a start

Sunday. Fog. Snow rots in the ditches, but robins aren't far off. That's March in Mankato.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. I'm not suggesting an association of Mankato with the valley of death, despite the rich reality that Mankato is in the heart of southern Minnesota's river (valley) country. No, the valley of the shadow of death is a place in the heart, not a place on a map. Its geography is spiritual, mostly, although it might have a different location in another's experience I don't know about. It's a place I've spent some time in while thinking I wasn't really there at all (denial isn't just a river in Egypt). But there I was, and am at risk for finding myself there again if I don't stand against the beaconing call to visit, or worse: to live there.

The end of a weak winter in Mankato incites the hope for a breakthrough in the soul as in the seasons. It's time for the end of winter, the season of silence. The sun's rise into full spring is only two weeks away, and the increasing light calls brightness into our eyes. The stronger sun helps me hear the affirmation that I've been called to take a stand here in Mankato. There's a call on me to align with this town. This city that has the notariety of being the site of the largest mass execution in the nation's history is also a city that I believe will become a city of refuge when hard times come to the region.

In the meantime, we're at the bend of the River, where the Minnesota makes a 90° turn, changing its flow from southeast to northeast, to empty into the Mississippi at Fort Snelling by the MSP airport. There's something to this change of direction, a spiritual meaning that isn't completely clear to me yet, but I'll suggest the concept of repentance. In the Hebrew, shoob means turn back, or turn around. Just turn. So our location here at the bend of the river is a place to overlook the turning of a great river.

Well, maybe not great. But it's the state's namesake river, so don't sell it short. Yes, it's polluted. Yes, it gets so shallow some years in late July and August that it all but stops flowing. Ok, it's a middling river. But it's ours. And Mankato has a destiny as it signals a change in direction.

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