...the not knowing

Green pastures are before me, which yet I have not seen;

bright skies will soon be o’er me, where the dark clouds have been:

my life I cannot measure, the path of life is free;

my Savior has my treasure, and he will walk with me.

---Anna L. Waring, 1850

The not knowing. Is there a more helpless feeling than not seeing the path that lies ahead of you, not being certain of what the future holds for you? How are we to plan, to plot our course, to steel ourselves against the possibility of future injury or harm without the knowing?

Let go. Let go of knowing. Let go the stress of needing to be in control of a future that was never yours to begin with. Trust that your pathway will wind its way through green pastures, under bright skies. Trust that the Savior holds what is truly treasure for your life.

And know this one thing: the steps you take, wherever your path leads, are walked beside your Savior. Every step, in shadow or sun, through green pasture or shadowed wood---never alone.

...flashlight, not floodlight

Oh, how sweet to walk in this pilgrim way, leaning on the everlasting arms;

oh, how bright the path grows from day to day, leaning on the everlasting arms.

---Elisha A. Hoffman, 1887

Path. Way. Journey. Through the years, these expressions of spiritual life have come to ring truest in my ear, and resonate most soundly in my soul. While I am not always positive about my destination, and my goals change, and sometimes finish lines seem frustratingly movable, feeling called to the journey is a constant. If day breaks, there is a path, and even when I may not be totally sold on the reason, my feet will be on it, because that is what feet, and paths, are for.

In this little bit of late-19^th cent. poetry, the hymnist speaks of the path growing bright from day to day. My mind travels to the memory verse from Bible Drill---“Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.” (Psalm 119:105) And the thing is, I’ve walked on some dark paths in my life (yep, literal and metaphorical), and I know how lights work. That flashlight? Even a good one, with the batteries you remembered to replace before you packed it up for the campout? It illuminates the path only a few steps ahead.

God’s presence? Right there with us on the path, every step of the way. But that light it throws? It’s a flashlight, not a floodlight. We were always meant to walk leaning on God, steps at a time, waiting for the light to shine up ahead.

Wow. Light for the journey, and an arm to lean on. On the path with Jesus.

...the God-pitched tent

Love divine, all loves excelling, joy of heaven to earth come down,

Fix in us thy humble dwelling: all thy faithful mercies crown.

Jesus, thou art all compassion, pure, unbounded love thou art;

Visit us with thy salvation; enter every trembling heart.

---Charles Wesley, 1747

You a camper? I am…was…have been…wouldn’t mind being again. I grew up camping with my folks and brother, both in tents and in a way-cool pop-top VW van camper that seemed in my teen years to have all the comforts of, well, almost-home. For those of you familiar with the groovy contraptions, my sleep spot was the hammock hung over the front seats (because I sleep curled up anyway---perfect). Tim slept in the pop top. We have slept in that van in every sort of weather (including a surprise tropical storm), and even in someone’s front yard by mistake (another story for another day)! Our longest trip was a 5 week jaunt out west, as far as Glacier National Park and back, most of the trip toting a genuine tumbleweed (don’t ask) that took up much of our precious free space. Dad even drove straight through the night to get us from Oklahoma to the AHS parking lot in time for Mr. Goff’s band camp to begin (‘cause didn’t nobody miss band camp).

Shortest camping trip? A bit shorter. Counting car time, it lasted 4 hours. Henry and I were the parents of a toddler, and looking forward to passing on a joy of camping adventure to Sam. The itinerary went something like this: plan, pack, check for approximately 2 days; load up the car with tons of stuff (camping, little kid, pregnant lady, etc.); drive just across the state line to FDR; unload tons of stuff in the dark (yeah, those of you who camp, or have kids, or watch comedy movies, or read Greek tragedies---you know where this is going); set a lit kerosene lantern safely (haha) out of reach on the picnic table while assembling the 347 pieces of the new family-size tent; listen in horror as prized first-born son screams in agony after grasping the hot kerosene lantern; cuddle child, bandage hand, sing songs, hang lantern on tree, mutter under breath, try to continue with the joy of camping adventure; give the whole thing up; do everything in reverse; arrive back home---4 hours later. Even with this less-than-stellar start, we enjoyed some good times in the woods over the years following.

When I read the line in this verse of today’s hymn---‘fix in us thy humble dwelling’---I can’t help but think back to those years of pitching tents in the woods with little kids in tow. There was a time in our faith memory where pitching a tent figures pretty prominently, too. When the people of Israel wandered in the wild places, they packed the ‘tent of meeting’ with them, inviting God’s presence among them even in (or especially in) their wandering.

For us today, the cry of our hearts is that the God of Love would pitch a tent in us---among us, and within us. Imagine the ways we might experience transformation, with the tent of love fixed in our souls.

Visit us with your salvation, Divine Love. Fix your dwelling in us.

...it's Sunday...but Monday's coming

Soar we now where Christ has led, following our exalted Head;

Made like Him, like Him we rise; ours the cross, the grave, the skies.

Alleluia!

---Charles Wesley, 1739

Here we are at Easter, the simplest day of the year to follow Jesus! Soaring where Christ has led, rising like him…feels pretty wonderful, right? And we need a day like Easter, because the rest of the year is sure to follow. There was a popular poster when I was younger (Kids, we used to unroll these big paper pictures with groovy sayings on them and hang them on our bedroom walls! They were like the memes of a bygone generation!) that featured a cross dramatically backlit, with the text, “It’s Friday…but Sunday’s coming!” Well, I need a poster (but I’d just as soon have a good meme) that says It’s Sunday! …but Monday’s coming. #wompwomp.” We live in a Monday world, friends, where the cross and grave, and busyness and inattention, and a hundred tiny everyday cruelties are always with us. We need a little Easter every now and then. We are promised that if we follow Christ by owning the cross, and the grave, that we will also own the skies with him.

Made like you, to follow you, we turn with expectation toward a future that includes the cross, the grave…and the skies. Alleluia!

...see it, say it, raise it---like a kid

All glory, laud, and honor to Thee, Redeemer, King,

To whom the lips of children made sweet hosannas ring.

Thou didst accept their praises --- accept the praise we bring,

Who in all good delightest, Thou good and gracious King!

---Theodulph of Orleans, c.821

Count on a kid to tell it like it is. Maybe this is the reason for the old adage, “Children should be seen and not heard.” Over the course of our lives we develop the ability to filter our thoughts before they become words. We become polite, refined, and maybe just a wee bit fake. We also sometimes lose the child’s ability to see things as they are, without expectation or preconception. We accept nothing at face value, examining each comment and appearance for inflection, shading, nuance. Kids? They see it like it is, and say it like it is.

In today’s text, hosannas stream from the lips of children. They were onto Jesus, and seemed attracted to him without reservation. They saw what they saw, and liked it, and joyously praised Jesus. May we today be like children…no filters, no prejudices, no reservations about praising our redeemer, Jesus Christ.

Let at least one of those hosannas be mine, Lord.

...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!

......sinking sand

In Christ alone my hope is found; He is my light, my strength, my song.

This cornerstone, this solid ground, firm through the fiercest drought and storm.

What heights of love, what depths of peace when fears are stilled, when strivings cease.

My Comforter, my all in all, here in the love of Christ I stand.

---Keith Getty and Stuart Townend, 2001

In about 1834, Edward Mote wrote this familiar refrain:

            My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.

            I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus’ name.

            On Christ the solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.

A century and a half later, Stuart Townend and Keith Getty voiced these thoughts that echo those of Mote. The truth in the text shines through --- there is one rock, one foundation, one source. My hopes placed on anything else --- person, institution, tangential belief --- are misplaced.

Nothing else, no one else, can be the Rock in our lives. And, as much as we try, we cannot be the Rock in our lives. It is too much to ask or expect of any but Jesus.

In Christ alone…

...I need you, Jesus (but just a little)

Come, ye weary, heavy-laden, lost and ruined by the fall;

If you tarry till you’re better, you will never come at all.

Let not conscience make you linger, nor of fitness fondly dream;

All the fitness he requireth is to feel your need of him.

---Joseph Hart, 1759

I have never had a maid or cleaning service (visit my house and you’ll know it!), but I have heard several folks speak of “cleaning up for the maid to come”. It always makes me smile a little, but I sort of know the impulse. Maybe it is the same urge that overcomes folks with disorganized piles of random receipts just before they meet with their accountants. There is something in us that will admit we are needy, but not too needy. We need Jesus’ salvation and life-changing power, but we don’t want to need it too much. Sure, we’re sinners, but not sinners.

This hymn, one of my favorites from that era (1800’s American), reminds me all the time that we all need Jesus, and that if I wait around to acknowledge my need till I’m more worthy of Christ’s attention, time will pass, and I may never approach the intimacy with God that Jesus offers me. I need not dream of fitness; Jesus is ready to accept me as I am…poor…needy…ready.

...(be)friended by the Almighty

Praise to the Lord, who doth prosper thy works and defend thee;

Surely his goodness and mercy here daily attend thee.

Ponder anew what the Almighty can do,

If with his love he befriend thee.

---Joachim Neander, 1680/trans. Catherine Winkworth, 1863

This particular hymn text astounds me. Penned in 1680 (the translation made in 1868), this text deals with the nature of God’s power. What is amazing to me is the intimate nature of the relationship the writer envisions between the powerful God of the universe and regular gals and fellas like us. I know I shouldn’t, but I tend to think of intimacy with God as a contemporary thought; this text brings me up short. This concept is nothing born with our relational thinking, but has been a part of the way many before you and me have wondered about God’s care for us. I am asked to ponder anew what friendship with God can mean to regular people like me.

What does it mean to be friends with God? And how would being on God’s ‘friends list’ change the way I walk on this earth, the way I relate to the rest of humanity? What kind of effect does that kind of friendship have?

...tenderly bound

O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be!

Let Thy goodness, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to Thee:

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love;

Here’s my heart, Lord, take and seal it; seal it for Thy courts above.

---Robert Robinson, 1758

It might be easy to see this verse as a guilt trip. What kind of lousy follower am I? Prone to wander, in debt to grace, I need a fetter --- a chain --- to bind me to God. Ouch. Then I remember that in this hymn, as in so much of life, it’s not about me. This hymn explores not human nature, frail and failing though it be. This text is all about the nature of God, a God who loves us enough to pursue us, to bind us to Godself with chains --- chains made not of might or threat, or violence, but of goodness. And in my inmost heart, I long to be held close to the heart of God, with fetters that tender. I am a debtor. For God’s unfailing mercy, I owe a debt I will never repay. Through God’s grace, freely given, I owe nothing.

Because of the weightlessness of my bonds, I will serve always out of love and gratitude. I’m bound like that.

...transformed, not done

In the bread of life here given, we become what we receive.

In the cup of love here offered, affirm what we believe.

In the word of God proclaimed here, the good news of truth is heard.

In the telling of the stories, be open to God’s word.

---James Chepponis, 2002

Been there. Done that. I admit it. I am the first to make the jaded comment, or, on choking it back, to think it. This again? Or maybe, like Yogi Berra, It’s like deja-vu, all over again. And it’s kind of true.

Each time we gather and take communion, there is a familiarity to the elements, a sense of ritual in the setting. If I’m not careful, I can coast through the serving of the elements, the doing this in remembrance, on autopilot. If I am not present in the moment and attending to the story of my friend Jesus’ sacrificial love for me, a high holy moment can be, instead, just another holy snack pack and some pretty mumbling.

And those Bible stories? For heaven’s sake, I’ve been coming to church now for, well, for a long time. I have heard them all. Twice. What good does it do me, really, to be here with you, listening to the stories again? To sit and listen to the same old words and phrases over and over, till they are so burned into my soul that I could tell them myself? To know them so well that the words spring, unbidden, to my mind at unlikely times during the week? What good are a bunch of stories?

I have to be careful. I wouldn’t want to mix up being transformed with being done. Because being transformed? That could take a lifetime.

...when we don't hear

God is calling through the voices of our neighbors’ urgent prayers:

Through their longing for redemption and for rescue from despair.

Place of hurt or face of needing; strident cry or silent pleading:

God is calling --- can you hear? God is calling --- can you hear?

---Mary Louise Bringle, 2003

“Oh, how I would like to hear God speak clearly!” “I’m just waiting on a sign from God.” “It would have been so much easier to live in Jesus’ time --- we could hear straight from his lips what he wanted from us!” If you have not been the speaker of one of these comments (or something similar), you have surely heard folk who have said these things. If only God would speak, and tell us exactly what we need to know!

In this very new hymn, Mel Bringle posits that God is speaking to us in our modern age. God is speaking through the natural beauty of the world, through music and art, through hymns and carols. She also states that God is speaking to us, pleading, in the voices of those with needs and hungers living among us. God speaks to us in the tragedies and injustices of the world in which we live.

Jesus even addressed this kind of God-speak in Matthew 25. The ‘church people’ asked him, incredulous, “When in the world did we ever hear your voice, Jesus, calling out to us in need or pain?” And Jesus said, “Anytime you heard the cry of your fellow humans, of basic needs, of care and concern, of human dignity, that voice was mine.”

God is calling. When we don't hear, it is not because the calling has stopped.

...the dance of grace

Sister, let me be your servant, let me be as Christ to you;

pray that I may have the grace to let you be my servant, too.

Brother, let me be your servant, let me be as Christ to you;

pray that I may have the grace to let you be my servant, too.

---Richard Gillard, 1974

Lord, make me useful. How can I help? What can I do for you?

How quick we are as a people to offer, and (generally) follow through with, help, assistance, and support to those around us in need. And that is awesome. And while we may argue with Joey Tribbiani of Friends fame over whether there is any truly selfless good deed (“Look, there’s no unselfish good deeds, sorry.”), most of us would agree that serving others makes the world a kinder, gentler place. We are quick to offer to friends, family, and even strangers the hand of help, as Charlie Puth sings in his new song:

            I’m only one call away, I’ll be there to save the day,

            Superman got nothing on me, I’m only one call away.

What I am not as good at, and I bet the same could be said for you, is allowing someone the gift of being servant to me in my need. I would do nearly anything to not need you. And that, friends, is a crying shame. Because when I keep you from serving me in my need (and it is there, let’s not kid each other) I don’t just rob myself of the aid and comfort you are glad to offer me as your sister. I also fail to exercise the grace of allowing you to be a servant, to participate in your own transformation into the likeness of Christ. All because I would swear with my last breath that I’m just fine.

Let us be each other’s servants. And let us allow others the holy privilege of serving us. This grace…it’s a mutual dance, never meant as a solo.

...never stop changing

In the tongues of all the peoples may the message bless and heal,

As devout and patient scholars more and more its depths reveal.

Bless, O God, to wise and simple, all the truth of ageless worth,

Till all lands receive the witness and your knowledge fills the earth.

---Ferdinand Q. Blanchard, 1953

God’s word never changes. But, by God’s grace, God’s people continually do. In the brightness of new light, we see more and more truth. In the warmth of seasons’ turnings, we fathom new depths of wisdom. In the shared scholarship of community, we open ourselves to the prismatic understanding of our brothers and sisters.

So although God’s word is a constant, our approach to the word of God must never be still. We must seek always to find more justice, more compassion, more service, more healing and blessing for our hurting world in its pages. We owe it to our world. We owe it to the Word.

Never stop changing.

...real world music

All creatures of our God and King, lift up your voice and with us sing

Alleluia!

Let all things their Creator bless, and worship him in humbleness,

Alleluia!

---St. Francis, 1225

The text of this ancient hymn is attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, and dates from around the year 1225. Let’s just think for a minute about a tradition that still values the wisdom that can be gleaned from the riches of the past. Thank you, Church, for preserving these hymns for us and our children.

Now, on to the poetry and genius of the text. St. Francis couldn’t actually cover “all things”, but he covered all the bases he could with contrast. Listen to some of the contrasts from this lover of all things natural: burning sun and sliver moon, rushing wind and sailing clouds, rising morn and evening lights, flowing water and masterful fire. Can you imagine a concert of voices made up of all these natural elements, praising the One who’d imagined them? It would be pretty spectacular, I’ll bet!

And yet, Francis doesn’t leave out the human element of nature’s praise, and reminds us that our voices are needed to make the song complete. Hearts, both tender with forgiveness and heavy with pain and sorrow, are called to praise God, and to cast all care on the One who cares for us.

Let all things their Creator bless…Alleluia!

...let's don't lie

Blest be the tie that binds our hearts in Christian love;

the fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above.

We share our mutual woes, our mutual burdens bear;

and often for each other flows the sympathizing tear.

---John Fawcett, 1782

“Hey! How are you?” “Fine! How are you?” “Fine!” “OK, good to see you!” “You, too!”

Have you had an exchange (or a thousand) just like this with friends, family, and other folks who love you? Are you always fine? Are they? ‘Cause, I’ve said the things. And, I wasn’t. Not even close. But I smiled, and I swallowed back truth and tears, and I lied.

And I snatched away from you, my sister or brother, the chance to be real with me in that moment. I kept it safe. And fake. And I diminished the chances that, when your life is going down in flames, and I ask you The Question, you will answer anything but “Fine! How are you?”

And that’s not the way this is all supposed to work. John Fawcett said it in the text of this hymn in the 1700’s. Bill Withers said it in 1972:

            Please swallow your pride if I have faith you need to borrow,

            for no one can fill those of your needs that you won’t let show.

            Lean on me when you’re not strong

            and I’ll be your friend, I’ll help you carry on;

            for it won’t be long till I’m gonna need

            somebody to lean on.

Speak now.

...straw against the chill

There within a stable, the baby drew a breath
There began a life that put an end to death.
And in the frozen stillness, a mighty voice is heard:
"God is here among you! Human is the Word!"
It was so long ago, but we remember still:
Star upon the snow, straw against the chill.
A planet dancing slow, a tree upon a hill,
Star upon the snow, straw against the chill.
---Bob Franke

Emmanuel. God with us. Here. Now. All the straw we'll ever need against all the chill we'll ever encounter.

...the dark light

We travelers, walking to the sun, can't see
Ahead, but looking back the very light
That blinded us shows us the way we came,
Along which blessings now appear, risen
As if from sightlessness to sight, and we,
By blessing brightly lit, keep going toward 
The blessed light that yet to us is dark.
---Wendell Berry, 1999

I was sun-blind. Could not see anything ahead, not road, nor obstacle, nor turn. Unsure of what step to take next, whether to step at all, paralyzed with the blind fear of it.

Then I looked back. Not a long look, a stare. Not a longing gaze, cast with an eye to return. Just a look. And that look made me sure again---it reassured me.

Even when light hid light from my clear view, I was being led, guided; a path was being made. So, though I did not see, I stepped into the light.

It had led me before.

...renewed for glory

You come, O Lord, with gladness, in mercy and goodwill,
 to bring an end to sadness and bid our fears be still.
In patient expectation we live for that great day
when your renewed creation your glory shall display.
---Paul Gerhardt, 1653

We are used, I think, to the idea of waiting on God to reveal Godself in the world. The thought of that kind of waiting is like slipping on a pair of old, comfortable blue jeans---worn smooth, weathered and stressed in the very spots that your body bends and stretches, faded and sun-bleached. Reassuring, comforting---no surprises with this pair of jeans. Waiting on God is what we are used to.

What if we found out, all this time, we should have been waiting for something else? Not as in something different, but something in addition to? What if, maybe, God has had something else in mind for the revealing?

What if God's glory is to be revealed, not just to us...but in us? 

What if, while we have been waiting on God, God has been...waiting...on us?

What if we are being renewed for the express purpose of revealing the glory of God in our world?

...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?

...pass-along glory

Arise, your light is come! The Spirit’s call obey;

show forth the glory of your God, which shines on you today.

Arise, your light is come! Fling wide the prison door;

proclaim the captive’s liberty, good tidings to the poor.

---Ruth Duck, 1974

We are so used to hearing the themes of Advent and Christmastide that they ring almost common in our ears, feel a bit bland rolling off our tongues…Light! Glory! Good tidings! When I stop and think about these things, they make me glad --- I need some good tidings, and some light, and a little glory to shine down on me! Yay, me!

Then hymnist Ruth Duck uses the prophet’s message from Isaiah to call my attention back to intention. Yes, some of that God-glory falls on me...but not to soak up and store. That glory, that light, those are pass-along gifts from a God who has called us as co-laborers in the life-work of lifting, reviving, nurturing, and restoring. These gifts? They were never meant for me, for us, to get and keep. This glory, this light, has always been destined for community.

And those, my friends, are mighty good tidings.

...with the dawn

Being walkers with the dawn and morning,
Walkers with the sun and morning,
We are not afraid of night,
Nor days of gloom,
Nor darkness---
Being walkers with the sun and morning.
---Langston Hughes

The easiest person to be is yourself. The most comfortable skin to live in is your own. The easiest nature to seek out is your true nature. Being who we are should not be tough; it should be---well, second nature. 

In Langston Hughes' minimalist masterpiece Walkers with the Dawn, the American 20th-century poet emphasized the embrace of one's true nature. Because Hughes' people are dawn walkers, because they walk with the sun, they do not fear the night, nor dark days, nor clouded times. It is not because those times of darkness, or shadow, or unseeing, are not real---or really daunting.

But dawn walkers have it in their nature to know that light is there---behind the gloom, or after it. The nature of Hughes' people was to seek the sun. This was no extraordinary feat---it was in their nature.

As children of God, our nature is to be people of hope. By walking in hope we do not deny the tough times, or refuse to take a path that leads through them. But our nature is to abide in the hope, not the shadow. It is who we are.

...you've gotta be kidding me

Christians all, your Lord is coming, hope for peace is now at hand.
Let there be no hesitation, walk in faith where life demands.
Bear the word that God has given; share the birth that stirs your soul.
Alleluia! Alleluia! Christ will come and make you whole.
---Jim Miller, 1993

Prepare the way of the Lord. Wait...prepare the way of the Lord? It's struggle enough some days to prepare dinner tonight, or to prepare the presentation for the staff meeting tomorrow, or to prepare to hear the lab results from that medical exam you took last week. But to prepare the way of the Lord? What does that even mean, really, and how in this world are we supposed to prepare for something we haven't experienced and don't really understand?

Prepare? You've gotta be kidding me.

But wait a minute. I can hope for peace: real hope---the kind that puts feet to wishes, and real peace---the kind that surpasses the absence of discord to become wholeness and wellness lived out in whole and well community. And I can listen for the call of life on my life: what is it that calls out my gifts and passions, and who is it that needs the time and efforts I'm capable of? I can share my story with people who want to hear---a love story still in the making of brokenness and healing and pain and joy, and how the God whose best name is Love whispers keeping-on words to me, enough to share.

I can do these things; and you can, too. And in the doing, we may just find we are visited by God born in us, among us, like us. And in the doing, and in the visiting, we may be made whole.

It's a baby. And we prepared the way of the Lord.

...all I want

O come, Desire of nations, 
bind all peoples in one heart and mind;
bid envy, strife, and quarrels cease;
fill all the world with heaven's peace.
Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!
---Latin hymn, c. 1710

Desire. As I word-process these words, Mariah Carey's voice is singing to me out of my iPad Pandora channel: "Make my wish come true...all I want for Christmas is you." The scuttlebutt on Facebook is that DietPepsi drinkers really, really, really want their aspartame back. In 1946, Don Gardner just wanted teeth---at least, that's what his holiday hit, "All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth" said! All Steve Martin wanted in The Jerk was "this ashtray, the remote control, the paddle game, this magazine, and the chair." And if you watch the ads around holiday time, folks really want vacuums (watch as the vacuum commercials magically disappear into a 10-month black hole on Dec. 26!). Surely this can't mean no one vacuums except between Thanksgiving and Christmas (I mean, no one but me)?

Imagine, though, what God's desire for God's own creation might be, what God's intent for this humanity (created in God's own image) might be. Imagine one people. Imagine working together to solve humanity's issues with the good of the littlest, the lost, and the least in mind. Imagine setting envy aside; moving beyond grasping at resources like shoppers in the flat screen aisle at a Black Friday sale; giving up our right to hold grudges.

Imagine that world. And then put on your work gloves---there are walls to tear down, and bridges to build. Because God is not a stand-around-and-watch-it-happen kind of God. God is a grab-a-hammer-there-are-plenty-of-nails kind of God. And I want in on building that world.

O come, Desire of nations, 
bind all peoples in one heart and mind.

...on the way

People, look east, the time is near
of the crowning of the year.
Make your house fair as you able,
trim the hearth and set the table.
People, look east and sing today:
Love, the Guest, is on the way.
---Eleanor Farjeon, 1928

I know about some of the Christmas decorations out there. I've driven around. And I've cruised around FB too, and Buzzfeed. I've seen Santas, and snowmen, and nativity scenes (sometimes all in one yard). I've seen white lights, multi-colored lights, twinkle lights, chaser lights, net lights, all orange and blue lights (here in Auburn Tiger territory, not an uncommon sight).

I've seen tasteful and tacky, with a few stops in-between.

There is something in us, a good number of us anyway, that pokes and prods at us to pull out a Christmas sweater (or ten) for our house this time of year. Is it because we're happy? to make us happy? to convince other people we're happy? a bit of a combination of everything I've thought of, and more?

In this lovely poem from Eleanor Farjeon, we are reminded that we are preparing for the arrival of a special Guest, with all the 'trimming' that might bring. When we invite Love in to stay, what kind of decorating might we do to our hearts? How would we set the table of our lives to welcome Love? What would we do to prepare a place for this most important Guest?

People, look east, the time is near...

...shrugging off God-ness

For he is our childhood’s pattern;

day by day on earth he grew;

He was tempted, scorned, rejected,

tears and smiles like us he knew.

Thus he feels for all our sadness,

And he shares in all our gladness.

---Cecil F. Alexander, 1848

“You don’t know how I feel!” “Nobody remembers what it feels like to be my age!” “You have no idea what I’m going through!” Now, whether you are a child or a teen, a young adult just starting out on your own or an elder dealing with the autumn of life, chances are you have felt (if not voiced) these very sentiments. I know I have. There is no emotion so isolating as what this hymn refers to as ‘sadness’; the feeling that others don’t know what you are experiencing is one that builds walls between people, making it even more unlikely that anyone will connect with you. Here’s the thing, though. God knows. Jesus has been there.

The miracle of the incarnation, ‘becoming flesh’, is that part of becoming flesh means being human --- with the aches and pains, the tears and fears, the insecurities and lonelinesses. To shrug off God-ness for a time, Jesus took on skin, and everything that fit inside it --- the jumbled mass of feelings and aspirations that make us real. For this, Jesus walked out of heaven and into Bethlehem.

Our pattern, our goal, in humanity, incarnate. The Christ Child.

...that kind of dawn

Light dawns on a weary world when eyes 
begin to see all people's dignity.
Light dawns on a weary world: 
the promised day of justice comes.
The trees shall clap their hands; the dry lands, gush with springs;
the hills and mountains shall break forth with singing!
We shall go out in joy, and be led forth in peace,
as all the world in wonder echoes 'shalom'.
---Mary Louise Bringle, 2001

What would true justice look like? Would it be absolute fairness? A chance for everyone, then everyone for himself? Mel Bringle envisions justice as a condition by which we truly see each other, and thus see the intrinsic value in the other; we view each other with dignity.

Our world's response to the dawning of the day of justice in our world, weary for it, thirsty for it? Isaiah suggests we might witness the natural world break the bounds of possible and become animated with joy---forests and mountains clapping and singing out of their own accord, lending voice to God's own joy over humankind gone mad with value and esteem.

And we ourselves? The prophet says joy will overcome us, too---that our steps will lead us out in joy and peace. I don't know about you, but I imagine I'd walk a little differently on this earth each day if my steps were ordered by joy and peace. Can you feel the rhythm of that gait in your body, in your soul, right now?

Are you smiling? I know I am; I just can't help it. It is no surprise to me that the world shares the wonder at the 'shalom' (literally, the wholeness found in community) that we find together.

That's the kind of dawn I'd get up early for...

...a whole lot of light

Heavy clouds that block the moonlight now begin to drift away.
Diamond brilliance through the darkness shines the hope of coming day.
Christ, the morning star of splendor, gleams within a world grown dim. 
Heaven's ember fans to fullness; hearts grow warm to welcome him.
---Mary Louise Bringle, 2005

Waiting is so hard. The smallest sign can be enough to keep you hanging on.

When you are sitting in the dark, even a tiny glow looks like a whole lot of light. Day is breaking...can you feel it?

We wait with expectation for the dawning of light in our world.

...and nothing else

Many the gifts, many the people,
many the hearts that yearn to belong.
Let us be servants to one another,
making your kingdom come.
Christ, be our light! 
Shine in our hearts. Shine through the darkness.
Christ, be our light!
Shine in your church gathered today!
---Bernadette Farrell, 1993

The title of the 1979 memoir I'm Dancing as Fast as I Can always makes me think of that moment when someone has given 100 percent. "You take it from here, pardner," I hear them say, "I'm out." Or, <mic drop>...done. Elvis has left the building.

And I sometimes wonder if Jesus ever felt a bit of the pull of that tension---his time ticking away, knowing he'd need to count on his rag-tag band of followers to spread the word (that love was the way), knowing he was the Sun, but he'd be having to count on the Moon to reflect the shine in the world before too long. I wonder if Jesus felt like he was dancing as fast as he could.

The church lives in that tension too---never more so than here in the Advent season, when we await the great Already/NotYet: the shining of Light into our shadowy corners, the coming of Christ into our longing world. This verse of the modern folk hymn Christ, Be Our Light by Bernadette Farrell speaks to the divergence, and richness, of what we know, and acknowledge, and embrace. While we yearn for Christ to be our light in this world, to dawn on us, we yoke ourselves with Christ the Sun. As the church, we are the body of Christ in the world, reflecting light like the moon reflects the sun's.

If Christ is to shine in the shadowed corners, it will be through the light reflected by Christ's body, the church. It will be because we served one another. It will be because we welcomed each other. It will be because we nurtured and developed the gifts each brought to share.

If Christ is to shine in our world today, it will be because the church is devoted to the work of building the reign of Love, and nothing else.

...you say yes

No payment was promised, no promises made;
no wedding was dated, no blueprint displayed.
Yet Mary, consenting to what none could guess,
replied with conviction, "Tell God I say, Yes."
---John L. Bell, 1992

Let's make a deal! Well...not a deal, really. I need this, well, this favor. It's pretty huge. And there is no way I can put into human terms what the costs and rewards might end up being for you. I can tell you, though...amazing...and heartbreaking...and world-changing...and earthshaking. 

No person could be faulted for pushing away from the table with a deal like that on it. Too vague, too open-ended, too many possible downsides. Besides, your life is falling into place, your ducks are all in a row, you may not be Junior League just yet but it could happen.

But you say yes. Yes to...what, exactly? To uncertainty (that starts the moment you show up at your engagement party pregnant)...to heartache (there is Simeon in the temple, whispering something to you about a sword piercing your heart, too?)...to fear (now you flee under cover of night into Egypt, a bounty on the life of your baby boy).

But you also say yes...to joy...and to hope. And because you say "Yes," the rest of us get the chance to say yes.

We say yes to love.

...again, for the first time

Can I, will I forget how Love was born
and  burned its way into my heart: 
unasked, unforced, unearned:
to die, to live, and not alone for me.
---Jaroslav J. Vajda, 1986

I'm guilty. Every once in a while, when I hear a certain story start up, the tale winding out of a certain mouth, I'll think, "Not again. How many times do I have to sit through this same old tired yarn?" Folks may say, "Stop me if you've heard this..." but they don't really mean it. People like telling their stories, and as a culture we may be gradually returning to finding value in the stories of everyday people. Programs such as StoryCorps, and radio shows/podcasts like The Moth and Talking History promote the valuing and sharing of oral history and story as both cultural record and art form. And of course, not so many centuries ago, stories were the way cultural histories and beliefs were passed from generation to generation.

Do we ever have that been there, done that thought about the stories of our faith? "Nah, I've heard that 'Baby in a manger' story before; just gonna skip the service this Christmas." "Ehh, I know how that Jesus story turns out; no need to show up for Good Friday and Easter." Well, strictly speaking, we do know how those stories go --- we've heard them plenty of times. And we may, once in a while, even have a 'not again' feeling about those stories. We could say them in our sleep. We could set them to rhyme. We could draw pictures of them. We could sing songs about them. Chances are, we may have done some of that.

Here's the thing, though.

This Love? This new-born Love that seeps into our souls without us having to quest for it, to earn it, to wrest it away from anyone else? We will forget. 

We will forget. 

And so, we go to church, and we listen to the stories, again, for the first time. And the story is new. And it is old. And we will remember. And we will forget.

We will forget.

And we will listen again. Because in the repeating, we are made new. Every single time.

...the weary road

And ye, beneath life's crushing load,
whose forms are bending low,
who toil along the climbing way
with painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours
come swiftly on the wing.
O rest beside the weary road,
and hear the angels sing!
---Edmund H. Sears, 1849

Are you on the weary road? Not yet? Almost? Running parallel, and hoping to avoid the cross street that will carry you there? I don't mind telling you, I've been there---sometimes through no fault of my own, life's roadmap having directed me there through circumstance or happenstance, and me none the wiser. Sometimes, that destination was the fault of my own internal GPS, sending me down roads for which I was ill-equipped, weighed down with too much freight, exceeding the maximum passenger limit, barreling down some highway to God-knows-where, God-knows-why, because I have long ago forgotten the where and why. I'm weary, and that's what I know.

Right about then---right about now---angel song would sure sound nice. Right about then---right about now---I could lay down my burdens, and stretch my aching muscles, tense from constant alertness for that next thing coming to ambush my perfectly good day. Right about then---right about now---pulling over onto the shoulder of that weary road, and wrapping a blanket around me, climbing onto the hood of the car and leaning against the smooth windshield would feel pretty fine. Right about then---right about now---bathing in the starfall of a zillion messengers with heart-burstingly good news of real peace feels like all the heaven I need.

Right about then---right about now---glad and golden hours. Thanks be.

...who we are together

Every valley will be lifted up,
every mountain and hill eased low;
And the crooked path will lie straight,
and the rough patches smooth as glass:
And everywhere around will be evidence of 
the Lord,
And all of us will see it, the human family,
all of us together:
The Lord has always intended it be so.
---Isaiah 40:4-5 (para. laca)

Together. What a powerful word. Christianity is bound up, much of it, in individualism; making a personal profession of faith, choosing a private walk with Christ, developing an intimate relationship with God independent of any hierarchical relationship.

But there is a lot of together in faith. In this prophetic, forward-looking passage from Isaiah, the poet/seer yearns for the day when every geography is, well, flat. And if you are like me, and you are a mountain person, you are thinking, "Boooorrrrrrinnnnng. Who wants a world where everything is flat?" Which may be true. For the able -bodied. For the unencumbered. For the light traveler, not toting burdens, or children, or elderly parents. For the rested, not bent with sorrow or weariness.

But, for us all to gather around and witness the evidence that the Lord, Love, is here among us, we all have to be able to gather. The ground must be level and smooth, and the path must be straight, for us all to approach the glory of God. For us all to be witnesses, we first have to be here. Together. 

In this life, in God's household, if we don't approach together, we don't approach at all.

And all flesh shall see it together. (King James Version)

#ubuntu. I am who I am because of who we are together.

...that road trip, though

Holy Jesus, every day keep us in the narrow way;

and when earthly things are past, bring our ransomed souls at last

where they need no star to guide, where no clouds Thy glory hide.

---William C. Dix, 1861

Have you ever been on that road trip? The one where, because nobody is exactly sure where you are going, everybody is sure where you are going? The one where arguments follow every wrong turn (and every right, or left, one, for that matter)? The one where, for the life of you, you can’t remember what was so good about wherever it was you were going that you had to get in this car full of clowns and drive there? The one where the only thing you had running through your head was Tracy Chapman singing ‘Give Me One Reason to Stay Here (and I’ll Turn Right Back Around)’? Good trip gone bad, baby.

Now, imagine that trip---but with no clear destination, and only a vaguely-formed purpose in mind. Oh. And maybe the journey will take TWO YEARS. Or not. You’re on a need-to-know basis with the unfolding story, and apparently you don’t #needtoknow all that much. The things you know? Track the movements of a strange celestial happening, and follow that star. And find a King. No, not your king (that would be so easy---what do you think this is? Hide and seek?)…the King of a religious group in a Roman-occupied territory over there in that general vicinity. Oh. Now things become clear. #eyeroll But patience is a virtue, and the astronomers have plenty of time to work on their virtue as they follow.

You and I, though---how would we do with a challenge that nebulous, directions that vague, an objective sketched out in shifting sand instead of concrete? Would we follow, gifts at the ready--- staking our reputations, our futures, our hopes on a promise we traced on a map of the sky?

Would we gamble on a God who gambles on us, buying our souls from the meaninglessness of living without the star?

…and when earthly things are past, bring our ransomed souls at last

where no one needs a GPS, the path to show, the way to bless.

...before I believe

Where shepherds lately knelt and kept the angel's word,
I come in half-belief, a pilgrim strangely stirred.
but there is room and welcome there for me,
...and not alone for me.
---Jaroslav J. Vajda, 1986

Welcome. Welcome for me, stumbling in with no clue, and even less right. Not even sure why I'm here sometimes, not sure what draws me, who draws me, to this quiet scene. There is a diffuse light, and the damp warmth of night-calm animals. The babe makes the tiniest sounds...almost no sound at all. I remember a time when those newborn cries sounded louder than thunder. His mother comforts him; and it is easy, in that moment, to feel that everything in the babe's life will be charmed, that the star over the stable is a kind of sign, a blessing.

I know, of course. No one's life is lived under a blessing star. This baby won't be any different---will he? Because there is something...something...that pulls me to him. It isn't the charm of the star, or the comfort of the mother, though they hold their own appeal.

I need to believe there is room for me. Even before I believe.

...hush

Let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with fear and trembling stand;
ponder nothing earthly-minded, for with blessing in his hand,
Christ our God to earth descendeth, our full homage to demand.
---Liturgy of St. James, 5th cent.

Hush.

I'm afraid I often miss it. As a sometime musician, and a sometime wordsmith, I am a two-time loser in the silence department. Keep silence? I would sooner walk on my hands all day (and that, friends, is not happening). Most of the time, I see silence as a vacuum to be filled, an invitation to respond to, a note passed in fifth grade with a place to check 'yes' or 'no'. 

And even in, or especially in, worship, my response to perceiving the presence of God---vast as universe, close as breath---is sound and motion. Say something, do something---THERE IS GOD!
Like the Psalmist, I want to sing a new song---a loud one, a better one, a prettier one---to the Lord. Like David, I want to rip off my cloak and lose myself in a dance of such abandon that my soul will finally be revealed...<sigh>...to the one who created my soul and inhabits it still. Like Peter, I want to spring into action, gathering up sticks and building the hut to end all huts, so that, forevermore, #wecanallhangoutandthisfeelingwillneverchangebecauseJesusyouarethesparkliest.

When sometimes, the perfection, the completeness, the wholeness of worship might be bound up in silence. In stillness. In breatheinbreatheout. In wait. 

But. That's not my spiritual gift.

Hush.

...when the world turns

Though the nations rage from age to age,
we remember who holds us fast:
God's mercy must deliver us 
from the conqueror's crushing grasp.
This saving word that our forebears heard
is the promise which holds us bound,
till the spear and rod can be crushed by God,
who is turning the world around.
My heart shall sing of the day you bring.
Let the fires of your justice burn.
Wipe away all tears, for the dawn draws near,
and the world is about to turn.
---Rory Cooney, 1990

God's unearned pardon reigns down 
on those who make awe their breathe-in, breathe-out.
God's strength is exercised in a surprising way;
the proud find themselves alone with their 
hollow, shallow concerns.
God has emptied out boardrooms and 
stripped off power suits all over,
and raised up those who never grasped at greatness;
God pulls out a chair at the feast for the left-outs,
and the A-list are turned away at the door, 
shaking their heads in disgust.
God doesn't forget God's fundamental nature;
mercy, and the merciful, are at the very heart of God.
---Luke 1:50-55 (para. laca)

Power and might are not what they seem. Sometimes they are rather well-disguised. But look out. We may all be surprised by what strength looks like.

When the world turns.

...release God

There's a wideness in God's mercy like the wideness of the sea;
there's a kindness to God's justice which is more than liberty.
...
But we make God's love too narrow by false limits of our own;
and we magnify God's strictness with a zeal he will not own.
...
For the love of God is broader than the measure of our mind;
and the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind.
...
---Frederick W. Faber, 1854

What fools we are, to create God in our own petty little image, and then to submit ourselves, and each other, to this little-god's judgement and condemnation. When --- oh, God --- the world would expand to neverending-ness right away if we trusted that God was always more.

Always more. 

Always more love.

Always more kindness.

Always more acceptance.

Always more forgiveness.

If we would release God from the chains of being made in our brokedown image...and step into the blazing reality of, ourselves, being created in God's image. Imagine what we might become, what we might already be.

Always more.

Always more.

...light me up

Jyothi dho Prabhu.

(Give us light, O Lord.)

---bhajan, northern India

Give it to me, baby. 

Give me all your 4's (Go fish).  

Give me patience, and I want it right now.

Give me all your money, and nobody gets hurt.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.

Gimme.

We love the word. We use it early and often. To be fair, sometimes we are doing the giving, and that is a really good thing. But in this prayer from northern India, the pray-ers are asking---Give us light. We want it. What you have, Lord. Light of the world. Light for all time, or just the light that might get us through this present darkness. We yearn for that light, beg hungrily for it during our shadow seasons. And we maybe don't care if we sound grabby and greedy when we do the pleading. Our gimmes are that overpowering, and the dark is that, well, dark-ish.

Yet here's the thing. The prayer for light---Give it to us, Jesus---turns out to be not so selfish after all. Because the gift of light is sort of like Oprah's big car giveaway. Just one person can't get the light. Nah, light doesn't work that way. See, if you are sitting beside me? and you get light? guess what? That same light lights me up, too! And I can hear Oprah exclaiming, "YOU get a light! and YOU get a light! and YOU get a light!"

Because when light shines in this life, it lights up the whole place. That's the way light is. It's a gimme. 

Thank God.

...do you believe something?

O come to us; abide with us,
our Lord Emmanuel.
---Phillips Brooks, 1868

"I don't believe in anything. Do you believe something, Ms. Armstrong?" The teenage question was casual, almost throw-away; but there was already a life's worth of pain and betrayal in the carefully-controlled voice, the meaning of life bound up in the few words. I knew my answer had to be truth. And it had to be clear. Oh, and it had to be right then. Because life happens, well, at the speed of life. And I knew she'd already heard plenty of sermons. And lectures. And object lessons.

And she did not believe. Not one thing. 

And while I gathered up the pieces of my heart from where they'd fallen as it shattered, once again, at a broken world that does this to its kids, I slowed my breathing, and gathered my racing thoughts, and stilled my heart, and breathed a prayer. Wisdom, I prayed. Courage, I pleaded. Hope, I begged. Love, love, love, past pain, past failure, past bleak unbelief. And in I plunged.

"I do believe. Not in a God who micromanages the world and every little thing that goes on in it. I have seen too much hurt and pain in this world to believe that way about God. I can't be down with God pulling all the strings behind a world like this. But I do believe. I believe so much in a God that walks this life beside us, hurting with us when we hurt, and celebrating with us when we celebrate. This is the life with God I have experienced, and I can tell you I believe it."

"Well, I know you're right about the world, Ms. Armstrong."

God help us, I'm right about the world. God willing, I'm right about walking together. Here in this holy season, we anticipate the arrival of a God whose name is Emmanuel, 'God with us'. Not some God-up-there, or God-that-was, or God-with-a-carrot-and-a-stick. But God-here laughing at an inside joke,  God-here weeping at the pain of a hurting world, God-here when the path is the most difficult to discern. God-here God-now. Close as breath. Abiding. Emmanuel.

I believe.

...and now we wait

Match the present to the promise, Christ will come again.

Make this hope your guiding premise, Christ will come again.

Pattern all your calculating and the world you are creating

to the advent you are waiting: Christ will come again.

---Thomas H. Troeger, 1985

Wait. WAIT! Wait. There are so many different ways to say one simple word, so many colors and nuances to it. We wait --- in line. on hold. for that check in the mail. till hell freezes over. for that second chance, and the break that will make it ok. to be older. to be old enough. for time to heal all wounds (or wound all heels). till your father gets home.

And even Tom Petty knows, the waiting is the hardest part. All that standing still, and not doing anything, all the stasis and buzz of inactivity. All of the un-. So this Advent –time of waiting can seem pretty…well, pretty un-. Sitting around waiting for…for…God knows what, really. A baby born in a manger? A king, arriving all stealthy and incognito and un-kinglike? A household of God’s own making, realized in Heaven but reachable on earth? The Kingdom come?

But what if there is another way to wait? What if waiting on God’s household to come is the most active thing we can do? What if this waiting is full of dreaming, and planning, and co-creating along with the God who never really stopped in the first place? What if we play a part in ushering in that kingdom characterized by hope, peace, joy, love? What if this Advent waiting is anything but un-?

Come, Lord Jesus. We wait on you.

...time will tell

We ourselves are God’s own field, fruit unto His praise to yield;

wheat and tares together sown unto joy or sorrows grown;

first the blade, and then the ear, then the full corn shall appear;

Lord of harvest, grant that we wholesome grain and pure may be.

---Henry Alford, 1844

It doesn’t look like corn. It looks like wide blade grass; St. Augustine, or maybe Johnson grass. Not like corn. Not at first. But wait. Just wait. Keep caring for the plant, watering, weeding, tending. And wait. It doesn’t look like corn at first. But time will tell.

Our own efforts at cultivating the Good News about God’s gift of abundant life may be like tending that corn. It may not seem like our efforts are yielding any results, in ourselves or in the world around us. Funny thing is, though, our task is to water, weed, tend, care. And wait. It may not look like a harvest at first. But time will tell.

...be still, my soul

Be still, my soul: The Lord is on your side.

Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain;

leave to your God to order and provide;

in every change God faithful will remain.

Be still, my soul: Your best, your heavenly friend

through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

---Katharina von Schlegel, 1752

There seem to be truths about life, truths that anyone who lives long enough will experience. Life is not always fair. Bad things happen to good (and bad) people. And the only constant in this life…is change. And while I have made my peace with life’s essential unfairness, and the fact that good and bad things happen to good and bad folks, change kicks me in the teeth like a schoolyard bully every time. Weird thing is, I resist change even when the situation I find myself in isn’t particularly ideal. Because, you know, change, OUCH. You may have a problem with one of the other of these great life truths.

And with truths like that, we need a friend in our corner. In this text from the mid-1700’s. we are reminded that God, our best friend, is on our side (your side, my side, all of our sides---but that’s another story for another day). Armed with this knowledge, we are empowered to tackle and solve some of life’s problems. And the others? Those river rapids rushing in the near distance? We are supported while wading through treacherous crossings, a strong arm firm around us lest we slip beneath the surface.

Be still, my soul…there is One beside you.

...being out there

O for a faith, a living faith, the faith that Christ imparts;

belief not locked in ancient creed, but flamed within the heart.

O for a fellowship of love, the love that welcomes all;

that helps the burdened with their load, and lifts them when they fall.

In gratitude for this, our church, a growing faith we claim.

We here resolve, for years to come, to serve in Jesus’ name.

---William R. Hornbuckle, 2007

Almost by definition, a living thing is one that is growing in some way---being changed from the inside out. A living thing is under construction, continually evolving, developing in ways both deep and wide from the nourishment being gathered from its environment. A nurturing, healthy, rich environment means strong, consistent growth---a healthy living thing.

This kind of growth marks a living faith, too; and the church is a natural and wonderful environment for nurturing the kind of development that marks lifelong growth. And the life-affirming thing about the church is that its role in growth doesn’t end with the nurture of personal faith! Because personal faith is not an end in itself, and the church should rightfully be woven into the fabric of not only personal growth, but the very life of the community.

We are strengthened and raised up in a living faith for the express purpose of pouring ourselves into the life of the world around us, with its hurts, and poverties, and divisions, and griefs. We are called to live our faith in the world, among our neighbors, being out there what we’ve learned of Christ in here. Our living calls us, compels us, to be there, in the world.

We have two hands, after all. One to hang on…and one to reach out.

...the table for everyday saints

Here we nurture and encourage as we share this common meal,

While we foster deep communion and our inner selves reveal.

---Larry E. Schultz, 2004

The starting blocks. The finish line. The beginning and the end. In the life of faith, communion serves both as birthing moment and gathering-in, as jumping-off and destination.

When our faith is new, and we are building our muscles of believing and living the life of love to which we have been called, the table provides communal strength and model for our growth. The saints with whom we share the love feast are there to hold our hands during our first tentative steps, to dust us off and brush away our tears after our falls and false starts. As our faith matures, as hopefully it will, we combine drawing strength from the communion of saints with offering our own to those who walk beside and  follow after us --- encouraging, guiding, offering grace, nurturing growth --- always finishing the course where it began, at the table of love.

For this table, for this feast, to nourish us as it could, for its communion to be true and deep, each place must be set as a safe place for the nakedness of honesty to rest, a place where we dare to reveal who we really are to each other. Where we seek to know each other in all our complexity. We must trust each other that much around the table…and being known, and knowing, must matter that much.

That table, everyday saints. Start to finish. Your place is saved. Come home.

...on reckless giving

Take whatever I can offer --- gifts that I have yet to find,

Skills that I am slow to sharpen, talents of the hand and mind,

Things made beautiful for others in the place where I must be;

Take my gifts and let me love you, God who first of all loved me.

---Shirley Erena Murray, 1992

Offering. Giving. $$$. If we are honest, many of us equate “giving” and “offering” with dollars. And there is no doubt about it --- the challenges of the world need your dollars, and mine. But what intangibles do you command that could make this world a better place? What of your own essence can you offer to God?

Is there a skill you can offer? Some expertise you can bring to a situation? What talent could you bring? Could you make the world a more beautiful place with your art, your music? Could you give voice to those without? Shirley Erena Murray, a New Zealand hymnist, imagines offering gifts and skills still “in development” to God; gifts we are still discovering can be offered in trust to God. Can we be reckless in our giving to God, offering up still unformed parts of ourselves in the assurance that utility, even beauty, can be shaped from them? Do we trust God to honor our gifts offered in love?

God. Who first of all loved us.

...rock, paper, scissors, water

By our nurture, by our culture every life is shaped to grow,

fed by long tradition’s learning, formed by mentors as we go;

tune our ears to hear the gospel questioning accepted thought,

ready to respect each other, see the gifts that each has brought.

---Shirley Erena Murray, 2004

Rock, paper, scissors, shoot! If you are like me, you will remember this hand game from childhood. If you are a little less like me, you may remember it from earlier today! For those unfamiliar with it, the game is played using a hand sign each to represent rock, paper, and scissors, and two players face off with their hands out. After counting off three, each player ‘shoots’ one of the hand signs. According to a damage inventory, certain signs ‘beat’ other signs --- rock crushes scissors, scissors cut paper, paper covers rock. Best two out of three, of course, wins.

I have always felt that, if I played rock, paper, scissors, I would carry in a trump card, an unbeatable element against which none could stand. The longer I have owned my own home, and been responsible for the innumerable things that can go wrong there, the more sure I have become of my winning strategy. I would bring water to the game. Un. beatable. Boom. Because water dissolves paper into its pulpy components, and rusts the metal fabrication of scissors. And, given the time, water wears away stone to nothing. Not bragging or anything, but water wins every time.

So in our lives, who or what stands in the place of ‘water’ --- the steady, relentless, direction-shaping influence that ends up changing the complexion of our souls? Will culture do water’s work? Will we be eroded by our upbringing and family? Will mentors and learning shape us? Might, somehow, all of these waters flow together and chart their course across the core of us? Will these waters tune our ears and hearts to hear the radical message of the gospel, bathe away the hardness from us and expose the tenderness? What is water in your life?

Because, friends, water wins every time.

...let go of knowing

Green pastures are before me, which yet I have not seen;

bright skies will soon be o’er me, where the dark clouds have been:

my life I cannot measure, the path of life is free;

my Savior has my treasure, and he will walk with me.

---Anna L. Waring, 1850

The not knowing. Is there a more helpless feeling than not seeing the path that lies ahead of you, not being certain of what the future holds for you? How are we to plan, to plot our course, to steel ourselves against the possibility of future injury or harm without the knowing?

Let go. Let go of knowing. Let go the stress of needing to be in control of a future that was never yours to begin with. Trust that your pathway will wind its way through green pastures, under bright skies. Trust that the Savior holds what is truly treasure for your life.

And know this one thing: the steps you take, wherever your path leads, are walked beside your Savior. Every step, in shadow or sun, through green pasture or shadowed wood---never alone.

...in the gap

Stand for truth and cry for justice, share with those who don’t belong,

And remember as you serve them, sing for those who have no song.

Sing a joyful alleluia, praising God in all you do,

And remember as you witness, God is singing over you!

---Wesley Forbis, 2000

This fall our First Bells are learning a handbell setting of the American folk hymn ‘Jesus Walked This Lonesome Valley’. I love the arrangement, and I love the bluesy folk tune. I even love the poignancy of thinking of Jesus turning his face toward Jerusalem, alone among his circle of friends and followers in understanding what lay ahead for him. But I am, perhaps, just as content not to sing the hymn, and to play it instead; for the second verse begins, “We must walk this lonesome valley, we have to walk it by ourselves….” And friends, I am not sure that is the calling we have received in Christ. Because, when we do it best, walking with Jesus is walking together with our brothers and sisters, sharing our joys and pains, our successes and failures, our tears and laughter, our burdens and strengths. When we do it best, we live life together.

This second verse of this relatively new hymn addresses the being there-ness of the Christian life: we stand up, we cry out, we share, all on behalf of those who, for whatever reason, cannot. And then a line lovely and true --- “…sing for those who have no song.” Even more than lending voice to the voiceless, this phrase brings to mind the Old Testament image of ‘standing in the gap’. When there was a breach, or gap, in the walls of a town, a defender would stand in the breach, defending those within at the spot where the wall was weakest. Leaders including Moses were known to have figuratively stood in the gap where God’s people were weakest, being strength for them in their time of need.

When we stand in the gap, when we sing for those who have no song, when we bear each other’s burdens --- then we live life together, and become Christ’s body, here, in this place. Alleluia.

...let me be?

Take My Life and Let It Be

Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to thee;

Take my hands and let them move at the impulse of thy love.

Take my love, my God, I pour at thy feet its treasure store;

Take myself and I will be ever, only, all for thee.

---Frances R. Havergal, 1874

Confession time, readers: most modern hymnals get this title right. But I grew up singing out of the white 1975 Baptist Hymnal, which told me the title of this hymn was, indeed, not “Take My Life and Let It Be Consecrated", but “Take My Life and Let It Be". Could two phrases be any more different? One asks of God, “Take the gift of this life and make of it something holy, dedicated to you in whatever it finds to do.” The other is the ultimate modern ‘gotcha’ statement: “Take my life…well, no, I need to borrow it back to accomplish these very important things for myself…ok, here you go, God…nope, need it back, good times to enjoy….ok, all yours now….well, take my life, but LET ME BE is what I really mean.”

Are you ready to pour the treasure store of your love, your very life, at the feet of God? Do you want God to let your life be consecrated, or just to let you be?

...held like Jesus

Water Deep and Life Made Whole

tune: O WALY WALY

As John baptized the crowds that day,

Made straight the path, prepared the way,

Jesus approached the water’s edge

To seek God’s will, to make his pledge.

I’ll follow Jesus through the flow

Of water deep and life made whole,

Blessed knowing I’m held from above,

Like Jesus was, in God’s great love.

When Jesus stepped into the tide,

All other yearnings swept aside,

With singleness of heart and mind

He turned his life toward humankind.

I’ll follow Jesus through the flow

Of water deep and life made whole,

Blessed knowing I’m held from above,

Like Jesus was, in God’s great love.

And now we seek the water’s mark

To call to mind the Spirit’s spark

That kindled love’s warm glow within,

Remade as each new day begins.

I’ll follow Jesus through the flow

Of water deep and life made whole,

Blessed knowing I’m held from above,

Like Jesus was, in God’s great love.

...the space will be filled

Come away from rush and hurry to the stillness of God’s peace;

from our vain ambition’s worry, come to Christ to find release. 

Come away from noise and clamor, life’s demands and frenzied pace;

come to join the people gathered here to seek and find God’s grace.

---Marva Dawn, 1999

Horror vacui, “Nature abhors a vacuum”, was thought to have been postulated around 485 BC by Greek physicist-philosopher Parmenides. The theory, in my (very) laywoman’s terms, is that where nothing is, something will rush in to fill it up. Lots of things about physical science don’t make sense to me; this, I have no trouble with. Clear off the kitchen table…whoosh, two days later, the surface is covered with the flotsam and jetsam of daily life. Horror vacui, indeed.

I thought of this principle as I read Marva Dawn’s wonderful new hymn text. She addresses the call, tempting to us all at various times in our busy lives, to come away, to retreat, to leave behind. And the things she names as ‘retreat-worthy’ are indeed the things that wear us down and use us up. But our lives don’t need to be left vacant, empty spaces void of substance or meaning when we retreat from the stressors of everyday.

Dawn suggests that when we come away from rush and hurry we come toward the stillness of peace. When we retreat from the idea that we change the world by worrying we move forward to release through trust in Christ. And when we draw back for a time from the lures of this world, with its clamor, frenzy, and unending demands, we can step into the gathered family of faith, seeking grace in each other’s company and God’s presence.

Nature abhors a vacuum. So when we step away from what binds us, let us lean toward the fullness of faith.

...glory to glory

Finish then thy new creation, pure and spotless let us be;

Let us see thy great salvation perfectly restored in thee:

Changed from glory into glory, till in heaven we take our place,

Till we cast our crowns before thee, lost in wonder, love, and praise.

---Charles Wesley, 1747

Restored and finished. Charles Wesley, in the mid-1700’s, used these words to envision the fulfillment of God’s dream for humanity. With a love that surpasses any other concept of love, God continues to “create” us, to draw us toward purity, rendering out anything that blurs our essential essence. This verse is an encouragement to me, as I often feel God must not quite be done with me yet! With each new day, God’s love changes us, glory to glory, allowing each of us to become more of who we were always meant to be. What a God we worship, Whose creation is not limited to a one-time act, but happens over and over to create and re-create us as whole, complex, and complete!

It’s enough to lose ourselves in wonder, love, and praise….