...and God showed up

O Master, from the mountainside make haste to heal the hearts of pain;

among these restless throngs abide;

O tread the city’s streets again:

Till all the earth shall learn Your love and follow where Your feet have trod;

till glorious from your heaven above shall come the city of our God.

—Frank Mason North, 1903

God showed up last Sunday. God showed up in the powerful story of affirmation of the place where a pastor’s core identity and elemental calling each complemented and strengthened the other. God showed up as a diverse congregation gathered to bless one of its own, a young PhD ready to return to his country with the love and nurture of a faith family behind him. God showed up in bread and wine, the body re-membered; and in call to action for peace and justice; and in grief over young lives detained and lost (because God shows up in the grieving, God does). 

But then a funny thing happened. Sarah and I got on the train for home. And God showed up in the singing aloud with the song in his earbuds of the disheveled man a few seats ahead of me (all about that bass, ‘bout that bass, ‘bout that bass, no treble...). And we got our bus transfer, along with a couple struggling with a stroller. And God showed up in the guy in gym clothes who gave up his seat and jumped up to lift the stroller into the aisle beside them. And God showed up in the wondering gaze of the babe who, lifted in his tiny kimono from the stroller, lit up the faces of the strangers all around him. 

And I’m reminded, in a hundred big and small ways, that where and when glimpses of beauty and love break through our isolation and fear, it’s then that Christ walks the city’s streets again. It’s then that God’s kin-dom reveals itself a little more fully. It’s when we learn to follow, that we’ll find we’ve been walking on holy ground all along. 

...the best sorts of Mothering

Like a mother with her children You will comfort us each day,
giving guidance on our journey, as we seek to find our way.
When we walk through fiery trials, You will help us take a stand;
when we pass through troubled waters, You hold out Your tender hand.

—Jann Aldredge-Clanton 

My ideas of good mothering have matured along with me, being shaped by the act of mothering itself, moving from theory to practice and from toddling to dancing. Okay, okay...so, there  may  only be minutes that my mothering approaches the lithe grace of dancing, but you know what I mean. As my maturity as a mother has increased, I have grown to trust more in the preparedness, capability, and potential of my children, and to see my role as less of a rescuer. I’ve learned to provide more guidance and support  than unsolicited direction and dictation. And it is more and more evident to me that presence in the storms of life is to be desired over protection from any discomfort. Somehow I bet life is not through teaching me, either. 

When I look at the ways God loves me, I see the tender strength and steadfast presence of a Mother come through. Comfort, Guide, Courage, Presence—God embodies the best sorts of Mothering. And whether we had a mother who did for us, or not—imagine what it would feel like to know that we all have a God who mothers us so well.

Thanks be to our good God, whose love never fails.