...lift life heavenward

Lord, You make the common holy: “This My body, this My blood.”

Let us all, for earth’s true glory, daily lift life heavenward,

asking that the world around us share Your children’s liberty:

with the Spirit’s gifts empower us for the work of ministry.

---Jeffrey Rowthorn, 1978

Have you ever known someone with the touch? Someone who could take the most ordinary day and imbue it with otherworldliness? Turn an everyday action into a ritual of uncommon beauty? Take a passing conversation and bless the words exchanged, draw out the pain and joy masked behind safely neutral words and phrases?

I feel like Jesus must have been one of these rare persons. There are so many recorded instances of him breathing holiness into the mundane everyday of existence—everyday tasks, everyday conversations, everyday touches. In Jesus’ hands, touch healed disease and stigma, the fruit of wheat and vine became sacred sign. In Jesus’ mouth, names spoken called fishermen from their nets, taxmen from their graft, the dead from their repose, faithful women from their grief.

Is the gift for crafting sacredness from ordinariness, then, Jesus’ gift uniquely? Or are we to be imitators of Christ in this too, always open for the Spirit to move in us to transform the common into the holy…in the midst of us…through us?

Let us all, for earth’s true glory, daily lift life heavenward…

...the toll of love

Crown him the Lord of love! Behold His hands and side,

Rich wounds, yet visible above, in beauty glorified;

no angels in the sky can fully bear the sight,

but downward bend their burning eyes at mysteries so bright.

---Matthew Bridges, 1851

There is a country song that includes the line, “…you ain’t lived till you got scars.” I think there is a lot of truth in the statement. My daughter Abby’s knee will always show the scars of a childhood fall from the “high monkey bars” and a couple of inelegant adolescent stair descents. Sarah’s forehead will always have a Harry Potter-esque ‘lightning bolt’ mark to remind her of the hutch at the bottom of the stairs at Grandma’s in Columbus. Any mom will tell of scars related to birthing, then raising, children --- scars both physical and emotional. Life takes its toll on us all.

And life took its toll on Jesus. When I read this hymn, I am struck by the thought that the Jesus glorified in heaven, present with the angels, still bears the scars of a real life. The kinds of scars we all carry--of injury and discouragement, of betrayal and disappointment, of rejection and indifference—if we walk the world long enough, earnestly enough. No air-brushed, cleaned-up, sanitized version of Jesus reigns in heaven. The Lord of love, mystery of mysteries, still bears the marks of his sacrifice on his glorified body.

You ain’t lived till you got scars.

...wrong every time, Palm Sunday edition

Christ’s is no earthly kingdom; it comes from heaven above.

His rule secures our freedom, and justice, truth, and love.

Hope, peace, and joy our treasure, God’s love above all measure,

Hosanna to the Lord, for He fulfills God’s word!

--Mikael Franzen, trans. Philip M. Young

What do you mean?

--Justin Bieber

Not that kind of kingdom. Not that kind of king.

Those who followed Jesus when he walked the paths and skirted the shores of the Holy Land so long ago got it wrong. They looked for power (as they understood power), might (mainly military and political), the overturning of Roman rule and the restoration of the rightful place of the people of God (top of the heap). It was the lore on their lips, the dream in their hearts, the birthright they claimed. Now was the time, and Jesus was their man/king/savior.

We still get it wrong today. Every time we long for power more than compassion. Every time we ransom the welfare of ‘the least of these’ for another rung on society’s ladder. Every time we trade the deep divine undercurrent of joy for the cheap fleeting thrill of victory. Every time we look to Jesus as a vendor to supply us our momentary desires rather than the Vine to connect us to the source that is truly Life.

Because Christ’s is not that kind of kingdom. And Jesus is not that kind of king. 

Don’t look for that, here.

...into my brokenness

Jesus, the name that calms my fears, that bids my sorrows cease;

‘tis music in the sinner’s ears; ‘tis life and health and peace.

He speaks, and listening to His voice, new life the dead receive;

the mournful broken hearts rejoice, the humble poor believe.

---Charles Wesley, 1739

I don’t like admitting it. It doesn’t make me proud, isn’t the sort of admission that I’d want engraved on a plaque or cross-stitched on a pillow. But because I don’t like it doesn’t make it any less true: I’ve been battling the way of the world lately, and the world is winning. I mean, I am beat. If you are not seeing the scars, it must be because I’m dressing right. I am just weary and worn with the meanness that seems to be around every corner, waiting to pounce on the weak or unsuspecting. And the weariness feels cumulative and exponential, building on itself like a runaway snowball (children, remind me to tell you about ‘snowballs’ from the good old days).

In my weariness, it is so easy to forget. To forget to listen for the voice that is always whispering life into the stillness. To forget to listen for the presence that is always calling into the absence. To forget to listen for the joy that is always singing into the despair. To forget to listen for the voice of my brother Savior speaking wholeness into my brokenness.

But, oh. When I remember. The mournful, broken hearts rejoice…

...while we wait

O God in whom all life begins, who births the seed to fruit,

bestow Your blessing on our lives; here let Your love find root.

Bring forth in us the Spirit’s gifts of patience, joy, and peace;

deliver us from numbing fear, and grant our faith increase.

---Carl P. Daw, 1990

The more we learn about gestation and human growth, and germination and plant growth, the more similarities become apparent. So much of early growth happens silent, hidden—good, strong changes taking time and nourishment before new life is ever ready to make an appearance on the scene. And while I’ve never been a farmer, having to depend on invisible growth for the future, I have been a mom, waiting helpless for months on growth beyond my control for my arms to be full. And I know the numbing fear that comes with trusting unseen growth, especially what must be the farmer’s fear after a drought year. I know the mother’s waiting fear after still birth. The breath-held, afraid-to-hope, needing-to-trust, wanting-to-believe fear that growth is happening.

I think other parts of our lives are like that, too. So many characteristics of a faithful life grow unseen, tucked away, nurtured by time and steady attention. The Spirit’s gifts grow in us, perhaps unseen as they germinate, but growing all the same, ready to yield mature aspects of our character that will shape the world around us. Peace, love, joy—powerful forces for transforming life. And the patience to believe that unseen growth will yield a harvest.

May God deliver us from the chokehold of fear into the embrace of faith…while we wait.

...my kind of river

Like a river glorious is God’s perfect peace,

Over all victorious in it’s bright increase;

Perfect, yet it floweth fuller everyday,

Perfect, yet it groweth deeper all the way.

---Frances R. Havergal, 1874

I have never floated on the Mississippi River, but I’ve read Huckleberry Finn. There is a vivid description of the river that stays with me. Huck and Jim are floating on their raft down the river, intending to veer into the Ohio where it joins the Mississippi. Neither had ever seen the Ohio, or that part of the Mississippi; when they realized that the time for paddling hard upstream of the Ohio was nigh, it was obvious that the river was too wide, too deep, too inexorable to fight against.

I thought of this passage when I read the hymn text for today. This river of God’s peace? It’s no shallow, meandering, drought-sickened rivulet. This river, this peace, is a powerful force, growing ever deeper and fuller in its completeness. This peace is not a resigned, mousy resignation to the ‘true’  powers in the world. It is the force that is able to sustain life, overpowering the unrest, the injustice, the terror in the world with its current. This peace is the true force to be reckoned with.

That’s my kind of river.

...diamonds from ashes

When through the deep waters I call thee to go,

The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;

For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,

And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

---John Rippon, 1787

There are lots of ways to look at the rough patches and tragedies in our lives. Some folk choose to look at everything that happens as God’s distinct will, some look at bad stuff as karma or payback. I see the bad things that happen as part of the price of being truly human in this world. For me, this resonates with my observations, with history, with my own life experience, and with my belief in a loving God.

In today’s hymn, with its text from the 18^th century, the hymnist speaks from the viewpoint of a strong, caring God to a searching believer. We will be called, no choice about it, through our life experiences, to journey through deep waters; but we will not go alone. God goes with us through our troubles and distress, to bless and even to make holy those experiences that try us the most. To me this says that God can bring some worth out of even the most tragic, worthless, hurtful situation, diamonds from ashes.

What a hopeful thought from a loving God!

...to risk life

O Love that will not let me go, I rest my weary soul in Thee;

I give Thee back the life I owe, that in Thine ocean depths

its flow may richer, fuller be.

---George Matheson, 1882

It’s hard to believe. Someone comes to you and says “Give up your riches to me. Blindly trust that I will take them and increase them.” And if this were an email solicitation, or a risky stock market offering, or a trench-coated fellow on a busy street corner, we know we’d be foolish to go along. No one wants to be scammed like that.

However, this is what God calls us to do. Here the hymnist imagines God as the personification of Love, a love that seeks us and pursues us, wraps us up and embraces us. This love calls to us, “Trust me. Turn over your life, which you may consider rich, full, and precious. In the depths of my life, your life becomes rich indeed. Entrust your life to me to achieve depth and meaning. You can rest here from your striving; here you are loved.”

This is a risk we can take, must take, if we are to live lives of meaning. Oh, to be found in the ocean of God’s love!

...the darkness reveals the stars

I've heard people say the things. You have, too. Maybe I've even said the things. "Life's been hard on him." "She learned the hard way." "Never had to work for a thing. Now they're soft." "I used to be a nice person, but I got lied to/used/cheated one too many times. Those days are over." The thoughts are, I think, that our life's experiences create us, or at least complete us.

But.

Do those experiences make us? Or do they reveal us? When (when, not if) shadows, struggles, heartaches, defeats, setbacks come, do they batter us, do they better us?

Or, like darkness reveals the stars, do circumstances allow for the truest view of our realest selves?

In darkness, what will be revealed in us?

...don't look for that, here

Christ’s is no earthly kingdom; it comes from heaven above.

His rule secures our freedom, and justice, truth, and love.

Hope, peace, and joy our treasure, God’s love above all measure,

Hosanna to the Lord, for He fulfills God’s word!

---Mikael Franzen, 1800's, tr. Philip M. Young, 2005

Not that kind of kingdom. Not that kind of king.

Those who followed Jesus when he walked the paths and skirted the shores of the Holy Land so long ago got it wrong. They looked for power (as they understood power), might (mainly military), the overturning of Roman rule and the restoration of the rightful place of the people of God (top of the heap). It was the lore on their lips, the dream in their hearts, the birthright they claimed. Now was the time, and Jesus was their man/king/savior.

We still get it wrong today. Every time we long for power more than compassion. Every time we ransom the welfare of ‘the least of these’ for another rung on the social ladder. Every time we trade the divine undercurrent of joy for cheap momentary happiness. Every time we look to Jesus as a vendor to supply us our momentary desires rather than the Vine to connect us to the life that is truly Life.

Because Christ’s is not that kind of kingdom. And Jesus is not that kind of king. 

Don’t look for that, here.

...come and get it

Come, then, children, with your burdens --- life’s confusions, fears, and pain.

Leave them at the cross of Jesus, take instead His kingdom’s reign.

Bring your thirsts, for He will quench them --- He alone will satisfy.

All our longings find attainment when to self we gladly die.

---Marva J. Dawn, 1999

From pop culture to Protestant work ethic, from self-realization to prosperity gospel, even the loose cherry-picked readings of some of the New Testament’s “red letter writings” ---  all over, the universe seems to be sending us a message loud and clear: If you want it, come and get it. Take what you need. The desires of your heart are there for a reason. Seek and you will find. Work for what you want. God wants you to have nice things.

Here’s the thing, though. When we are invited, coaxed, beckoned, called by Jesus to walk in his path, we do hear “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find….For everyone who asks receives.” But I can’t help but look at Jesus’ life among the poor and broken, and think that perpetual Christmas morning excess is not what he had in mind. I hear Jesus say, “When you lay down the distraction of what you thought you wanted, you can begin to focus on the real life of the spirit. And I will meet every need. And you will finally be able to stop striving, and running after, and grasping, and resenting. And then, friend, you will know what it is to live.”

Lay down your burdens at the cross. Pick up life.

...never, never alone

There’s not a plant or flower below, but makes Thy glories known;

and clouds arise, and tempests blow, by order from Thy throne;

while all that borrows life from Thee is ever in Thy care,

and everywhere that we can be, Thou, God, art present there.

---Isaac Watts, 1715

The signs are all around. They are in the breeze, underfoot. In messages writ large and small, we are reminded that we don’t make our way through this life unaccompanied. Power and tenderness, delicacy and strength, stillness and motion---God’s presence is felt in myriad ways, in every place and time, in ways we desperately seek and in ways discovered as serendipitous gift.

The Psalmist relates it this way:

            Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?

            If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.

            If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,

even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast.

If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me,

and the light around me become night,’

even the darkness is not dark to you;

the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is as light to you.

            ---Psalm 139: 7-12

Sisters and brothers, we are never. never. alone. And it is not our job to bind God to us some way.

Erasmus said, ‘Bidden or not bidden, God is present.’ Hear the good news, and rest assured.

...life interrupting Life

Praise yet our Christ again, Alleluia, Amen!

Life shall not end the strain; Alleluia, Amen!

---Christian H. Bateman, 1843

Singing praise to God is an important part of our weekly worship services, and should be a part of our lives during the rest of our week. I don’t know about you, but too often my life seems to interrupt the song of praise. Jobs need doing, family and friends need our attention, all sorts of media surround us with wall-to-wall sight and sound. Life itself threatens to end the ‘strain,’ or song, of praise I desire to offer to Christ. This hymn reminds me that even my busy, distracted life doesn’t have to drown out the offering of praise I want to give to God. 

Let us embrace with a sense of joyful awe the sacred responsibility of calling each other to the faithful living of our lives as a gift of praise to our Guide and Friend, Jesus.

Alleluia, amen!

...the present instant

No wind at the window, no knock on the door;
no light from the lampstand, no foot on the floor;
no dream born of tiredness, no ghost raised by fear:
just an angel and a woman and a voice in her ear.
---John L. Bell, 1992

You just had to be there. Sometimes experience is gold. That instant when Mary understood...something...happened because she was present, in that moment, open to that experience. She heard...something...because she was listening, ready for the whisper of the messenger-voice.

The world...changed...because Mary was really there.

What voice might we catch, what message might we intuit, were we to be fully present to life, in all its messy moments?

How might the world change if we were to really listen?

... the unfilled turning

Jesus, thou joy of loving hearts,

thou fount of life, thou light of all,

From the best bliss that earth imparts,

We turn unfilled to hear thy call.

---Latin hymn, 12th cent.

Meh. Whatevs. idc. Mom, I’m bored. There are lots of ways, old and new, to express our ‘doneness’ with what life has to offer. Now, at some points in history, this may have been understandable. But look --- today most of us have access to libraries with thousands of volumes (or e-readers with access to even more), cable or satellite TV with hundreds of channels, and internet access that opens virtual doors to the world (with all that can walk in through those doors). It is easier than ever, with cell phones and social media, to keep in touch with friends near and far away. There are, at any given point in time, literally 1.65 zillion things to do. And lots of them are exciting, fun, super-cool things.

So, why do so many of us feel so empty so much of the time?

It just may be that, even when it offers us its best, this world only has the stuff of life to give. And the hunger in our souls, deep down, can’t be sated with stuff; if needs life itself. St. Augustine, in his Confessions, wrote, “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in Thee.”

Even the best of the good life leaves us unfilled, seeking the abundance that hearing our call, and following, will bring.

...faint or full

Does sadness fill my mind? A solace here I find,

May Jesus Christ be praised!

Or fades my earthly bliss? My comfort still is this,

May Jesus Christ be praised!

---Katholisches Gesangbuch, 1828

Probably none of us, if we live long enough, will avoid the deep ache of sadness. Some may be fortunate, and experience only brief periods of “fadedness”. Others, through life circumstance or brain chemistry, may slog through long terms of depression and sadness. And, because Jesus walked this life fully human, we can surmise that he experienced every emotion common to humanity, including the dark cloud of sadness. This thought is so comforting to me --- to know that I can experience nothing that my Savior has not experienced first. And out of that comfort can come praise. In my darkest moment, I can cling to Christ, and sing my anguished, confused, joyful song of praise, faint or full though it may be.

May Jesus Christ be praised, and may praise do its transformative work in the world, and in me.

...for my sake

My song is love unknown, my Savior's love to me,
love to the loveless shown that they might lovely be.
O who am I that for my sake my Lord 
should take frail flesh, 
and die?
---Samuel Crossman, 1664

How overwhelming, that God stepped into the same skin that we walk around in, knew the risks, took on the aches and pains, shouldered the heartbreaks.

Chose this life. This death.

Chose not to walk away.

For my sake.

...borne safe

When ends life’s transient dream,

When death’s cold, sullen stream shall o’er me roll,

Blest Savior, then, in love,

Fear and distrust remove;

O bear me safe above, a ransomed soul.

---Ray Palmer, 1830

There are some days inspiration flows easily. There are others when I sit and stare at the screen (or the composition book page if I’m rocking it old school) and it stares back at me. Then there are days when the text bounces back to me, twisted fantastically, as if by a funhouse mirror, distortions and warps making it hard to grasp meaning.

Guess which afternoon it’s been? This verse from the beloved mid-19^th century hymn pulled me toward it, then reflected back at me: “Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream; merrily, merrily merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.” Yep. Talk about a brain freeze.

So, I scrolled down on my page, past those first two lines of the verse (out of sight, sort of out of mind). And got to something I could hold onto, something that would hold onto me. In love Jesus, in the midst of our fear, ransoms our souls. In love the Savior, our distrust notwithstanding, bears us safe through the transient dream of this life.

Let me be wholly Yours.

...winter's clear anatomy

I love to see, when leaves depart,
The clear anatomy arrive.
Winter the paragon of art,
That kills all forms of life and feeling
Save what is pure and will survive.
---Roy Campbell

If you look out any window where you chance to be right now, odds are you'll see them. Tree skeletons. Tall ones, narrow as rails. Squat ones, bones a tangled mess. Huge ancient ones, central trunks it would take two of us, three, to embrace, with tired arms nearly sweeping the ground, full of stick bundles long abandoned for cozier, deeper climes. Looking, for all the world, like death. No life here, not in these bones.

But we know. We, who've been around the sun a few times ourselves. We know there is life in those dead-looking tree skeletons. We know they are resting, for a season. Waiting. We know that to count them out now, because they look done, finished, over, would be a grand mistake. We know the purest sort of life is hidden in that bareness, waiting for its time. Distilling, concentrating, becoming more itself, more true, the life waits.

Don't discount the bare trees of winter.

Risen with healing in his wings

Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace! Hail the Sun of Righteousness!

Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings.

Mild he lays his glory by, born that we no more may die,

Born to raise us from the earth, born to give us second birth.

Hark! The herald angels sing, “Glory to the new-born King!”

---Charles Wesley

There is a danger in the carols of Christmas, one that threatens to deaden us to the wisdom hidden within. This danger is familiarity, the same quality that makes them beloved. Anywhere you go, you are apt to hear some version of this carol, sung or played by a wide variety of ensembles. Many of us could sing this carol in our sleep --- all three verses!

Our familiarity with this carol should not, however, blind us to the message of comfort and hope contained within. Hear these words anew: “Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings….” We all know that in the midst of the great joy of the season lurk illness, injury, grief, and sorrow. These are part of life, and do not miraculously disappear during Advent and Christmastide. But there is good news, even in darkness! There is one who brings light for our darkness, life for our dead places, and healing for what hurts us. In the middle of this tumultuous existence, Christ comes to meet our deepest needs.

...so here we stand, whoever we are,

bathed in the light of a star...