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Western civilization, and the United States in particular, has developed to the point where pain is unacceptable, headaches are some kind of affront to human development, strain is a problem to be solved, stress is intolerable. On the public front, technology promised us peace, psychology promised us personal health, social psychology guaranteed us group success, medicine teased us with promises of eternal youth, bionic regeneration, and well-being. No wonder, then, that we feel frustrated and fearful in the face of so many wonder drugs, medical and otherwise, that have disappointed us. With the largest, most powerful military the world has ever know, we are living in more fear than ever before. With all encounter groups in the world, we are also dealing with more divorce than society has ever known. With all the scientific wonders of the Western world, we still suffer from diseases no one ever knew we had. We still get sick. We still die.
The promises have failed us. The expectations remain. No wonder then that we flee from relationships that require something of us to maintain them, regardless how fundamental, regardless how benign they may be. No wonder we strike out when we’re confronted. No wonder we become despondent when what we want we do not get. We go to psychologists to fill up the emptiness and calm our fears. We beg psychiatrists for medicine to blunt the hurts within us, even when the hurts are not medical in origin. We lose sight of the fact that hurt may actually be part of the process of life. We fail to understand that the pain we feel may be more of the spirit than of the psyche, more of the soul than of the chemistry of the mind.
“Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope” - Joan D. Chittister
Prayer
Abba Poeman said: “The nature of water is yielding, and that of a stone is hard. Yet if you hang a bottle filled with water above the stone so that the water drips drop by drop, it will wear a hole in the stone. In the same way the word of God is tender, and our heart is hard. So when people hear the word of God frequently, their hearts are opened to the fear of God”
The contemplative does not pray in order to coax satisfaction out of the universe. God is life, not a vending machine full of trifles to fit the whims of the human race. God is the end of life, the fulfillment of life, the essence of life, the coming of life. The contemplative prays in order to be open to what is, rather than to reshape the world to their own lesser designs.
The contemplative does not pray to appease a divine wrath or flatter a divine ego. The contemplative prays in order, eventually, to fall into the presence of God, to learn to live in the presence of God, to absorb the presence of God within. The contemplative prays until wordlessness takes over and presence is more palpable than words, more filling than ideas. One prayer at a time, the hard heart melts away, the satiated heart comes newly alive, the mind goes blank with enlightenment.
“Illuminated Life” -Joan Chittister
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“The Bloomington Indiana Company bound for California on the 20th of February 1849 will spend Sabbath, the 25th of February at Terra Haute, Indiana and will rendezvous at St. Joseph’s Missourion the 23rd of April at which time all persons wishing to join thecompany will please report themselves to the undersigned, with the necessary outfit. The outfit will consist of one good strong two-horse wagon and three yoke of oxen or an equal team of mules, room for up to four persons, bring suitable camp utensils, a suitable supply of provisions, medicines, clothing, etc. Each adult male must have one good rifle and a good supply of ammunition.
After starting from St. Joseph, Mo., mutual aid will be given each other. Good moral character will be required of all wishing to join the company, with satisfactory assurances that the Sabbath will be observed when practicable. Persons wishing to join this venture must be members of the Methodist Church, well recommended, persons of strong constitutions, industrious habits, teetotalers, warm-hearted Christians who carry out the principles of Christianity wherever they go, and under all circumstances will share and share alike.”
Signed: Reverend Isaac Owen
Advertisement placed in the Cincinnati Methodist Christian
Advocate of February 7, 1849.
I welcome you to this pilgrimage. This is not a pilgrimage of geography. We will not be journeying to a sacred site, like Canterbury or Lourdes. Rather, we will be traveling through a broad spiritual landscape - contemporary American Protestantism - as we move through places, reflections, activities, and time. We will do what pilgrims do: tell stories all along the way. Like campfire tales, really. Surprising, sad, and funny stories with spiritual and theological morals.
The journey begins with a question, “What happened to the neighborhood church?” The answer is deceptively simple: Many old neighborhood churches are failing. The old way of organizing American religion has vanished. In the wake of the loss, however, some Christians are rebuilding spiritual community, and a new kind of Protestant church is being born. The people I met are building upon tradition, faithfulness, and wisdom to offer a distinct alternative to a Christianity based on personal salvation and moral certainty. They are creating a new kind of neighborhood church.
Next, we may ask, “How do we get there?” As with any worthwhile spiritual journey, there are many possible paths. Although no single way exists, there are, however, signposts to let us know that we are heading toward beauty, goodness, and truthfulness. Christians call these signposts “practices,” the things they do together in community that form them in God’s love for the world. We will follow the signposts and see where they lead.
Finally, we wonder, “Are we there yet?” Every pilgrimage has a destination, and this one is no exception. Emerging Christianity is about change-about changing from spiritual tourists to pilgrims-about transforming ourselves, our congregations, and our communities. We are going there, to a change of heart that revolutionizes one’s whole life.
Christianity for the Rest of Us -Diana Butler Bass
Churches that cultivate Risk-Taking Mission and Service not only encourage members to volunteer for their projects but also actively invite and welcome newcomers, visitors, and the unchurched to help them in making a difference in the lives of others.
Service projects become an entry point into the church and into life in Christ. Many people with no religious affiliation and no church home want to make a difference, yearn to improve the conditions
of other people, and desire to make the world a better place by relieving suffering, reducing poverty, or struggling against injustice. Often they hold an image of churches as self-serving and self-absorbed, or as hypocritical. Young people in particular are searching for ways to channel their altruistic impulses into handson, face-to-face service that changes lives. Service isn’t just for insiders and longtime members; it’s a means God uses to shape faith and bind people into the body of Christ.Congregations that value Risk-Taking Mission and Service streamline the process by which ministries are approved, supported, and completed. They replace lengthy and rigid organizational protocols that strangle passion and turn the church inward with a permission-giving organizational environment that is agile, quick to recruit and respond, and empowering of those who passionately want to work. They continue annual and ongoing projects that truly make a difference, and they work to create additional opportunities and channels of service so that the church’s ministry remains fresh, new, and relevant to the changing needs of the community and world.
- Robert Schnase
Several years ago my husband fell off a six-foot ladder onto concrete pavement. When I reached him, he was only semi-conscious. Outwardly I was a model of cool efficiency. I knew not to move him; I knew to send for an ambulance; I knew to cover him and speak to him calmly. Inside I was a shocked, churning mess! In the emergency room the attendants tried to stop me from going to my husband, who was asking for me. By the time the physician arrived, I was shaking from head to foot with shock and anger.
The doctor sized up my condition at a glance; took my cold, shaking hands in hers; and said in a voice of calm, firm authority, “Of course you can sit with your husband. I will take you to him. But you’re in shock. Stand still and take a few slow, deep breaths. That’s right; breathe very slowly and deeply. You’re doing fine.” Warmth flooded me, and I stopped shaking. We smiled at each other, and she led me to my husband.
I believe that Jesus spoke with such a voice both to the panicked disciples and to the storm – not with irritable, scolding, or angry shouts but not merely soothing either. The word rebuke means a sharp, clear correction. When we are gripped by panic, it is calm, firm authority that reaches us best through the turbulence around us and our pounding hearts within us.
The empowered Healer is as fully with us in our tossing boats as he was in that boat on the Sea of Galilee. Christ stands in risen power with us, just as that physician stood with me in the emergency room – holding our hands, breathing with us, calming our hearts. . .
I believe we are on a great frontier of learning how to pray for the vast communal storms of this world – the storms of ancient hatreds, anger, fear that rage among nations, races, ethnic groups, religions. What radical healings would unfold if our religious communities did not just vaguely pray for peace, but specifically offered up these communal tempests to God’s heart to heal and cleanse them of their toxic power?
Not only did Jesus calm the raging storm on the lake and soothe the panic of his friends, but also he implanted a vibrant peace in their hearts, a cleansed and creative energy. The New Revised Standard Version speaks of a “dead calm” that followed the storm. I prefer the working in older translations such at the King James Version; “a great calm.” There is nothing whatever dead about the shalom, the living peace, Christ gives us. It is alert, alive, and strong beyond description.
The disciples would need that special peace when they landed on the other side of the lake. Difficult hours and hard work lay ahead of them, but the great energy of inner peace that had replaced the inner storm of fear remained within them. –Flora Slossom
Story As Scripture
When the chief priests and the scribes saw the amazing things that he did, and heard the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they became angry and said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” - Matthew 21:15-16
Listen
We read the scripture –
children saw Jesus as he was, were amazed,
and shouted,
“Hosanna to the Son of David.”
Those in power
did not want to believe –
this healing, humble one
did not meet their ideas of Messiah.
Let us not follow those
who mold the Savior to their designs
and miss the message.
Let us listen to the children,
the powerless,
and join with them in joy
to cry “Hosanna!”
- Roberta Porter
top of pageMy parents gave me the great gift of faith in God who is a God of love, total love. It is ironic that because of my father’s precarious health and his late hours as a drama and music critic, I went with my parents on Sunday to a late church service or to Evensong and did not go to Sunday school. Unlike many people I have encountered, I have not had to spend a lot of my adult life unlearning the horrors of an angry God, horrors that are often taught in Sunday school, so that it is difficult for some people to understand that God is a God of love and forgiveness, not one who is out to punish us as harshly as possible for all our wrongdoings.
Another misconception is of Jesus as a sad, self-pitying man who is not the wild and powerful and often unpredictable Jesus of Scripture. He was, as Isaiah prophesies, a man of sorrows, yes, but he was also a man of great joy, humor, and formidable authority.
Perhaps it is because I was never fed platitudes in Sunday school, or taught about God’s wrath toward our total depravity, that I approached the Bible with no preconceptions. I went to the Bible as I went to any storybook, and it is indeed the greatest storybook I have ever encountered, far more exciting than The Arabian Nights! The story of Joseph and his dreams was a favorite from Hebrew Scripture, and in the New Testament I especially loved Jesus’ appearing to Mary Magdalene after the Resurrection.
And because I read the Bible as a storybook, not a moral tract (which it is not), I read it with pleasure (surely God’s Word should be pleasing to us!), and I read it for fun. I read it as play, not work, and surely that is how it ought to be read. Jesus had a marvelous sense of fun, of play.
“The Rock that is Higher” by Madeleine L’Engle
Going empty into God is the key to finding and embodying grace. During one of my Sabbath visits to my early teacher Rabbi Reuven at his kabbalistic kibbutz in Israel, I passed the rabbi on the sidewalk leading into the dining hall. I was carrying several books, and as we passed one another, he slapped the books out of my hands and shouted, “No carrying on Shabbos!” Shabbos is the Yiddish word for “Sabbath.”“But Rabbi,” I stuttered, “there is an eruv around the kibbutz. Carrying is allowed in here.” An eruv is a boundary placed around a space that defines what is inside that space as “home” and thus allows you to carry items between buildings as you can between rooms of a house.
Reuven waited until I had picked up the books. “Yes, we have an eruv, you are right,” and then without any hint of what was coming he slapped the books out of my hands once again, shouting, “No carrying on Shabbos!” I stared at him dumbly.“No carrying on Shabbos,” he repeated flatly.
“Yes,” I said, looking at the books lying on the sidewalk. “No carrying on Shabbos. So I am not carrying anything.”
“Drop it!”“Drop what?!”
Then he grabbed me in a playful hammerlock, and rapped me on my head with his knuckles. After a few bangs he stopped knocking, kissed me on the head and let me go, saying, “The head, Rami, drop the head. Your head is full of ideas, words, schemes, notions, theories, teachings from this rabbi and that rabbi; your head is so heavy it is a wonder you can even balance it on your neck. You carry all this baggage, but not on Shabbos. No carrying on Shabbos.” Reuven bent down, picked up the books, kissing each in turn, handed them to me, and walked away.
Shabbos, as Rabbi Reuven was trying to teach me, is living in harmony with spacious mind. Living in harmony with spacious mind is living without fear, and thus without anger, greed, and worry. It is living in grace. There is nothing I lack on Shabbos, nothing I need to know that I don’t already know. On Shabbos I was to put down the burden of learning and just know.
“The Sacred Art of Lovingkindness” ● Rabbi Rami Shapiro
top of pageBe merciful after your power, give as God enables you. If you are not in pressing want, give something and you will be no poorer for it. Grudge not, fear not, lend unto the Lord, and God will surely pay. Give in proportion to your substance.
● John Wesley
A trading vessel that sank in the harbor of Kyrenia, Cyprus, 2,000 years ago, was brought to the surface a few years ago. The New York Times (June 18, 1974) reported, “The worm-eaten skeleton still bears the mark of a skilled and dedicated craftsman.” “He built it to last!” said the archaeologist, gazing up at the wide-bottom hull, gracefully, almost languidly, rising toward the barrel-vaulted ceiling of the castle. “He built it with his name on it. He was saying, ‘This is my work, and I’m proud of it.’” All of us responsible for the institutions of the church need occasionally to remind ourselves that the fragile institutions we serve have Wesley’s name on them. Thus, the institutes’ theme “Regeneration and Renewal.” We know we need this. We know our institutions need this.
● Thomas Trotter
We turn to our roots and seek what it was in the past that enabled persons like us to live courageously and faithfully in their time. What was it that bound them to God and God’s presence and power? What was it that bound them together in a common endeavor that challenged and transformed them into a holy and righteous movement? They needed and obviously found some instrument that, when used, brought them to a place of transformation.
I believe we have reached a place where, as a people of faith, we are ready to give serious consideration to another way, a more faithful way of living as disciples of Jesus Christ. This way must be clear that it can be taught and practiced by everyone. It must be accessible and inviting to young and old, rich and poor, powerful and weak, and those of every theological persuasion. It is a large order, but we already have in our hands the blueprint for this way of living. And with God’s help and our willingness, it can change our world.This way of living was given to John Wesley in a time much like our own. He took this blueprint, fleshed it out, taught it, and practiced it. And now it has been passed on to us. Now it is up to us to see if we will take it, teach it, and practice it until it becomes our natural way of living-a way of living that will mark our life together and our lives as individual Christians.
Do No Harm
Do Good
Stay in Love With God
“Three Simple Rules” – Rueben P. Job
top of pageThe Season of Epiphany
Patiently a friend explained a depiction of the Lord’s Supper crafted in wire and steel. I tried to see the message in this piece of art, but it seemed invisible to my eyes. Only as she traced the images with her finger was I able to see the beautiful and dramatic image of Jesus gathered at table with the disciples.
Epiphany is the day and season in the church year when we patiently watch and listen as God is quietly revealed before us once again. Sometimes, even when we try hard to do so, we just don’t see God in our everyday lives or in the events of our world. Epiphany gives the time and the resources to watch, wait, listen, look, and anticipate the light, life, and truth of the Lord’s presence in our midst. This life “enlightens” us as we remember that we too have come from God, are invited to walk with God, and one day will be fully at home with God.
The Cross in the Manger
If there is no cross in the manger,
there is no Christmas.
If the Babe doesn’t become the Adult,
here is no Bethlehem star.
If there is no commitment in us,
there are no Wise Men searching.
If we offer no cup of cold water,
there is no gold, no frankincense, no myrrh.
If there is no praising God’s name,
there are no angels singing.
If there is no spirit of alleluia,
there are no shepherds watching.
If there is no standing up, no speaking out, no risk,
there is no Herod, no flight into Egypt.
If there is no room in our inn,
then “Merry Christmas” mocks the Christ Child,
and the Holy Family is just a holiday card,
and God will loathe our feasts and festivals.
For if there is no reconciliation,
we cannot call Christ “Prince of Peace.”
If there is no goodwill toward others,
it can all be packed away in boxes for another year.
If there is no forgiveness in us,
there is no cause for celebration.
If we cannot go now even unto Golgotha,
there is no Christmas in us.
If Christmas is not now,
if Christ is not born into the everyday present,
then what is all the noise about?
“Kneeling in Bethlehem” -Ann Weems
To Listen, To Look
Is it all sewn up-my life?
Is it at this point so predictable,
so orderly,
so neat,
so arranged,
so right,
That I don’t have time or space
for listening for the rustle of angels’ wings
or running to stables to see a baby?
Could this be what he meant when he said
Listen, those who have ears to hear. . .
Look, those who have eyes to see?
O God, give me the humbleness of those shepherds
who saw in the cold December darkness
the Coming of Light
the Advent of Love!
Toward The Light
Too often our answer to the darkness
is not running toward Bethlehem
but running away.
We ought to know by now that we can’t see
where we’re going in the dark.
Running away is rampant. . .
separation is stylish:
separation from mates, from friends, from self.
Run away and join the army
of those who have already run away.
When are we going to learn that Christmas Peace
comes only when we turn and face the darkness?
Only then will we be able to see
the Light of the World.
“Kneeling in Bethlehem” -Ann Weems
top of pageOur God is the One who comes to us
in a burning bush,
in an angel’s song,
in a newborn child.
Our God is the One who cannot be found
locked in the church,
not even in the sanctuary.
Our God will be where God will be
with no constraints,
no predictability.
Our God lives where our God lives,
and destruction has no power
and even death cannot stop
the living.
Our God will be born where God will be born,
but there is no place to look for the One who comes to us.
When God is ready
God will come
even to a godforsaken place
like a stable in Bethlehem.
Watch. . .
For you know not when
God comes.
Watch, that you might be found
whenever
wherever
God comes.
“Kneeling in Bethlehem”
● Ann Weems
“Notable Quotes”
“He who gives what he would as readily throw away, gives without generosity:
for the essence of generosity is in self-sacrifice.”
● Sir Henry Taylor
“If we love Christ and his church enough, we will not stay away from church for light reasons.
If we love enough, we will not easily turn down a church committee assignment.
If we love enough, we will not refuse to help in the church school or choir.
If we love enough, we will not have too tight a hold on our pocketbooks.
Love wants to pour itself out. Love never counts the costs.
Love never fails.”
● William LaRoe Jr.
“Our love follows our pocketbook. Some say, dedicate the heart and the money will follow; but
our Lord put it the other way around. ‘Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.’ If your treasure is dedicated, your heart will be dedicated. If it is not, it simply won’t. It’s as simple as that.”
● G. Timothy Johnson
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Multiply Our Faith ![C:\Documents and Settings\Audrey\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\FWO46QZX\MCj03502230000[1].wmf](meditation20_files/image003.gif){kind=small}
O God of miracles and multiplications,
in bringing these gifts
we dare to measure ourselves
not by our fears or failures or frailties,
however large they seem,
but by our hope and faith and love,
however small they may be.
Now we pray that by your grace
we, our boldness, and our gifts
will become miracles of leaven
in the lump of this world
Multiply our courage
that we may be a source of life
and justice and peace
for those we carry in our hearts,
and on our consciences
Multiply our faith in you
that all our struggles, all our joys
will be steps taken toward what it means
to be human,
to be sisters and brothers,
and to be yours;
through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
“My Heart in My Mouth, Prayers for Our lives” ● Ted Loder
From: A Royal “Waste” of Time
by Marva J. Dawn“Ascribe to the Lord the glory of his name; worship the Lord in holy splendor. (Psalm 29:2)
To worship the Lord is – in the world’s eyes – a waste of time. It is, indeed, a royal waste of time, but a waste nonetheless. By engaging in it, we don’t accomplish anything useful in our society’s terms.
Worship ought not to be construed in a utilitarian way. Its purpose is not to gain numbers nor for our churches to be seen as successful. Rather, the entire reason for our worship is that God deserves it. Moreover, it isn’t even useful for earning points with God, for what we do in worship won’t change one whit how God feels about us. We will always still be helpless sinners caught in our endless inability to be what we should be or to make ourselves better – and God will always still be merciful, compassionate, and gracious, abounding in steadfast love and ready to forgive us as we come to him.
Worship is a royal waste of time, but indeed it is royal, for it immerses us in the regal splendor of the King of the cosmos. The churches’ worship provides opportunities for us to enjoy God’s presence in corporate ways that take us out of time and into the eternal purposes of God’s kingdom. As a result, we shall be changed – but not because of anything we do. God, on whom we are centered and to whom we submit, will transform us by his Revelation of himself.
There is a trend in the Church today for a congregation to write a mission statement. I’m stunned. The church of Jesus Christ is two thousand years old, and we don’t know what our mission is? Perhaps that’s our problem. Each church seems to be a little kingdom, and a mission statement turns out to be what we want the church to do for us.
Have we forgotten to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul” and “Love your neighbor as yourself?” Have we forgotten who is in charge of the world and the Church? Have we forgotten to go into all the world and preach the gospel? Have we forgotten what the gospel is? When we’re throwing bad news at each other, the world will not hear the good news of Jesus Christ.
The grace of God is so profoundly freeing that we can disagree and hold hands at the same time. When we realize how much we have been given, we are no longer slaves to the agony of trying to be God to one another. We are no longer bound to the pile of rules we’ve made to bind one another. We are no longer bound to our insecure little kingdoms, thinking we have earned all that we have. Instead, we are free to live in the kingdom of God. We are free to praise God for the grace bestowed on us. We are so free, we can love one another in the beautiful loving spirit of Christ.
● Ann Weems, Putting the Amazing Back in Grace
Silence is helpful, but you don’t need it in order to find stillness. Even when there is noise, you can be aware of the stillness underneath the noise, of the space in which the noise arises. That is the inner space of pure awareness, consciousness itself.
You can become aware of awareness as the background to all your sense perceptions, all your thinking. Becoming aware of awareness is the arising of inner stillness.
****
Pay attention to the gap – the gap between two thoughts, the brief, silent space between words in a conversation, between the notes of a piano or flute, or the gap between the in-breath and the out breath.
When you pay attention to those gaps, awareness of “something” becomes – just awareness. The formless dimension of pure consciousness arises from within you and replaces identification with form.
****
True intelligence operates silently. Stillness is where creativity and solutions to problems are found.
Stillness Speaks
-- by Eckhart Tolle
How’s the produce section of your life? Are your orchards yielding a good crop of God’s fruit? Living a life that matters means inspecting and evaluating our fruit. Take a craisin, for instance.A craisin is a dried cranberry. Actually, it’s not even that. A craisin is really the dried remains of a cranberry after all the juice has been extracted – the outer shell after the inner meat has been discarded. It carries few nutrients, but it’s a good source of fiber. Some entrepreneurial farmer interested in utilizing all parts of the cranberry came up with the concept of sprinkling these little numbers on salads and in pilafs for color and texture.
Are there any craisins in your life? There are in mine. I’ve had my share of craisin days. Some mornings I’m growling at my husband in the bathroom before either of us has even entered the shower to wash away sleepiness. Sometimes a gritchy mood while carpooling sends me into a tirade about homework. And I remember one interchange at a UPS mailing center when, after hauling in box after box at Christmastime and receiving a craisin-like response from the counter worker, I retaliated with my own dried-up attitude. As I exited, she remarked that I’d been a speaker at her church’s retreat earlier that year. Great.
Craisin days have a way of creating craisin lives. Dried up. Few nutrients. Good for little but fiber to flush away waste.
Are you living a fruit-filled life? Are your orchards yielding a good crop of God’s fruit?
Love. Joy. Peace. Patience. Kindness. Goodness. Faithfulness. Gentleness. Self-control. The fruits of the Spirit are those characteristics that God produces in our lives when we’re connected to him.
Fruit. Varieties of smells and shapes and sizes. All nutritious. All tasty. Each distinct. Each unique.
Fruit is the result of growth. It’s the evidence that a plant or a vine or a tree has been rooted and established, fed and nurtured, watered and staked and pruned to the point of reproducing. Spiritual fruit is what results in our lives when we root ourselves in a relationship with God. When we live a life connected like this with God, he grows his nature in who we are and fruit results: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
● Elisa Morgan, “Naked Fruit”
In addition to a theology of pleasure and a sacramental view of the body, Christians who want to understand how continence takes root in our lives would also do well to recover a theology of moral formation. Christians and non-Christians alike have understood for centuries the important role that habits play in shaping us to be the people we are. In light of this it is fascinating that recent research on brain chemistry suggests that there is a physical-material impulse to engage in behavior of which we have established neural networks. In other words, we may be closer to offering a physiological explanation for how habits work to direct our behavior. If so, then we may discover a deep connection between this physiological explanation and Paul’s words in Romans that resonate so deeply with all of us: “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do” (Rom 7:19)
● Philip D. Kenneson, “Life on the Vine”
Fruit for Thought
- As you reflect upon your life, how you spend each day, are there activities, actions, people or addictions that need to be pruned out? What fruit of the Spirit might replace them? Patience, kindness, faithfulness, etc.
- How does pruning require self-control?
- Is there such a thing as too much control? Why or why not? In what area of your life might this become an issue for you? How can the growth of another fruit, such as joy or peace, help you to relinquish over-control in this area of your life?
Lord, open unto me.
Open unto me – light for my darkness.
Open unto me - courage for my fear.
Open unto me - hope for my despair.
Open unto me - peace for my turmoil.
Open unto me - joy for my sorrow
Open unto me - strength for my weakness.
Open unto me - wisdom for my confusion.
Open unto me -Thy Self for my self
Lord, Lord, open unto me.
● Howard Thurman
Gentleness
Real gentleness, is fact, comes from a place of spiritual abundance – because we who are poor are rich in Christ. We can only afford to be gentle when we are secure enough to lay aside our instincts for self-protection, defensiveness, or aggression – when we know that we have what we need. One of my dearest mentors, a woman in her eighties, rich in laughter and seasoned by a life full of incident and insight, often had this word for me when I was anxious, hurt, or angry: “Honey, you can afford to let that go.” The message came frequently and at just the needful moment. You can afford to forgive. You can afford to wait awhile. You can afford to be gentle. It was a reminder of abundance from a woman who lived in conditions of severe simplicity, in a small apartment rich with hospitality. Her reminder to me was that no matter how bereft I might feel, I had access to love so steady and sufficient, and to a perspective on life so much bigger than the frustrations of the moment, that I really could afford to forego the emotional cravings awakened by the most recent conflict. Being so blessed, I could afford to be gentle.
Gentleness is the discipline of waiting for that answer, accepting no substitutes for the best that can be had of relationship or community. But gentleness of this kind probes while it waits. It is receptive, but not passive; it seeks to learn. Gentleness is a characteristic of real truth seekers. Some of the most probing questions I have encountered have come from very gentle people: What do you mean by that? What are you really hoping for? What are you afraid of? What kind of help do you want? Do you really want what you are asking for? Confronted with questions like these from people who asked them in love, I felt not invaded, but attended to. They were gentle words.
● by Marilyn Chandler McEntyre - Weavings
Fruit for Thought:
1. In what areas of your life have you seen God growing the fruit of gentleness, helping you to yield your desires to God? Now…tougher question: Where are you still wrestling for control?
2. Like a banana that easily bruises, we do become more vulnerable as the fruit of gentleness grows in our lives. What precautions do we need to take as we allow God to grow this fruit? Is there such a thing as being too gentle, too yielded, or yielded to the wrong thing?
Dear Jesus, You alone are my safety zone. I yield to you. Cover me with your love and protection as I yield my choices to your desires. In your name, amen. “But we were gentle among you, like a mother caring for her little children.” -1 Thessalonians 2:7
Faith
FAITH IS THE GATE, the goal, and the bedrock of the contemplative life. Faith is not denominations. It is confidence in a God we cannot see but know without doubt exists – if for no other reason than that we feel the power of life within us and know our smallness at the same time. Immersed in the awareness of God everywhere, overwhelmed by the effort of living in a consciousness punctuated by death, the contemplative has faith in the process of life.
Life is not a game we win, and God is not a trophy we merit. No matter how “good” we are, we are not good enough for God. On the other hand, no matter how “bad” we are, we can never be outside of God. We can only hope in each instance to come to such a consciousness of God that no lesser gods can capture our attention and no trifling, self-centered gods can keep us from the fullness of awareness that is the fullness of Life. It is the project of life, this coming to Wholeness , this experience of Purpose beyond all purposes, this identification with everything that is.
Life, the contemplative knows, is a process. It is not that all the elements of life, mundane as they may be, do not matter. On the contrary, to the contemplative everything matters. Everything speaks of God, and God is both in and beyond everything.
Having the faith to take life one piece at a time – to live it in the knowledge that there is something of God in this for me now, here, at this moment – is of the essence of happiness. It is not that God is a black box full of tests and trials and treats. It is that life is a step on the way to a God who goes the way with us. However far, however perilous.
The thought of life on a small planet whirling in space is a recipe for despair. It is the source of human anxiety, this thought of having been cut adrift alone and without meaning. To the person of faith, it is this very mystery that pushes us to the edge of our souls where life is the beginning, not the end, and presses us down into the center of our souls where God, the energy of space, waits for us smiling.
To the contemplative, faith is not about having lights turn green before we get to the stop light at the corner or even about having cancerous tumors disappear on command. Faith is about knowing that life is the tabernacle of a living God made small by our meager icons of Being. To the contemplative, it is clear that the many forms of life all reveal in some measure the Life that is their Ground. The life to come, the contemplative knows from having lived this one, will be good.
To be a contemplative, we must have the faith that is beyond our need for magic solutions to daily questions. We must allow the soul to soar far freer than simply to the thought of a God who exaggerates the natural order in our behalf. Faith comes only when we are willing to trust the Blackness that is Light, the hard spots of a fragile world, each of which we would rather have had made easy.
Joan Chittister – Illuminated Life
Commenting on Matthew 25:31-46,
Rabbi Rami Shapiro wrote:
This is the real meaning, message and promise of kindness: doing right by the powerless, the disenfranchised, those who can be of no use to you and your quest for success. It is easy to be kind to people who can be of help to you in achieving your dreams, and doing so need not be a sign of anything but self-interest. Jesus challenges you to measure your ability to actualize kindness in relation to those who cannot further your goals. On a similar note, the Rabbis of Jesus’ time said that one of the highest acts of kindness is to tend to the dead, for the dead are the quintessential example of the least of these. While there are many specific acts of kindness we could explore here, I will limit myself to the four I find most compelling.
The first is making room for the suffering of others. While acts of kindness are not predicated on another’s suffering, the fact is we are confronted by the suffering of others every day, and unless and until we open our hearts to that suffering, our kindness toward those who suffer will be more an act of avoidance than love. To see the pain of another and to say “There but for the grace of God go I" is to misread the situation entirely. The other’s suffering is your suffering if you truly understand the nonduality of self and other. The suffering of the least among us is yours as well, and until you experience this directly you cannot act with true loving kindness.
In Remembrance
Several years ago, an experience brought new meaning for me to the Eucharist and the elements of bread and wine.
It happened on a personal renewal retreat when my spiritual director asked me to recall some family experiences and identify how God had been working in my life. I recalled the fond memories that I had had as a child, and the anticipation when my father would go on a business trip and come back. I always waited with great expectation to see if he had brought me something!
“This is probably a tradition in all families,” I commented. “I find myself doing the same thing. When I go away on business, I usually bring back a small gift to my children. But, I guess my children are getting too old for me to bring them little gifts.”
My spiritual director replied, “The meaning of this ritual is more than just the small gift. When your children ask you, “Did you bring me something from your trip?”, they are really asking you, “Did you remember me when you were gone?”
Needless to say, the ritual has continued, and I still bring something back from my trips. Sometimes it is a twig, a rock, a leaf…a symbol to say, “When I was gone, I remembered you.”
Since then, my understanding of the Eucharist has taken on an even richer meaning. Jesus gave us a symbol with which to bring us into holy communion: When I am gone, do this to remember me. In doing this, you will also know that I have remembered you.
● Joaquin Garcia
The peace of one individual is small. The peace of many people together is big. When we see ourselves as separate from our community and from nature, then violence and strife arise. It is only when we understand our part in an overall unity that there is the possibility of peace on a large scale.
● Deng Ming Dao
Put things in order, listen to my appeal, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.
● 2 Corinthians 13:11
We regard our living together not as an unfortunate mishap warranting endless competition among us but as a deliberate act of God to make us a community of brothers and sisters jointly involved in the quest for a composite answer to the varied problems of life.
● Steven Biko
Fruit for Thought
- Stereotypes of peace can get in the way of experiencing this real fruit. Make a mental list of the ideas you carry around that seem like peace to you but when peeled off like a fruit’s skin reveal a wrong belief about peace.
- When we are at peace resting in a relationship with God, we are kinder to other. Do you agree with this statement? Can you give an example of seeing this at work in your life or the life of someone around you?
- How is the fruit of peace in one’s life related to world peace? Or even peace in the family or church?
Back into Joy
Madeline is with Dana and Margie, two of their “summer children.” They had attended a carnival with Hugh and had brought home enormous trumpets.
Sunday evening was clear and luminous so we went to the star-watching rock and welcomed the arrival of each star with a blast of trumpet. We hay there, in an odd assortment of coats; I had on an embroidered coat a friend had bought in Dubrovnik; the two girls had on ancient fur coats’ and we were covered with blankets. We needed them, even though the rock itself still held the warmth of the sun, our own star. And radiated a gentle heat to us as we lay there and watched the sky, blowing the trumpets and listening to the crickets and the katydids and trying to identify the other night singers, and then outsinging them with all the nursery rhymes and songs and hymns we could think of which had stars and alleluias in them.
And I was totally back in joy. I didn’t realize I had been out of it, caught in small problems and disappointments and frustrations, until it came surging back. It was as radiant as the rock, and I lay there, listening to the girls trumpeting, and occasionally being handed one of the trumpets so that I could make a loud blast myself, and I half expected to hear a herd of elephants come thundering across the far pastures in answer to our call.
And joy is always a promise.
● Madeleine L’Engle
Stillness Speaks
● by Eckhart Tolle
Silence is helpful, but you don't need it in order to find stillness. Even when there is noise, you can be aware of the stillness underneath the noise, of the space in which the noise arises. That is the inner space of pure awareness, consciousness itself.
You can become aware of awareness as the background to all your sense perceptions, all your thinking. Becoming aware of awareness is the arising of inner stillness.
* * * * *
Pay attention to the gap -- the gap between two thoughts, the brief, silent space between words in a conversation, between the notes of a piano or flute, or the gap between the in-breath and the out-breath.
When you pay attention to those gaps, awareness of 'something' becomes -- just awareness. The formless dimension of pure consciousness arises from within you and replaces identification with form.
* * * * *
True intelligence operates silently. Stillness is where creativity and solutions to problems are found.
Dear Friends in Christ,
Grace and Peace to you and yours from the heat of Stockton. I trust all is well in your lives. From my office window I can look across Pacific Avenue and see the house of the President of the University of the Pacific.A couple of days ago a Bekins truck pulled up in front of the house and started unloading. Back and forth, up and down the loading ramp, in and out of the house, went the workers. Boxes and bags, chairs and couches and all kinds of “stuff”. President DeRosa and his wife Karen have moved out. New President Pamela Eibeck and family have moved in. Endings and beginnings – for Pacific and for former President DeRosa and for new President Eibeck.
We all know of endings and beginnings. Some of you reading this know them very well – having just ended and just begun anew. To those of you beginning new ministries in new places – may the calmness and peace and presence of the Holy Spirit be upon you. To those of us continuing our ministries in familiar places – may the energy and excitement and joy of returning renew our spirits.
Let our endings be times of grace and forgiveness. We offer into God’s grace-filled, life-giving, healing spirit all that has gone before, all that ends with our new beginning. We let go of past hurts – real or imagined. We forgive those who have wronged us – real or imagined. We forgive ourselves for past failures – real and imagined.
Let our beginnings be filled with openness and hope. We open to all the possibilities God might offer. We open to all the dreams we, with our fellow journeyers, might dream together. We open to the hope of life lived guided by the presence of the unimaginable stirrings of the Holy Spirit, We open to the hope given birth in new relationships and new opportunities.
Whether our endings are simply the endings of the day with the sun setting on the familiar, whether our beginnings are simply the beginnings of the day in places familiar – we end the day in the grace and forgiveness of a gracious and loving God. We begin the day open to the Spirit of life and possibility. Let it be so!
Be gentle with yourself, with one another, with all creation.
Peace, Salaam, Shalom, Namaste,
Dave Bennett, Senior Pastor, Central UMC, Stockton, CA
