perfect.   As we walked through the house, I lingered on the main level a little longer, and my wife and the realtor went upstairs to see the bedrooms.  When I came upstairs a minute later, my wife was exiting the

Here’s a song that is both old and new.  The text of the verses was written in the 5 th  century, then translated and altered in the 19 th  century.  Here I pair the text with a new refrain and all new music.  I made the range a little too high for me, so I’m recruiting a friend to re-record the vocals.  I’ll be sure to share it when the improved version is ready.  But for now, it’s just me.   In the beloved Christmas song “Angels We Have Heard on High” we are told that mountains echo the joyous song of the angels.   Echoing the joy  happens not only when mountains reflect sound waves, but the “ Echoes of Joy ” from that night still reverberate in the faith-waves of our hearts.   I invite you to rejoice along with me that Christ the Savior is born for us.  Our rejoicing together will be an echo of that first Christmas night. The text of the song is below the link. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN   Echoes of Joy 1. From east to west, from shore to shore Let ev'ry heart awake and sing. The holy