Engaging Grace

2012-02-20T14:19:00.002-04:00

Today's grace came to me from a devotional reading:
from: "My Personal Daily Prayer Book", Christine Dallman, Margaret Huffman
2009 Publications International, Ltd.

Administering the healing power of love to defeat the destructive power of hatred;
wielding the freedom of truth to do battle against the bondage of lies;
ambushing the fear of death with the hope of life.
As the fight of faith goes on all around us, may we find ourselves fighting for love, truth, and life.

Grace seems to take so long. We pray to not loss hope before grace comes in its fullest.

2012-02-16T11:05:00.000-04:00

www2.elca.org/peacenotwalls/wall/forbidden.html

Conferences in February

2012-02-08T15:45:00.000-04:00

Every February, Lutheran clergy in Atlantic Canda, get together for a conference. For many of us it is the highlight -the grace- in the middle of a dull month. It allows us a few days to breathe between the end of Christmas and Annual Meetings, and the start of Lent and Easter.
It is a time of supporting each other, telling and listenng to each other's stories, planning for the future, and a time to worship and pray together.
I am grateful today for my colleagues who shared of themselves with me the past few days.
I was graced by them and the ministry of the Bishop and Assistant to the Bishop. We were all graced by the presence of Anglican brothers and sisters.
We were graced with conversation that allowed for honesty and a chance to dream big.
The Bishop's sermon today quoted Henri Nouwen - that joy is like a cat - it is not something we can try to grab because it will run the other way, but sometimes it rubs against our legs and ends up in our laps -these moments are grace. The conference was joy.

The Language of Music is Grace, as is Derek.

2012-01-25T09:20:00.000-04:00

the image: Fishing for people

2012-01-24T19:07:00.000-04:00

Epiphany 3B

Thurs. morning when I was out for a run, I ran past the sign outside St. Thomas Aquinas church. The sign said, “I will make you fishers of people”. Now I understood the message on the phrase, I knew what Gospel would be read this morning...but what about all the people in the cars, who read the sign while sitting at that intersection waiting for the lights to change. When they read, “I will make you fishers of people”, would they understand it? Think about it for a moment...what does that phrase mean if you do not relate it to the story of Jesus’ calling the disciples who were fishermen? What does it sound like if you do not know the story? I have spent a lot of time thinking about the image, fishers of people. And honestly I realized that I have never followed through the whole image.

Idyllic images may come to mind of the those fishing, sitting peacefully in lawn chairs along the river casting in their lines, watching the water flow by, floats bobbing gently, perhaps conversation, perhaps not, and in the end no real necessity to catch anything – if a fish is caught it would come for supper, but no pressure or expectation. A caught fish however, did bring bragging rights and a joy no matter the size. Perhaps the image that comes to mind is similar, two old gaffers in fishing vests and hats, out in a boat on a calm lake, enjoying each other’s company, being outside. ...but we are talking about catching fish, what about catching people?

When going fishing, one baits a sharp hook, tosses it in and tempts the fish to bite.

Does the church do this? Tempt people to come inside; tempt people to believe? Sure... free books are offered to those calling in to TV evangelists if they give their lives to Christ, Street Sunday schools offer trinkets for coming –more badges and awards if you bring friends along the next week, people are baited with coffee house church, “new” music, entertainment; some fish with a sharp hook spiked with the fear of death and hell fire, with a bait of knowing the way to avoid such an end.

Sometimes the fishing is by net, where the net is thrown wide and then reeled in: boxes being sent to children around the world at Christmas, stuffed with Christian pamphlets before being given out, homeless having to listen to a sermon before being fed, communities where the church demands local ma and pop shops to hire a certain number of their members or they will boycott their establishments, door to door evangelism...people are caught.

But then what? This is where the image “fishers of people” really falls apart or becomes scary. What happens to fish after they are caught? People have they are reeled in?

The area where I grew up was known for sports and leisure fishing. That meant lots of glossy pamphlets with big fish, happy faces, and beautiful water. What didn’t appear on the pamphlets was the –what next?

In contrast to this sunny picture was the reality of the catch, known by the locals predominately by the smell; there were lots of gutting stations along the waterways. You know, where fish were killed if not already dead, sliced and cleaned, later to be cooked and eaten. Yuck. And how does that translate to fishing for people?

Fishing is one thing...but this following Jesus thing is messy.

John the Baptist has been out in the Jordan River, casting a wide net, calling the people of the surrounding countryside to repentance, alluding to the One coming after...the One who guts and cleans. It’s messy business, although those washed in the waters of the Jordan have no idea. The first inkling of mess, John is imprisoned and for those who are watching carefully –the red and white float on the fishing lines bob –once caught, discipleship is going to be costly.

Jesus is proclaiming the Good News -the hook, the bait...but calls for repentance. For the disciples this means turning away from their livelihood. In weeks to come, the gutting process finds the disciples touching lepers, mingling with women and the unclean, coming into conflict with the religious leaders, shedding old ideas, forming new understandings. The cleaning sees them change just as Jesus is killed, they throw out nets of Good News, and as time passes most of them are imprisoned or martyred. Messy.

I’m not sure that those waiting in their cars for the light to change at the corner of Oxford and Jubilee –would want to know what “fishers of people” means. Most people swim, as best they can, away from mess. The message of Good News, the stories we have to share of Jesus, of the Messiah, of God’s kingdom coming near –although cased in supposedly idyllic images, is casting a message with shiny luring bait...but when unpact the images allude to mess: gutting, cleaning...and when lived out to the fullest, death.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer in The Cost of Discipleship says: “The first call which every Christian experiences is the call to abandon the attachments of this world. “ The disciples, Andrew, Simon, James and John abandon their jobs, families, and friends – they detach; and attach themselves to the Good News. In the story of Jonah, when released from the fish; detached from the fish, self-pity, unwillingness – Jonah attaches to God, God’s call, the prophetic message he was to carry to the Ninevehites.

The Word asks us this morning, from what do we need to detach? What from our lives are we to abandon? What are we to repent of?

What needs to be gutted and cleaned from our lives, from us, so that we can totally attach to the Good News?

This following Jesus thing: It’s messy and it is not for the weak of heart.

In a lectionary group discussion one person commented that, “Jesus was a catch and release fishermen! He catches people, and frees us from our sins”. Sure, not an inaccurate statement but, the idea of released to what end? That is not where Lutheran theology takes us. We are freed by grace, but grace has hooked us so deeply that we are released with Good News to share that grace with others –God’s suffering love; and that means abandoning that which is dear and being willing to walk a path to death, for the freedom of all. Have you been gutted and cleaned, -detached from the world, been attached to grace such that you can do no other than follow Jesus’ steps to death?

Another person in the same discussion suggested that preachers sometimes get too hung up on the one picture of fishing for people; then commented, of trying to imagine Jesus walking down the aisle of any church on a Sunday morning whispering into the ears of those present:

to the artist, "Follow me and I will teach you how to paint images of the kingdom of God";

to the nurse, "Follow me and I will teach you how to heal hearts";

to the farmer, "Follow me and I will teach you grow other disciples";

to the musician, "Follow me and I will teach you to sing the kingdom into hearts and minds."

As German theologian, Jurgen Moltmann, theologized that the kingdom of God was not about the kingdom in chronological time but to be understood as nearness, God’s kingdom has drawn near, in the idea of near and dear to one’s heart.
But all these images are not drawn out...painting vast visions means mess, carving up canvasses, offering new images, changing perspectives, shedding old understandings, opening oneself and ideas to critique...

Nurses practicing healing is messy –offering hope in places that seem hopeless, being exposed to viruses, putting one’s own health at risk to serve the other, watching and journeying with people dying...

Farming is messy –relying on uncontrollable forces to help grow crops, fighting bugs and weeds, watching some crops grow, some die...

...hard work, sweat, tears, passion, bringing God’s kingdom through one’s gifts, one’s vocation –whatever it may be...is messy.

Think back to the church sign at St. Thomas Aquinas – would it have accomplished any more for it to have read: We are about messy work! Or come join us and live in mess. Be gutted and cleaned to live detached from the world, attached to God.

It’s a Catch 22, isn’t it?

To encourage and invite others to follow, to share what is called “Good News” and experienced as such –yet it comes at a high price, with a sacrifice of self, even death. As Bonhoeffer said, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die”. We invite the world to come and die. That is a message of Good News, but one not easily accepted.

This is the thought you are left with today. Imagine a world where people choose to follow the invitation to come and die: where all of us here today seriously are gutted, cleaned, willing to die ...

envision how that would change the world.

Fishing in the new waters of the world, renewed, teeming with life, fresh, clean...Good News in every ripple and current...fish would simply jump into the nets –mess - death being seen as but a phase to usher in the kingdom of God!

2012-01-18T23:56:00.001-04:00

THE OVAL HAS CANCELLED THE SCHEDULED MORNING SKATE (8:30-9:30am)
Those who were going to come skating: I invite you to take time to have a coffee/tea and pause for prayer and reflection instead.

Frank Sinatra Let it snow

2012-01-10T18:17:00.000-04:00

This song reminds me of the grace of having someone with us who loves us, and loving someone in return. The images of the video remind me that although weather causes chaos and often a change in plans, sometimes being stuck at home is wonderful...and in the end, the light playing off snow, the silence and beauty of the snow falling on trees is pure grace. Gift.

It Came Upon the Midnight Clear .... and that Changes Everything!

2012-01-03T19:51:00.003-04:00

Epiphany B

“It Came Upon the Midnight Clear” was first published in the Christian Register, on December 29, 1849.

It is the first American Christmas carol and was written by the Rev. Edmund Hamilton Sears, who trained at Harvard and practiced as a Unitarian minister in Massachusetts.

It is one of the first hymn/carols to emphasize the social implications of the angels’ message –that of achieving peace on earth and good will to all – that is peace and good will toward our fellow humanity in the midst of social difficulty.

“It Came Upon the Midnight Clear” was written at a point in American history that was characterized by unrest –Americans were “beneath the crushing load”: there was escalating tension between the North and South erupting a decade later in the Civil War; New England was experiencing growing pains and social upheaval as a result of the local industrial revolution; and the frantic “forty-niner” gold rush to California was underway. This carol addresses this context– and it urges Americans in 1849 to slow down and listen once again to the singing of the angels.

The final stanza is the great verse of hopeful optimism, spoken through prophets and angels for centuries – a hope-filled image of God’s vision for creation, for humanity... the promised picture is beautiful...“the time foretold, when peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendours fling, and all the world give back the song, which now the angels sing.”

The Gospel reading that we read today is set a couple years after Jesus’ birth. The wise arrive from distant lands to pay homage to Jesus, bringing with them gifts fit for royalty. The land in which they arrive is rift with tension: the occupying Roman regime vs. the occupied Judeans –both with political hierarchies in which people are killing for power; there are separate laws, various religious ordinances; lobbying parties; zealots taking matters into their own hands; unsafe roads as the dispossessed turn to robbery; major centres are seeing and trading with strange peoples from outside their lands.

King Herod is scared of losing his position and the story continues from where we ended reading today, with Herod seeking to kill “this One” whom foreigners have deemed a King. Joseph takes Mary and Jesus and they flee to Egypt. Cue the music... ”And you, beneath the crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps; and slow”.

Fast forward from Jesus’ time, through 1849 America, to Jan.1^st, 2012.

“beneath the crushing load”...a statement that needs no further explanation as to how it accurately describes the present day. The Rev. Sears’ carol invites us: “look now...rest beside the weary road and hear the angels sing!”

Most of us did that very thing over Christmas in the singing of Christmas carols, in the coming and hearing the nativity story again. We entered into the mystery of God becoming incarnate –human –choosing to love in a new radical way. We revisited the simplicity of love and relationship through the story of the birth of a baby. Hope and joy was once again birthed into the world. Most of us get it...love...hope...joy...when it comes packaged in a baby, every baby. ...but in particular, this baby...God

“It Came upon the Midnight Clear”....and that changes everything.

My oldest once told me that I do the things I do because I am paid to do them. If I wasn’t a pastor I would speak, act, and live differently. I wouldn’t care so much for other people, animals, or the planet. I wouldn’t send time worrying, praying, helping, supporting, sewing, collecting, organizing, delivering, calling, writing, tithing...et cetera. You know, this is simply not true, and I was saddened - because my job hinders her from seeing and believing that the angels’ song, has changed everything: it has changed me.

Growing up, I remember seeing how the angels’ song affected by parents –it meant tithing although they made less than they would have on welfare; it meant going out of the way to help neighbours without payment; it meant recycling, reusing, repurposing; it meant significant attention to creation and resources; it meant not having what everyone else seemed to have; it meant talking respectfully and not about others in a negative way; it meant trips to church, concerts, art galleries, museums, parks, ancient relatives –places where one might hear, learn, or gain a new perspective; it meant praying and learning to read via the King James Bible; my dad wore bells on his boots to “make a joyful noise to the Lord”; the village ladies met from house to house for Bible Study; hours were spent volunteering in the community. ...but do you know how the angels’ song was most seen...it was lived in attitude; ...love...with immense and continual hope...and underlying both was a simple joy in being.

In Jan. 2012, “lo, the days are hastening on” –they’ve been hastened by prophets through the years, by those working for justice, by those who share love in a plethora of ways, by those who have paused to hear the angels and picked up their song of Good News.

The trouble is, it seems at times, that the hastening has slowed and in some places is close to stopping. Darkness seems to be growing, spreading, and poisoning. And the reality of this falls on our shoulders. Not only do we have to live in such a world, we, through baptism, have been commissioned to be the light that fights the spread of darkness. That means that the continuing of the song so that all will hear, all will learn to sing it, is our responsibility. At this change of year, when our minds turn to reflection and rethinking our actions for coming days, let us pause to reflect on those who in our own lives have sung the song, who have taught and lived the song –and then go and do likewise.

For 2012 be resolute in singing the angels’ song. Have a Good News attitude. Love....with immense and continual hope...encouraged by an underlying simple joy in being.

-----------for only then is there a chance that darkness will be dispelled and days will quickly hasten to “the time foretold, when peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendours fling, and all the world give back the song which now the angels sing.”

New Year's Eve

2011-12-31T16:38:00.000-04:00

It is the Eve of 2012: The weather is unpredictable, the children are antsy, the cats are having moments of crazy, the world is in chaos ...but there is hope growing...
my neighbour is playing opera outside in his greenhouse as he putters around the yard....content
going to enjoy a quiet night with friends...content
the Christmas tree is brightly twinkling and the faux-fire is crackling...content

Blessed New Year to all who read this. May it be full of hope and SON-shine.

ELCIC National Bishop's Christmas Call to Spiritual Renewal

2011-12-26T11:45:00.000-04:00

Gaudete (Sermon Dec.11 -Advent 3)

2011-12-17T10:09:00.001-04:00

There is a little girl who loves to wear pink dresses, shiny paten shoes, with a little purse and sparkly headband. You see her in a million different places, if you keep your eyes open. She wears a smile and is usually holding the hand of someone she loves –that is when she is not twirling around watching her skirt branch out like a bell. It is obvious that this little girl loves life, it oozes from her. Most when seeing her smile back, chuckle to themselves, or wish to have even a little piece of her joy. The little girl is Gaudete.

Gaudete is a Latin word that translates “to rejoice.” This third week in Advent has traditionally been named Gaudete Sunday – a day when in some places a pink candle is lit on the Advent Wreath; and priests are allowed to wear pink vestements. The name for today’s celebration was taken from the opening sentence in the Latin Mass which quoted from Philippians 4: “Gaudete in Domino semper” (“Rejoice in the Lord always”).

The colour of pink is to be an effective expression of the specific character of the mystery of faith we celebrate on this day. Today is a day to reflect on the mystery of JOY; joy which leads to rejoicing.

There was once a little girl named Gloria Winter, I don’t know if she wore pink and sparkly headbands but, I do know that from the age of 6 she took words and made them dance. Gloria was a Gaudete by nature, expressing her understanding of God and sacred word because she could not keep it inside. Rejoicing was her mainstay as she began to take piano lessons and put her words to simple music.

As she grew, she joined the Medical Mission Sisters, hoping to be trained as a doctor and to serve the poor around the world in this way. The sisters however sent Gloria, now Sr. Miriam Therese Winter, to study liturgy. She loved Gregorian chant and traditional forms of expressing praise to God, but times were changing in the church and she was called upon to speak the words of Scripture and liturgy –no longer in Latin, but in English –with modern poetry and song.

Miriam Therese recalls, "I tried to do what the chant had done, sing the themes of scripture, match the rhythmic pulse of the melody to the accent of the word. My own compositions, my scripture songs, were simply a response to God's word heard loud and clear through the lectionary readings and the prism of the liturgical season celebrated in community."

The songs took wings, they twirled around the world in the joyous rejoicing of communities, singing the words of scripture; the Good News; Gaudete in its fullest meaning.

There was once a youth who wore a pair of cut-off jean shorts, with bright yellow flowers with red centres painted on them, as if growing out of the turned up cuffs. This youth frolicked through the forest teaching nature classes, played through Bible Studies, told scripture stories such that they would come alive in new forms. This Gaudete worked at summer camp – encouraging new emerging voices to tell the Good News story. This Gaudete was often saddened by the children at camp –those who told stories of abuse, those who were obviously malnourished, those who came with only one change of clothes, those who were watched closely as threats had been made to kidnap them, those who were grieving, those who carried burdens that went unspoken –and at the end of a week she had to let them go home to a place that was not safe.

Gaudete was the light that was to share something with these little ones to carry with them on their journey. One of the stories that inspired Gaudete and kept her sane over those summers were words written by Sr.Miriam Therese.

I saw rain drops on my window, Joy is like the rain.
Laughter runs across my pane, Slips away and comes again.
Joy is like the rain.

I saw clouds upon a mountain, Joy is like a cloud.
Sometimes silver, sometimes gray, Always sun not far away.
Joy is like a cloud.

I saw Christ in wind and thunder, Joy is tried by storm.
Christ asleep within my boat, Whipped by wind, yet still afloat,
Joy is tried by storm.

I saw rain drops on a river, Joy is like the rain,
Bit by bit the river grows, 'til all at once it overflows.
Joy is like the rain.

This song was a song sung at church camp, easy to remember, easy to sing. Now none of these words came directly from scripture, however, what a true expression and reflection of JOY. I wonder if any of the little ones who were taught that song, sang it for encouragement –a remembrance of God with them, a hope, a thought that they remain in that camp counsellors prayers –loved.

We heard words from Isaiah today, spoken to the people of his time as words of hope, joy and rejoicing to follow a dark time of exile and oppression. We hear beautifully written words by John the evangelist about John the Baptist –a brief moment of John’s life where he was the Good News, a prophetic voice to a people ready to reconnect with God, to rediscover hope and joy amidst a world in chaos; but all too soon a joy that turns to John’s martyrdom. We hear of the promised Messiah, of Mary saying “yes” to carrying God incarnate –but once born all too quickly joy turns toward death.

Scripture and Sr. Miriam Therese draw our attention to who Gaudete really is and what this Sunday is about. Gaudete is God incarnate; Christ asleep within my boat.

You have noticed that days are getting shorter; there is more physical darkness every day until Dec.21.

You may have noticed that the world is gearing up for Happy Holidays; the pleasure of giving and receiving gifts; the music, advertising, and stories we hear are telling us that we are to be happy. But for those with addictions, those who have lost their jobs, those who have lost a loved one, those who have no family or bad memories, this time of year is dismal...often with an added stress of having to appear happy to everyone else.

Joy is not about happiness; happiness comes about because of a happening to which an emotion is given. Joy is different.

Joy is like a drop of rain. It falls and splashes out, with the centre soaking the point at which it hits; changing that point forever. It comes and goes. It is a sense of hope amidst the darkness; peace during chaos; perseverance in times of need. Joy is Christ becoming incarnate and living among us, in us, and to be true joy –through us.

1 Thess. expresses Gaudete: rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances. This is joy; inward looking out –once wet, it cannot be taken away. This is living God incarnate into our day; incarnate in an ordinary stable and on a rugged cross; present by being vulnerable and dying; and in this is found joy and hope remaining. A mystery of faith.

Gaudete comes from those who share the rain of God’s grace, God’s joy with others –the story of Jesus’ birth, the story of Jesus’ death. Sr.Miriam Therese gave of her spirit and made this world a much better place by telling the story.

Her voice in the wilderness says: "Join me, please, in a spirituality of song and singing that seeks to integrate liturgy and life through a biblical understanding of word that is so much more than words. Together let us sing of Word enfleshed, Wisdom embodied, Spirit dwelling within and among us, day after day, year after year, re-creating our world and re- imagining you and me."

It is here in the re-living of Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection that we hear joy. Through communion joy is given and received. In community joy turns to rejoicing, as we sing and pray together. And it is here that we are reminded of our baptismal calls to be Gaudete’s in the world. You don’t have to wear pink or headbands with sparkles, it is simply asked that you hold fast to what is good and go and tell the Good News story in your words. Be a faithful bearer of God incarnate; be light, be hope, spread joy.

Let us pray –a prayer from the Medical Mission Sisters:

God of my childhood and my call,
make me a window, not a wall,
So like an icon, may I be
a sign of love's transparency,
and through the love that lives in me,
proclaim your lasting love for all.

O Holy One of Blessing, let Your love shine through me to all I meet this day. Amen.

warmth

2011-12-06T23:07:00.001-04:00

Today, Dec 6, grace was in wearing a suit coat and no mitts; a pleasant day to hold on to as snow is liabl
e to fly any day.

joy

2011-12-05T21:33:00.000-04:00

This evening I have had muchos time to relax. My husband has been laughing endlessly at things he has found on his new i-phone as he is figuring out what it does. I am relaxed as a whole bunch of Christmas preparations have been made and completed (not saying what as I do not want to cause a lack of joy for others). I have made home communion appointments for upcoming weeks. Best of all I have completed all large writing projects and speaking engagements for this year.
Laugher.
Relaxation.
Grace.

a parishoner shared this with me.

2011-11-30T10:24:00.000-04:00

Plato or Jesus?

Posted on November 25, 2011 -written by Richard Rohr, on his blog

I remember when our church history prof, the last day of four years of classes, said walking out of the classroom in 1970: "When all is said and done, the church has been much more influenced by Plato than by Jesus!" We were stunned, but knew it was true: We had been given a world of universal truths and forms that had to be protected by the priestly class, and body and soul were enemies, not friends. This is Plato's world of inexorable laws, not Jesus' world of freedom and grace.

Jesus, the consummate Jew, saw his God as personal, intimate, and conversational. The beauty of Jesus' "Father" was that he could adjust to circumstances, forgive, show mercy, and change the rules for the sake of the relationship itself. Divine union itself was the goal, not private moral perfection. Life was not a courtroom for Jesus, but a living room, kitchen, and bedroom. Whatever worked to bring us to relationship was to be used, and Jesus used it-because he knew God did the same. Jesus made human life a dialogue with the divine, whereas Plato made it a monologue from on high. Jesus was concerned with particulars and persons, Plato with universals and ideas.

For Jesus body and soul were not enemies, and body and Spirit were not enemies either; but both worked together as friends and partners. People were one united whole at their best. Jesus relocalized truth and morality in the heart, while not excluding the head. But we moved it back into the head where there was hardly any room for the heart or the body, God's heart or our own. Christian civilization, and Western politics, has been much the worse for it.

God's World is Pretty Amazing!

2011-11-29T09:33:00.001-04:00

http://www.ted.com/talks/david_gallo_shows_underwater_astonishments.html

it is skating time once again

2011-11-28T20:26:00.000-04:00

Today for a break from essay writing I went skating at the Forum. Before skating started I enjoyed watching SMU Huskies practice. Ice -was grace. The gentleman who gave me tips to be a better skater was also grace.
Sometimes God comes in a sudden change of plans and change of regular schedule.

little things

2011-11-22T23:40:00.001-04:00

Yesterday and today I set to do doing a whole lot of little things. I did them because the number of big projects -all requiring writing and creativity- were overwhelming. The little tasks, not all of which were immediately necessary, took off enough pressure that I was able to start tackling the big projects. All the tasks completed were tiny minute sparks of grace. Together the sparks were a grace extrordinaire!

Sunday Sermon -Nov.13

2011-11-15T23:30:00.000-04:00

Judges is a book that is full of conquest after conquest. The book of Judges at first glance is about war, victory over other people, possession of land, movement of troops, and gory details of death at the hand of another. And thrown into the mix to make it oh so much more complicated, is God, commanding the people into war, punishing the people for lack of obedience through reversal of fortune, and dominating one side of the battle field.

A lesson like this appears shortly after Remembrance Day. It is passage that turns many people off from seeking after God, it disgusts others such that they will no longer read Hebrew scripture, it is suggested that such texts not be read.

But the text is just as pertinent today as it was thousands of years ago. In our lifetimes, no matter which generation we are from, everyone here has been alive during a War that has been fought by a group of countries and peoples against a supposed or legitimate threat to others in the world. Since 1900 Canada has been at war: the Boer War, WWI, WWII, Korea, Persian Gulf, the present War in Afghanistan.

As a nation, as church communities, as individuals: soldiers, families left at home, or citizens electing public officials -at some point, somewhere, at sometime – questions come to the surface. Most of the time we try not to think about it, or there is so much to grapple with we turn ourselves off. We take time to remember the dead, the causalities of war – at remembrance services there are prayers, hymns sung –or music played. Have you listened to the words of said prayers, said hymns?

The questions are there. Is God on our side –the good side, the right side; the side of the faithful? And who is the right-side, the good side, the faithful –if both sides worship the same God? On both sides of every war, there are the soldiers’ prayers in the trenches, the peoples’ prayers for their loved ones to come home, prayers for peace, for safety, for land to call their own. Whose side is God going to take? Which prayers get answered, whose don’t?

These are the questions that the writer of Judges is wrestling with and what we read is the author’s reflection of where God is and how God is involved. In the archaeological record, for descriptions of battles from the book of Kings, there are literary records from the other side of the story...and guess what, the other side painted the picture as if their god had given them the victory. Curious isn’t it?

There is something very important in this text that often gets missed. Amidst the darkness, chaos, and human propensity to dwell on violence, there is a glimmer of hope and Good News.

This is the time of the judges. In this passage, Deborah is mentioned –a wife, prophetess, judge. The idea was that there was a different way: a way that didn’t involve kings, but rather chosen judges who arbitrated disputes in a relational way; there was a different way based on the lessons learned in the desert –lessons that were altruistic and compelled human beings to live beyond the shortcomings of human nature. A different way was offered, but human nature was sucked into being human, being part of a world that found and still finds it easier to fall into darkness, than fight to keep God’s vision alive –a vision of life, hope, light.

In Thessalonians we hear the words: “There is peace and security, then sudden destruction will come upon them, as labour pains come upon a pregnant woman, and there will be no escape!” –a very human description and interpretation of the darkness and chaos to be found in the world. There is a play back and forth by the writer of the letter between light and darkness; reminding the community that God’s vision is alive –life, hope, light –but only when God’s people purposefully choose to hold on to being the children of the light and believe their purpose is to share in the renewal of the earth and humanity by dispelling darkness. That means taking responsibility to live a different way.

Using the image from the letter to the Thessalonians, perhaps Christians are currently drunk, not sober, because we are forever being sucked into darkness quicker all the time: drunk by darkness -dabbling in the watching, sharing, gaming, and perpetrating violence; giving up trying to be a light to others because it is too hard with too much red tape and disagreeable sorts to squish ambitions and visions of a different way; darkness enveloping as we succumb to materialism, the attitude of scarcity, the fear of taking risks. We do good for ourselves, perhaps for others –but would never dare to say “I do this because God loves me –so I love others” –bringing God’s hope, light, life, promise verbally to the stage to confront human nature and the darkness that has cast a heavy shadow on the people of the world.

We have been given an answer to speak to the world, an answer that can abate the darkness –but it is not an easy prescription to sell; in fact many will not want to take it –because it is risky, with all kinds of side effects –good side effects, but ones that will induce pain, uncertainty, even fear.

The cure, God’s given prescription is “Abundance”

You may be asking yourself where this idea came from; where do I see that in the texts from today? It is right there in the Gospel reading. Have you heard about the master from the parable – the generosity shown, given, the abundance of the gift?

The slave that was given the least was given one talent. A talent is 6000 denarii. One denari is a day’s wage. That is 6000 day’s worth of wage – 16 years.

I heard this week a Jewish interpretation of the fall of Adam and Eve in the garden: the sin of Adam and Eve was not in the breaking of God’s command by eating of the forbidden fruit or the abundance of the garden, the sin was found in the blaming of another; when confronted Adam blamed Eve, Eve blamed the snake – there would have been no sin if responsibility had been taken for the disobedience.

How often do we blame, rather than take responsibility? All the time this sin is grown, the spiral of darkness is deepened – the government is to blame for a host of issues, -poverty, the economy, pollution –you name it all because of the improper use of tax dollars; school boards and systems are blamed for dismal literacy rates; society is blamed for racism; war is blamed on religion or someone else’s foreign policy; I’m grouchy this morning because someone who-shall-not-be-named peed in my cereal; Please! When will Christian’s wake up from their slumber and take responsibility. When will we take the prescription of abundance and start tackling the world’s problems for real, no excuses.

I also heard this week that according to Jewish law it was forbidden to invest if there was a fixed rate of return on the money. So, it would have been against the law for the slave who received the least talent to have taken it to a bank to collect interest. I wonder if Jesus’ parable is commenting that it would be better to have broken the law than to do nothing with the abundance God had given. Curious isn’t it?

Do you live from the attitude of abundance?

Walter Brueggemann, Professor emeritus of OT at Columbia Theological Seminary, Georgia, explained the phenomenon as, the Liturgy of abundance and generosity against the prevailing creed and belief of scarcity found in NA society. Walter paints a beautiful picture of the story of abundance: a song, a liturgy that moves through scripture. The liturgy begins in Genesis with the creation of the world, where everything is good, where “it is good” is repeated over and over, in abundance. Reference was made to the Psalms of praise of God’s magnificence, of blessing, of life moments full of promise. The liturgy continued through the lives of Noah, Abraham and Sarah; the people finding abundance in the desert –manna, quail, water, relationship- ; the people finding a land full of abundance –grapes, water, grain, vast spaces -; the abundance found in a stable in Bethlehem –a night when God became incarnate; the abundance of a few fish and a few loaves of bread –that fed thousands; the abundance found in the early Christian community that was being harshly persecuted.

The liturgy of abundance gets overshadowed with the passages like the one from Judges we read today. We see the prevailing creed and belief of scarcity: there is not enough land that all people can live in it and share its bounty, there is fear that “the other” will take too much or use it foolishly; blame is laid before a new way is even tried.

From week to week the sermons preached are not all that different from one another. Today is yet another reminder to risk living a new way –take the risk –stop passing blame and accept responsibility – forget becoming drunk by darkness and live light, live love, dance the liturgy of abundance.

You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.” — G. K. Chesterton

“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” — Albert Einstein

Can you see the holiness in those things you take for granted–a paved road or a washing machine? If you concentrate on finding what is good in every situation, you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul.” — Rabbi Harold Kushner

“

And finally:

Both abundance and lack exist simultaneously in our lives, as parallel realities. It is always our conscious choice which secret garden we will tend… when we choose not to focus on what is missing from our lives but are grateful for the abundance that’s present — — the wasteland of illusion falls away and we experience Heaven on earth.” –Sarah Ban Breathnach

Imagine Nov. 8th!

2011-11-08T22:34:00.001-04:00

Grace in:
Sunshine and 15 degrees
Squash soup and bagels with awesome smoked gouda
A super bright moon
Trying a new flavoured Rooibos tea
Watching TV with my hubby

LIFE is GOOD. :)

Reformation from A Woman's Point of View: Katie Luther

2011-11-02T16:16:00.001-03:00

I remember it well. The smell of herring, mixed with a nervous tension; the rough wood- choking in the smell, as the barrel thumped up and down with the wagon. This awful moment gave way to the resurrection of my life.

Oh but look at that, I have gotten ahead of myself haven’t I. I am Katharina von Bora, affectionately known as Katie Luther; Martin Luther’s wife.

Yes it is true, dear Martin and I had 6 children, raising 4 into adulthood: Hans studied law and became a court advisor, our son Martin a pastor, Paul a well known physician, and Margarethe married into a wealthy Prussian family. They have done very well for themselves and honoured the family name, following in a tradition of a people who were thinkers, who loved and respected education.

The Martin Luther you know so much about, called me “my lord Katie”. Not that I was Lord, for there is only one Lord. I guess he just appreciated the nursing I gave him over the years, he was not a well man. He left the managing of the household to me, and some household it was! –kids, Martin, large numbers of guests including at times 30 students and visiting scholars, despite limited funds. Sometimes I wondered if it could all be done; somewhere there was strength, and early early mornings, late evenings; the vegetables were grown, the orchard tended, the cattle and chickens fed, the fishpond kept, the animals butchered at my hand, and I ensured the beer was brewed. But no greater job gave me more pleasure than to free my Martin’s mind from teaching, writing and pastoring. This was my gift to Martin for what he did for me, for the church, for the hope given to the people of the time. Ahhh, that man, “lord” what a nick-name to give one’s wife–the only lord here was God working through us; but you can’t tell a stubborn man anything. He wrote about the Lord being Lord, and the pope not being the lord; but when it came to pet nick-names...

Did you know I was only eighteen when Martin Luther issued his now famous 95 theses from Wittenberg? I can just see him stomping up to the Palace Church door in his academic gowns and tacking his painstakingly thought out Latin document to the wooden door. As a scholar he was convinced that God was speaking a different word from the Bible than that which was being taught by the church –that was him always thinking, wanting debate, discussion. He loved the church; he loved study; he loved the combination of the two. And even better he was a teacher at heart who taught others what God was opening to him.

I wasn’t in Wittenburg on that day, Oct.31, 1517. I was in a convent where I had lived since I was three years old. You see my mother had died and my father did not have the means to support me, so I went to a convent school and later took vows in the cloister where my dad’s sister, my aunt, Magdelena lived.

At the cloister we caught wind of what was happening in the outside world and it was exciting so different from the daily regimented order we followed. We heard of Luther’s biblical teachings, opening the Bible to new understandings, letting the German people hear the word in their own language. Imagine, hearing a Gospel story and being able to tell it to a child as you put them to bed, or recite a Psalm in our mother tongue when sitting with someone in the infirmary. Needless to say the world was changing; Christendom was transforming. There were 11 of us nuns who were quite keen and wanted to join this Dr. Martin. We believed the principles he taught. We saw the falsehood of paying for the remission of sin, when through Christ sin had already been removed. It was time to join the reformation, to leave the cloister and soak up this renewed knowledge of God, of Christ, of being part of a priesthood of all believers.
As nuns we were limited in our ability to leave the cloister. We had no money, and our families did not either –that’s why we were in the cloister –a carefree life of hard work; so there was food, and we learned nursing skills, herbal remedies; we could all cook, brew beer, grow vegetables; we knew animal husbandry and we knew how to read and write. It was the education that helped us in our quest. I wrote letter after letter to the wealthy, the noblemen, the district rulers –all in an attempt to find a benefactor who would speak on our behalf, and pay the price for our freedom. No one answered our campaign –until believe it or not Martin heard of our plight through a letter we wrote directly to him.

He wasn’t just a man of words, he arranged with a merchant friend of his to help us escape.

Merchant Leonard Koppe. We all knew him he often delivered herring to the convent, and one evening in 1523, after delivering fish to the kitchens; he bundled us up into the empty fish barrels and loaded us on his wagon.

It was stinky; like death in the depths of those tossing barrels –dark, nervous, praying we were. When the wagons stopped, there was a quiet as if the earth stood still; then the tops were pried off the barrels; sweet sweet air filled our lungs – I can’t imagine resurrection being any more beautiful. We stepped out of the barrels into a new life.

The realities were that as women we needed to be connected to someone who had means to look after us. Several of the nuns returned to their families; Luther helped find homes, husbands, or positions for the rest. After two years, all the nuns had been provided for except for me. I wasn’t trying to be hard to get along with, I was courted by Hicronymus Baumgaertner from Wittenberg University but his parents thought better of the idea, and there was no way I was marrying Pastor Glatz –I simply refused.

But then, through the persuasion of friends and his father –as I was told later, Luther proposed to me himself, and I moved into the Augustinian monastery at Wittenberg given to Luther a few years before by the Elector. Gosh I did a lot of cleaning up in the monastery and someone had to bring order to Luther's daily life. Dear Martin, bless his heart – wrote to a friend, "There is a lot to get used to in the first year of marriage. One wakes up in the morning and finds a pair of pigtails on the pillow which were not there before." The pigtails were the least of the changes.
Like I said, we had six children of our own, then we raised four orphan children. Our house was a flurry of activity and the nights that the students and visiting professors filled our table with theology, debate, -God-talk were life forming, life giving events. 4 am mornings were no burden when I knew that later in the day Martin would encourage me in Bible study and he suggested passages for me to memorize. I lived for those holy moments. And it was this household that taught our children, guided our children, in fact guided a people. Martin always said that marriage was a school for character; that family life trained Christians in the virtues of fortitude, patience, charity and humility.
There was something about those years. I have to think that the excitement came through the Word. It was in our very own hands. It was shared. It was alive. It became part of who we were. It was part of our dinner time conversations, our walks in the woods, and mentioned in the market place. The Bible and God were no longer owned by the church; and we made a connection between Word for the head and Word for the heart.
My dear Martin died in 1546 and I had to leave our home: due to finances in some part, but quicker due to war. Then I left Wittenberg to avoid the plague- going to Torgau.
For six years, I lived there in the hope of the Resurrection, until I could once again be with my dear Martin. In those days, it was the word that comforted me. I sang the hymns Luther and I sang with the children around our living room – a mighty fortress is our God, away in a manger. I repeated his favourite Psalm, Psalm 146.

It has been said in your time that my last words were a great testament to my powerful faith in God –I saw my final words to not be about me at all but were said to the glory of God; for the grace imparted to the church; for the gift of living and breathing scripture; for the gift of Christ who stands for me before God.

I pray that my final words are words that you also can say every day and when at last your days come to an end your words and faith can say: my words;

My faith is this: "I shall cling to Christ as a burr clings to a coat."

Amen.

both ends of the spectrum

2011-10-23T23:39:00.001-03:00

It was one of those weekends: a burial of ashes long overdue, planning a funeral with one who is in palliative care, and a wedding. Today church seemed surreal, as all these emotions were churning inside. That's really the crux of faith - living in the chaos of life and bEing held together by something/someone outside of oneself. Yet the GRACE is that the someone outside of oneself is really deep within the depths of one's very being. Thanks be to God for the grace inside to be grace to others, especially when emotions are everywhere but calm.

Thanksgiving Sermon

2011-10-11T23:05:00.002-03:00

As I say the following words, I invite you to ponder each one for a brief moment:

Goodness, flowing streams, springs, welling up, milk and honey, abundance, blessings, satisfied, manna, give, forgive, deliverance, hope, strength, awe, joy, enrich, provide, bounty, overflowing, richness, sing together, cheerful, righteousness, great generosity, increased harvest, thanksgiving, glory, surpassing grace, compassion, mercy, healing, praise

Breathe in deeply and consider the feeling you have at this moment.

Now in the same way, ponder each of these words for a moment:

Busy, schedule, running around, tired, confused, plodding, buy, consume, use, revenge, fight, aggression, compete, pursue, power, more, time crunch, money, better, own, entitlement, scarcity, pollution, sadness, sick, depression, anxiety, destruction, death

Breathe in deeply and consider the feeling you have at this moment.

The feelings produced by these two very different paragraphs of words are an example of the difference between what Lutherans call law and gospel. The law demands that one fulfill a set of rules and be in complete obedience to the ethical will of God, where as the Gospel is full of promise, including the forgiveness of sin through Christ. In scripture, law and gospel are both present. Today’s texts are heavy on Gospel. The first group of words are words from the texts of the day... words and thoughts that are Good News.

How did you feel after pondering them? Uplifted, comfort, peaceful, content?

You could feel the difference, right, especially in comparison with the second group. The second group of words are those that we experience in our day to day lives; words that bring on stress, knots in the shoulders, a sinking feeling, malcontent, dis-ease.

There is a story of a man in India who lives in a mud hut with his wife, two children and mother-in-law. He finds that the hut is crowded, loud, and chaotic. He goes to the village shaman to see what could be done. He commiserates with the shaman that the chaos of his family in the hut does not allow for time of quiet and reflection; there is no personal pace...he feels stressed in his own home. He asks the shaman for advice about what he should do.

The shaman suggests the purchase of a king-like lounge chair. A chair that says he is the man of the house, a chair that is comfortable, protects his space, allows him to sit and direct the traffic in the hut; a chair that commands respect. So a large chair is bought, taken to the house and placed directly across from the door, where it is obvious; and the family takes notice for the chair takes up a large chunk of floor space in the hut. The family walks around it –way around – the man has his space. For two months the chair works wonders and the man is on top of the world...but then one day when he arrives home the chair, his chair, is full of children, the next day his mother-in-law is taking a nap in it, the next it has become the depository for laundry. Frustrated he returns to the shaman, unhappy.

The shaman suggests to the man that perhaps on his way home he should visit the local market and buy a couple of chickens; chickens would make everything better. The man is not sure how this will help but doesn’t question sage advice; so he buys a couple of chickens. The chickens are in the yard during the day, but as the desert cooled the chickens found their way into the already tiny hut. For the first few weeks the man enjoys the eggs they lay for breakfast, but after 4 weeks it is too much and no better than the previous situation. He returns to the shaman. After a similar exchange of his last visit, the man is advised to go a buy a goat. The goat also stays outside during the day, but as the desert cooled in the evening the goat entered the hut. The man tolerates the goat because it is producing milk, but with the early rising chickens, the children, his wife and his bossy mother-in-law taking over his chair, it is enough after two weeks to trek once again back to the shaman.

The shaman suggests that music would be a good idea to drown out the noise and chaos, so on the way home the man finds the only music available, the local snake charmer, who follows him home and plays every night for a bowl of food. For awhile, the goat and chickens are afraid of the snake in the basket so quietly stay in a corner, the children and mother-in-law are put to sleep by the charmers flute. This too however after a short time losses its pleasure as the rest of the house begins dancing and clucking to the music, or biting at the basket for something to eat. And if this is not enough, the ruckus is drawing complaints from the neighbours, the goat is eating the straw in the mud bricks of the hut, wild animals are trying to get in to snatch the chickens in the wee hours of the night, his wife is threatening to leave, there is nowhere left to sleep that does not smell like animal......a very sad and tired man plods to the shaman.

In exhaustion the man sits with the shaman, the shaman says, my son, “go home. Send home the snake charmer, sell the goat and chickens, give away the chair...and all will be well” The man does just this and do you know what he found, the little hut was perfect with plenty of room for his wife, children, and mother-in-law. For the rest of his days he was content with what he had and with the relationships around him. Life was good.

Would you say that you are content?

We spend a lot of life living the second paragraph of words that I shared earlier. We spend a lot of time being busy, seeking more, go-go-going. We overeat, oversleep, overwork, over play, over schedule, over indulge, over spend -trying to fill a need in our lives, trying to be content, to find a place where we have what we want so that we can be totally happy. And in the end we end up with a hut full of chaos, with things that we don’t need, didn’t really want, and didn’t think out. We are addicted. We have been conditioned to be consumers.

Think of your life, how much time do you fill with consuming things, events, wants, needs? Which paragraph do you put more energy into?

Earlier it took less than two minutes to read the Good News paragraph of words. In that two minutes your body and spirit went through a transformation, mind you it was short lived, but it was a transformation none the less. The feeling created by hearing the Good News was what contentment feels like. As the apostle Paul says it is indescribable. Over and over again throughout scripture God’s people are commended to “mediate on these things”...”these things” are scriptures and thoughts that are wholesome, life-giving, full of expectant promise. If we can feel connected to God’s promise in a short exercise in a sermon, what if we meditated “on these things” more frequently?

Currently the church sign says, “Right now, say something aloud that you are thankful for”. Try it, say something aloud that you are thankful for....something else...something else...something else. This is thanksgiving – a joyful expression. Contentment is staying in the Good News even in times when we may not be all that thankful.

In our lives, just like scripture, there is law and gospel. Far too often we spend our time focused on the laws, and the darkness we see and experience in the world around us; it comes out in our pains, sufferings, complaints, suggestions of unfairness directed at us. We forget about the Good News, the light of Christ within and in the end we fall short of living in the abundance of God; content.

On this thanksgiving Sunday you are invited to not just be thankful today, you are invited to accept and pursue the promises of God every day. You are invited to be Good News by meditating on Good News –to repeat as a in a mantra-while driving, or falling asleep, or while walking, or while taking a shower, the words of Good News you remember...

( big breath in and out)

By entering a state of contentment, into the promises of God, into the realm of indescribable grace –the world will change because you have changed. And the kingdom of God will come near.

Pentecost 16 sermon

2011-10-06T20:05:00.000-03:00

Pent 16A

A displaced person, also called a DP, is a person who has been forced to leave his or her native place, sometimes due to forced migration or a complete loss of home. Originally DP was used during WWII to refer to refugee outflows from Eastern Europe, where people were displaced from their native homes, forced off their land and thus became homeless, refugees, prisoners or recruited labour. Over the last 65 years the term displaced person has been expanded as vast groups of people around the world have been displaced and forced to migrate due to war, civil unrest, famine, or natural disaster.

This morning we find the Israelites in the desert; a gangly group of displaced persons fleeing the tyranny of the Egyptian Pharaoh and a life of oppressive slavery. The people are wandering, seeking a home. Home comes in an unexpected way –not in a homeland- rather this group of displaced persons is given a set of commandments with which to form a community; a community that was to be based first in relation to God and because of this relationship, a relationship with the each other.

Oliver James in his book, “Affluenza”, comments that psychologists squabble over human beings fundamental needs, however, psychologists do agree on 4:

Human beings need to feel part of a community

Human beings need to give and receive from family, neighbours, and friends

Human beings need to feel competent, not useless, but effective in chosen tasks

Human beings need to feel autonomous and authentic; masters of their own destiny, not living behind masks

Did you hear the first fundamental need? People need to feel part of a community.

That is what is happening as we have journeyed through the book of Exodus. We are watching a bumbling group of mis-matched people become a united community. The words we hear today in the Ten Commandments, as they have come to be called, are the parameters of interconnectedness –how they are going to treat each other as people living together. The Ten Commandments were a created as a freedom to live righteously with maximum love for God and neighbour.

In 1915 when the fore-fathers and mothers of this congregation gathered together to form a community they set down a constitution; a rule book of how the community would behave. The opening paragraph included the words that this community was:

“to sustain by the labour and gifts of love the pure Word and Sacraments as God’s only appointed means for saving the lost and for edifying His people; and to maintain a discipline doctrine, righteousness of life, and the peace and growth of the Church”.

The fore-fathers and mothers who wrote this statement of community purpose were themselves displaced persons. Some were descendants of the families from the Little Dutch Church –Germans who came to Halifax in the mid 1700s, and no longer had a church home. Others were displaced persons from Lunenburg County, come to the city for jobs. Yet others were men stationed here because of WWI. These people had a common need, a need to feel part of a community; a need to give and receive; a need to feel competent; a need to feel autonomous and authentic. Together these displaced persons formed a relationship based on a common need of relationship with God, which translated into a relationship with each other, that over the years grew into the community of today.

In Paul’s letter to the Philippians he recites a long list of points that make him, without a doubt, a member of the first century Jewish community. Paul belongs –he’s circumcised, of the tribe of Benjamin, parents were Hebrews, a Pharisee, a zealous upholder of the law- a fighter for the cause. But despite a “seeming to belong”, Paul is a displaced person. After the encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus, a life altering God-experience, he no longer has a place in the world he knew and had dedicated his life to.

Paul’s credentials no longer matter, for they pale in comparison to having relationship –given through the death of Christ. It is the power of Christ’s love even to death and God’s power over death by resurrection that motivates Paul to press toward the ultimate goal –life everlasting and the fruition of God’s kingdom.

Paul has through relationship with God been changed and in changing become a catalyst for pulling together displaced persons who grow into Christ following communities. Displaced persons, those at odds with Rome, or the Synagogue, those who were sick, held different beliefs or practiced alternate ways, all were grafted into Christ the vine at baptism, nourished by bread and wine, shared in Christ’s suffering they knew the power of resurrection and lived it out in community.

You may have noticed in the past week, other churches in Halifax have advertised on their church signs that this is World Communion Sunday. This celebration is observed, on the first Sunday in Oct, by Christian denominations around the world to promote Christian unity and ecumenical cooperation. The tradition originated in the Shadyside Presbyterian Church, in Pittsburg in 1933. It was adopted throughout the US Presbyterian Church in 1936, and from there spread to other denominations and the World Council of Churches. By observing this celebration congregations are asked to think of Holy Communion in the context of the global community of faith; Christians in every culture break bread and pour the cup to remember and affirm Christ as the Head of the Church. We are reminded that they we belong; that we are part of the whole body of Christ; a vast community.

Recently I have been doing work on a school paper that outlines my strategic plan for ministry here at Resurrection. Readings have suggested that communities that last from generation to generation do so because there is a set of core values at work. These values do not change, although they might be expressed in new ways, the meaning and essence are the same. Resurrection’s core values are found in the stories of the displaced persons who sought to create a community of like-minded believers who worshiped in a Lutheran way.

Over the years many displaced persons have come through this home. Highlights include Norwegian sailors, WWII displaced persons from Europe: some of whom are still with us today; over the years the number of students come from all parts of the world to study in Halifax; those who have transferred here for internships or jobs; refugees from Ethiopia; and various other CFAs

But you know there is a part of each of us that is a displaced person: perhaps economically, socially, politically, in relation to orientation, morally, physically, mentally, educationally and so on.

In our world today, when we are about being rather than having, when we don’t conflate our wants and needs, when we focus on the need for community, for giving and receiving, for living authentically, for being useful –when we are about fundament human need; we are truly displaced persons. The world doesn’t follow the same ethic, a sense of faith directing ones’ actions is perplexing, offered compassion is not trusted as being free with no strings attached. As Jesus’ followers there is a need to come together in community to foster relationship with God and each other, in order to have the strength to return to the world where the tenants want more, to consume more, to build more, to control more.

Being displaced persons and being grafted into the vine of Christ, being a community here, sharing in communion with like-minded Jesus’ followers around the world – we understand the need to find the lost, to offer compassion, to invite others into community, to love the displaced that come through the door.

Although almost 100 years old the opening statement of the 1915 founding document rings true today: that we will be about

Sustaining labour and gifts of love

Word and Sacrament

Discipline doctrine

Righteousness of life

Peace and growth of the church

These purposes act like the Ten Commandments did for the Israelites when they were a gangly group of displaced persons, with no home. These core values are about relationship, our relationship with God and how that affects our relationship with each other and with a lost world.

Jesus asks the Pharisees, “have you read in scripture: ‘the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone’”; Jesus is referring to himself. Jesus had a different relationship with God and thus with the people of his time. Jesus as a displaced person, who was at odds with the world around him. Jesus was compassionate to the core. Through death Jesus showed the path to resurrection -choosing to follow means bravely being a displaced person in the world, prepared to stand firm, prepared to die.

May we be displaced persons as Jesus was; at odds with the world; offering compassion, sharing community, welcoming the displaced, creating home; so as to further God’s movement toward perfect relationship –at homeness, at oneness.

Resurrection - new beginnings

2011-09-30T00:42:00.001-03:00

Currently it is really late on Thurs. night, or my son would argue really early on Fri. morning. The hour is what it is because there were evaluations and proposals to write, due by the end of Fri.,but needing committee approval before being sent off. Everything was way-laid because of a school project. It wasn't the project that was a HUGE grace in life today, it was the daughter who returned home asking for assistance: responsible, civil, organized, polite, sharing, and loving. Tonight was grace showering down and washing away the pain and heartache of the past few years. Resurrection - a beautiful butterfly has emerged from the ashes. Alleluia!

Theo Jansen's Strandbeests - Wallace & Gromit's World of Invention Episo...

2011-09-23T11:08:00.000-03:00

Creation, Imagination, Grace

In Between

2011-09-22T17:15:00.000-03:00

It has been a peculiar day, much of it spent pre-planning and solidifying a timeline for goals. In between, I was to have a visit -which was cancelled. So I spent more time pre-planning. Crazy! To feel busy yet not able to complete anything right this instance is a little off putting. So I set to work, on little tasks like cleaning up the Conference web-site, picking scripture and hymn for an advent reflection -not to be used until the end of Nov., and other such tasks.
So with all those little things done, it still feels like being "in-between". My day timer looks like a novel, but future events and dates will happen at the prescribed time; yet, they stay in my head nagging, pinching, and complaining to be done now.
Perhaps GRACE is learning to live in the "in-between" without stress. Others have called it living in the present, rather than the past or future.
Today's prayer is to see the "in-between" as grace, a space of holy waiting, a time of holy leisure - a time to watch and pray.

Passion

2011-09-16T15:51:00.000-03:00

Grace was found in the passion of a young man today. His passion grows out of personal experiences of injustice and the fight to make the injust, just. Oh that all should have the passion of seeing God's love come alive around them, through them, within them. Oh that all would not only find their passion, but live their passion. Oh that all, through living their God-given passion, could light the hearts, minds and imaginations of others.
That would be abundant grace, truly amazing.

Grace in more ways than one

2011-09-08T16:32:00.000-03:00

Grace is one of those things that often surprises. Today it was through a purple purse.

Way back at the beginning of the summer, I purchased a shiny faux patten bag, the size and shape of a handled Bible cover. At the time it was a piece of grace: not only was it 1/2 price day at Value Village, so it cost $2, it was brand new with the tags still on it; and even better it was found after patiently perusing through secondhand stuff. Secondhand finds are fantastic, as it is ecologically friendlier shopping, and it is finding something discarded, picking it out, loving it...giving it new life.
There a million theological reflections one could make....

Anyway, the bag is a piece of grace as it is being used outside of its intended purpose. It is really a cosmetic bag complete with two inside plastic zippered halves. In one side goes the Kobo, perfect fit, and in the other kleenex, wallet and purse type stuff.

This is the rainy season in Halifax, so today of course it rained. For those who walk, you know that getting from one place to another in a semi-dry state is not as easy as it should be. Choosing the wrong purse on a rainy day, especially if it downpours is simply awful! There are certain articles that do not fair well when wet.
Well come to find out my purple cosmetic bag, re-purposed is perfect. It gracefully handled the downpour. Not one drop of water went inside and even when opening the bag contents of each pouch stayed dry despite the drips off the raincoat.
Brilliant!

Thinking outside the box is always good. Re-purposing is grace.

Sermon: Sept 4th

2011-09-05T11:29:00.000-03:00

In yesterday’s paper Lezlie Lowe wrote, “Back-to-school carries such feeling of hope an opportunity. It’s a land of fresh starts and blank loose-leaf, and it’s still my favourite spot on the calendar. Back-to-school is like New Year’s, but better; a time imbibed with the sense that something big is about to happen.”

It’s true. There is an excitement about this time of year. At church we talk about getting back into the swing of things: Sunday School, Bible Study, and choir start up again. We see families returning from vacation, students moving in and others moving back for another year of school. Churches change liturgies, set programs, and lay out plans and schedules for the upcoming season.

It is kind of like New Year’s, where it feels like a fresh start. It is time for goal setting.

The biblical text for such a Sunday could not be better. Take any line from Romans, and it reads like a New Year’s resolution: I will love my neighbour as myself by not stealing, coveting what they have, or sleeping with their spouse. I will live honourably by not squandering daylight hours, not engaging in frivolity or indulgence, and avoiding bickering and hoarding.

Or from Matthew: I will be a Christ follower by seeking to resolve hurt and conflict in a relational way, using honest conversation, and then, if need be, turning to compassionate mediation.

The Exodus passage is a little different. As something new, a piece full of instructions, it is a set plan, a God-given resolution. It is a new ritual –not for individuals- but for a people.

The people are a varied group. In Exodus the use of the word “Hebrew” refers to displaced people rather than to one specific ethnic group. Abraham centuries before had been called a Hebrew, whose genealogy included Arabs, Arameans, Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites. The direction for the ritual given through Moses was to a collective group of people, united by their enslavement under the Pharaohs of Egypt. The people who participated in the meal chose liberation from bondage; they did so with a guided united experience, of eating together and then exiting Egypt, later they become a people, the Israelites.

But right now in Exodus they are not Israelites, they are not a people, they are not a community.

It is the institution of a communal meal and ritual around that meal that fosters the growth of a community. This group of displaced persons chooses liberation and to live life in a different way with a society fuelled by hope and promise, and bound by new parameters and rules.

This group of displaced persons spends 40 years in the desert where their time is spent learning about relational living – with each other and God; figuring out and setting priorities, carving out rules for a just and fair society, practicing living a life different from that of the Pharaoh’s Egypt –where many had too much and too many had too little.

The Israelites became a people, a people who through ups and downs, through law and a reinterpretation of laws over the centuries, who through stories and the remembrance of liberation from bondage by eating together yearly the Passover meal, are a continuing community. In community there are expectations, etiquettes, and loyalties, all relating to how one lives life –inside and outside of the community. In community one finds the freedom to seek, acquire wisdom, and grow faith.

Today is an Exodus, from our summer hiatuses to a more scheduled fall season. There is an expectation that the people of this community will gather on Sundays to welcome each other, to share in worship and in fellowship; that there is freedom to seek, to acquire wisdom, and grow faith. There is an expectation that people feel free to participate in any or all events that the church offers or to facilitate a program or event from their God-given gifts. There is an expectation that people become engaged; here –but beyond. God’s mission statement for this community is that “God is on a mission and we want to be part of it”

Jack Layton’s wife, Olivia Chow, was asked how she and Jack separated their public life from their private life. Her response, “Why would we do that?”

As a community we come together to welcome each other, to love each through fellowship, listening, and offering ourselves, our time, our possessions. We sing together, we pray together, and we eat together –Christ’s meal and the coffee/tea ritual. This place is home: a place where we can be ourselves, comfortable in the hands of God, where we are be respected and in relation with others.

This place is not about being religious, rather as a community we come here to give grounding to our spirituality. Spirituality is formed, grown, stretched and is always in the process of choosing liberation, whether liberation is needed from sickness, thoughts, crisis, or past paradigms that no longer speak to us or the wider world. As a community we seek, acquire wisdom, grow faith –all through relationship with Jesus and each other. Community liberates us as individuals to find our callings, our gifts-by encouraging, coaching, tolerating, gently guiding each other through honest compassion in relationship.

That means this exodus into a new season is about purposefully setting goals that take God’s mission and what we learn as community out into the world –to share with our whole hearts, where there is no separation between life in the church and our lives from Monday to Saturday.

You could say something similar about Lloyd Robertson; one word that continually is being used to describe him as a broadcaster, and as a man away from the camera, is integrity: life and work were intertwined.

“And that’s the kind of day it’s been, this”... Sunday September 4^th, 2011. Wouldn’t it be great if we could say Lloyd Robertson’s famous line with confidence at the end of each day, in acknowledgement that we have lived the day being fully present, fully grounded, fully who we are as God’s people– in the events of the that given day; to be able to say that you lived your best, serving the broader community, with honest compassionate integrity.

That’s what the laid out rules of order are all about in today’s Bible readings. They are sets of rules to regulate, direct, and help individuals embody God’s vocation in the living of their lives; but as you have already noticed it is not simply about the individual. It is about living ones’ vocation, ones’ own calling, offering and using ones’ gifts within a community of people who share a common identity. And as those gifts are encouraged they become so much a part of who we are that that is who we are in the world as well –God’s people, bearing honest compassionate justice and integrity, bearing hope and seeing to it that God’s vision is growing daily in the world.

God is on a mission and we want to be part of it. This has been enacted in various ways –the most obvious is the sharing of this space with community groups. We are known in the wider community as hospitable, welcoming...because of how you as individuals live your God given vocations in the world, people notice that there is an interconnectedness of public and private life – that faith, hope, and your understanding of the kingdom of God cannot be separated from who you are at any time. It equals honest compassionate integrity.

So let us begin with a New Year’s resolution, full of the anticipation of going back to school “that something big is about to happen”:

let us each set the goal of being our authentic God-created self, not only in this church community but intentionally in everyday life. It means that we will work on being relational and welcoming in our jobs and families. The goal is to have others feel the love that we receive from God and this community, working through us and touching others. The goal is to activate God’s compassion and see God’s love liberate those around us, who then will be part of liberating others, who then will liberate others, who will then liberate others....

“and that’s the kind of day it’s been”.

Amen.

Going Home

2011-08-31T10:28:00.001-03:00

As much as I love vacation:
Grace in learning new things, new experiences, time with family, no schedule, different food, trying things never tried before;
There is grace in going home!
Grace in appreciating the little comforts- my coffee cup, the chairs on the front porch, the kitty coming around, nodding to neighbours, watching changes in the flower beds-
And grace in the bigger things;
Grace in a good bed, routine, a new energy with which to go back to work, strength for the fall season and projects.
Grace is all this - and most importantly reconnecting with the me inside that is formed by the creator. Grace is my experience of God.

Sacred Harp Singing

2011-08-19T00:38:00.000-03:00

Tonight I learned about sacred harp music.
The principle of the singing is that it is not about the sound...this is grace in that this is the group for people like myself who would never make it into a choir...and after listening to sacred harp examples on YouTube, also those who are tone deaf.
Grace is in the solidarity created between the singers in the bodily co-existence and community action.
Curious check out the following:
www.fasola.org

The Socioligy of Religion periodical has a great article:
"Bodies in Sync: Interaction Ritual Therapy Applied to Sacred Harp Singing", Spring 2010, 71:1, pp76-97

Weather in Halifax

2011-08-10T12:37:00.000-03:00

If you were to speak to a Haligonian about the summer of 2011, you would probably get a groan and perhaps a rolling of the eyes. It has been wet, very, very, wet! Or so was thought...last night on the news, Haligonians were informed that less rain has fallen this summer than last. The difference on the ground is that there have been way more over cast days; either fog or days threatening rain.
Who knows what number of dark icky day today is?
Lots of tweets, emails, and conversations today are including head aches, sleepiness, popping ears, and blah moods.
Where to find grace in this...
well the head aches and popping ears might suggest that the weather pressure is changing...perhaps bringing some sun?
getting some extra sleep?
not working as quickly, perhaps a more summer relaxed speed that is too often forgotten?
hodgepodge, or as it is called in my house "ruskumsnusk", tastes even better on a damp day?

grace is the hope that in future days the sun will shine brightly.
It is a reminder that we are called to hope that the darkness and overcast skies in the world will one day shine brightly with God's shalom. It is a reminder that we have a part in making this happen.
O for the Spirit to move through the world, through God's people, blowing the fog and darkness off the ends of the earth.

"Standing Together", A Canadian Gathering To Remember a Norwegian Tragedy

2011-08-05T08:23:00.000-03:00

Below are the words I gave at this event, Aug.4, 7pm at St.Mark's Anglican Church, Halifax, NS:

Genesis 1: 1-5
In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, 'Let there be light'; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness God called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

Shortly after events in Norway, the National Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran church in Canada wrote:
"We join the world in sending our thoughts and prayers to those who have been devastated by the tragic loss of family, friends and classmates. We also join in prayer with the Church of Norway and the Evangelical Lutheran Free Church of Norway as they respond pastorally to those in shock and grief. We pray that the presence of Christ will be a source of comfort and strength in the midst of overwhelming grief."

The chaos in Norway, their grief, is the grief of Lutherans across Canada. Many of our church communities are home to Norwegian immigrants, many of whom still have family ties in Norway. One of the parishioners at Resurrection, where I serve, had friends and friend's children die -as many of you have connections to those who are gone. She reflected that grieving is hard, especially when one is separated from their people by an ocean.

In 2007, Rev.Stan Johnstone, a Lutheran Pastor who was the Brigadier General of the Canadian Forces at the time, reflected that battle/combat was true chaos -having no inherent meaning and being absent of light. Chaos is what there is before God comes; out of chaos/the formless void/the deep waters -God says,'Let there be". This phrase is not an order but an invitation, where something or someone responds to fill the void.

Tonight it is the community that has gathered here, you and me, that is responding to fill the void, to speak against the vacuum of violence, the chaos of grief -to answer the invitation 'let there be', with a response...a response full of hope and creative energy. We fill the void of chaos with prayers: let there be peace, let there be understanding, let there be good seen in the world again.

You are invited to pray:
(adapted from pray on pg.76 of Evang.Luth.Worship)
O God,
where hearts are fearful and constricted, grant courage and hope.
Where anxiety is infectious and widening, grant peace and reassurance.
Where impossibilities close every door and window, grant imagination and resistance.
Where distrust twists our thinking, grant healing and illumination.
where spirits are daunted and weakened, grant soaring wings and strengthened dreams.
For good to be seen in the world again.
All these things we ask in your holy name. Amen

Birthday

2011-08-04T16:36:00.000-03:00

Grace comes in the many friends who wished me well today, some through Facebook, others by coming and sewing quilts, email messages, and even a beautiful song. I love you all very much!

Grace is one of those precious moments that can be sent in the words of a card. Here are two that I may use in a card someday...

"If you believe that each of us was designed by God for a specific reason, then you know there's no such things as an ordinary person. ...Don't ever forget how truly unique, how essential, how important you are."

"wishing you a day where God has splashed His bright colours and beautiful moments."

A Birthday Invitation

2011-08-03T18:19:00.000-03:00

For those of you living near Halifax, tomorrow is my birthday and I would love for you to come and celebrate with me. I would like to spend the afternoon, 1-4pm tying and sewing the edges on quilts. These quilts are special; they are made of entirely recycled fabric and liners. The quilts will be given to St.Leonard's Halfway House for the residents at Christmas time.

The location of the quilting party is the church on the corner of Windsor and Allan Streets (please use the Allan St. door). You need not have any sewing skill.

See you tomorrow.
Oh yes, there will be a big pot of tea on.

Lutheran Camp Mush-a-Mush

2011-07-29T21:12:00.000-03:00

Grace came in many ways this past week.

I was at Camp Mush, Middle Cornwall, NS with a whole bunch of families for family camp. This week in July is a yearly event where families camp, worship, and play together in God's big backyard. Community with each other and rejuvenating a relationship with nature are fantastic graces.

At Camp data streaming takes a long time and uses a lot of phone power - a break from Twitter, and posting to the blog for sure.

Grace was found in the lack of inhibition by people of all ages to ask questions on their mind. These gave me great hope for the future of the church and a justice-filled humanity. The number of little ones (despite the noise) were a cheerful reminder that all is well with the world, as they grew their relationships with their parents, siblings, staff, creation, and most of all God.

Grace came this week by those at home who were God-sent to places of need in the parish. The people of God empowered to be all they are meant to be, without me...ahhhh.

Grace will also be found in the shower I am going to shortly jump into. As much as I love the dirt that God created, I also like to look the way God created me (no dirt); and I like to smell like anything but bugspray and dirty sneakers.

happy camping!

Grace is already being present when crisis happens.

2011-07-21T10:08:00.000-03:00

Grace is being part of something bigger than oneself. Some call it being part of humanity, some call it being part of the kingdom of God -made present in this time and place.

Currently the world has been awakened by the cries of hunger from East Africa. There is a certain hopelessness to the crisis. As a teenager in the 1980's I remember the world pulling together to feed the world, to make it a better place -for you, for me, for the entire human race...those of you of the same generation probably now have the song stuck in your heads. And what has happened since then, that now that famine and drought are worse this time around.

The Christian community of which I am a part, over decades has supported humanitarian need; not just with emergency rations but with long-term solutions. The agency, Canada Lutheran World Relief, started 60 years ago by bringing displaced persons from Europe to Canada, after WWII. As crisis changed, CLWR started projects throughout the world: as a teenager I remember being part of projects to buy cows for Mozambique farmers.

Grace for me in light of the drought and famine, is that for some there is hope.

CLWR wrote the following media release: -good news amidst chaos.

"One of CLWR's five-year development goals is to provide a safe water supply, sufficient storage capacity, and irrigation to over 150 communities in Africa.
In the last year alone, CLWR has helped about 80 communites develop new or improved sources of clean, safe water and trained 10,000 housefholds in the safe use and storage of water. CLWR-supported food security projects have trained over 5,000 African farmers in sustainable agriculture, and provided 2,000 farmers with tools, livestock, storage, and seeds.
Need for these porjects has become increasingly apparent as East Africa suffers its worst drought in 60 years. According to the World Food Program, at least 10 million people are affected by food stortages.
"Supporting CLWR's ongoing development work helps reduce te devastation drought can have African communities", says Robert Granke, executive director. CLWR wil continue to support sustainable development in the region.
In response to immediate needs for relief in the drought-stricken East Africa, CLWR has partnered with the Canadian Foodgrains Ban on a large-scale emergency food aid project that will benefit over 18,000people in Goro, a district in the oromia region of Ethiopia.
over 1,900 tonnes of food, worth over $1.5 million, will be distributed between June an dOctober 2011 by CLWR partner lutheran World Federation Ethiopia."

To contribute to further deveolpment and drought relief in Africa, donations can be made online at www.clwr.org/donate. The webite is worth looking at to see good news stories amidst chaos taking place around the world.

Grace is the light seen in the darkness.

It's Summer

2011-07-13T15:04:00.000-03:00

The heat of summer is grace.
As the thermometre rises, a persons ability to be busy lessens. The world today, especially North American society, is one that drives towards constant productivity and consumption. Isn't that true: do you feel guilty when not "doing" something or taking an extended break while at work?

As the thermometre rises and my body slows down, I am reminded to slow down and bide time -for there are times coming that will be an all-out-run: the weeks before Christmas, a season of sickness or funerals. The heat reminds me to take time and enjoy sitting on a park bench, to relax on a front porch with a book, or to socialize on a patio with friends. This is the season for rejuvenating the stores of pleasure, that so often are pushed aside because we are busy.

Although the heat can make one sick, the heat is a reminder to relax, enjoy life, and be healed through the power allowing oneself time to breath and reconnect.

teenagers

2011-07-04T22:23:00.001-03:00

Definition of grace:
When you finally are comfortable in your own skin, and although not always happy, are content with life and your roll in it

This definition came to me today as I was thinking about the three teenagers in my life. Watching them trying to figure out who they are, reminded me of those days. Today I am the most content I have ever been and I am happy to the person God created me to be. I pray my children find the same contentment; that too would be grace.

Canada Day

2011-07-02T00:21:00.001-03:00

This was a real holiday! There is something to be said for a beautiful front veranda, where one can sit and watch the world walk by. It really was the world: nieghbours, many First Nation peoples, Asians, Blacks, Arabs, whites; young, old, middle aged; dogs, cats...
To see this and not really think about it at the time - that means we live in a special place; a place where we can dream of no racism, people respecting each others' cultures and being invited to participate
in them.
Today my heart is filled with gratitude!
Thank-you for a beautiful place to live, surrounded by lovely people and peoples. May each day be lived with as much gracious hospitality. Amen.

P.S. If you live in Halifax take sometime on Sat.July 2 or Sun. July 3 and go to the PowWow and the multi-cultural festival.

for something a little different: feeding the inner child

2011-06-23T17:10:00.000-03:00

Wise Words from a Wise Man

2011-06-17T10:39:00.000-03:00

"All of these religions can make an effective contribution for the benefit of humanity. They are all designed to make the individual a happier person, and the world a better place. However, in order for the religion to have an impact in making the world a better place, I think it's important for teh individual practitioner to sincerely practice the teachings of that religion. One must integrate the religious teachings into one's life, wherever one is, so one can use them as a source of inner strength. And one must gain a deeper understanding fo the religioun's ideas, not just on an intellectual level but with a deep feeling, making them part of one's inner experience."
-p295, "The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living", his holiness the Dali Lama and Howard C.Cutler, MD (2009: Riverhead Books)

A little bit of colour on a very dull day

2011-06-15T09:42:00.004-03:00

http://www.faroeviking.etsy.com/

a quote full of grace

2011-06-14T08:58:00.001-03:00

-from Don Quixote, Miguel De Cervantes

"I'll say that he is wise who loveth well,
And that the soul most free is that most bound
In thraldom to the ancient tyrant Love."

Rain inside and out

2011-06-13T21:02:00.000-03:00

The weather outside has pretty much been rainy and that is what the weather calls for for the upcoming week. Outside rain can be rationalized: the flowers need it, it makes the grass bright green, it gives me good hair days, a cup of tea tastes so good (to take off the chill); at some level it makes us connect with being "rugged Canadians"; for those in the country wells are not running dry.... in rain grace can be found.
Where it is harder to find grace is in a house where the weather changes 4 or 5 times a day; chalk it up to teenage hormones, having to make life-choices, past baggage, parenting boo-boos, depression (seasonal affective disorder), asserting ones independence, wanting excitement...what does one wear when facing weather like this?
I'm seriously thinking about wearing my yellow slicker inside to give a hint to eveyrone that I am prepared for whatever they want to through my way. Would seeing mom in a yellow slicker make one stop and think before hailing insults?
Many parents speak of remembering earlier images of their children sleeping peacefully, little smiles on their faces. Those memories are not in an adoptive parent's bag of tricks, as sleeping for children who have been in care is usually sporadic and animated with movement or night terrors.
Present storms are like tornadoes, where there is calm, followed by horrendous wind, chaos, then clean up. Sometimes the next sotrm comes before clean up is barely finished.
Grace is hard to find.
I keep looking, extending a hand, in search for freedom, peace for my children...grace is the enduring hope in the centre of my being, believing that all will be OK.
Tomorrow the clouds may part and the sun come out.

green eyed loving cat seeking a home

2011-06-07T18:40:00.000-03:00

There are times when the church is called to provide shelter for those without a home. This adorable kitty has been living in the church window wells and under the gardening shed for 6 weeks. She needs a home. She is extemely friendly, domesticated, and just wants someone to love her. Do you have space in your heart to welcome this creature of God? If so, please reply to this post or phone 902 2230220.

thunderstorms

2011-06-01T23:18:00.001-03:00

Grace was in the air, as the trees began to anticipate their movement in the symphony about to unfold. I had a front row seat with a friend on his second story balcony. The low rumbles began in the East, rolling West, followed in quick pursuit by lightening. And then it rained; rained hard.
The air changed. The electric particles zapped the pollen out of the air and washed yellow trails to the Bay of Fundy. The air changed, now charged with grace.
The patter of rain, the thunder in the distance the trees swaying and glistening-the air was relaxed. I was relaxed and at union with all that was, all that is, all that will be. I am at rest although not asleep, content -loved by and loving all of creation.
Grace. Through the storm, purified by water-communion.

Personal Best (or Owning the Race)

2011-05-23T13:20:00.000-03:00

It started as an ordinary dinner party -at our house with friends. The meal was high carbed pasta with hubby's homemade pasta sauces, veggie or beef; accompanied by salad and garlic bread. This was the Blue Nose Marathon pre-race dinner. Two of us were really animated...so much energy we wanted the race to start right away.
When the guests left, much of the night was spent lying in bed with adrenaline pumping. Is it possible to use up all of one's carbs through a night of fitful rest, where the body is just thumping with excitement?
And then came the race.
There is nothing like starting a race with the goals of: smiling all the way, being mindful of staying in the moment, and keeping at bay the niggling want to make a personal best and stuffing down the doubts.
The goals were accomplished!!! This in itself made the Blue Nose Half Marathon a personal best.
Running is a gift of grace: to be in one's own space, head high, smile on, relaxed in posture, only seeing road ahead; when there is no jostling by other competitors; when nothing hurts and fatigue seems impossible; when the course is covered in a light fog and cool temperatures; when the kilometers zoom by and the 1:50 pace bunny is behind most of the way; and the race is run exactly as it has been run in one's head a million times.....grace upon grace.
This all makes for a personal best despite the time outcome at the end. ...this is owning the race.
It was a day of personal bests.
The final grace: a half marathon PB 1:51:27!

2011-05-15T15:12:00.001-03:00

EASTER 4A

When I go to Dean’s meetings, we meet at Queen of the Apostles’ Retreat Centre in Mississauga. Once upon a time this retreat centre was on the outskirts of Toronto, in the country; in the midst of woods and fields. Around the retreat centre now are mansions of all shapes and colours –they come in one size -huge.

When entering this community, one sees older stately homes...mostly sensible, with large treed lots and accessible driveways that look like country lanes. The newer mansions are surrounded by over-landscaped land and surrounded by 6 foot high metal rod fencing –black with rod tops pointed in copper or gold filigree. The driveways are made unsurpassable by mammoth gates –wrought iron with ornate letters or designs.

When you picture heaven: do you think mansions, streets paved in gold, pearly gates?

Whether it is jokes about meeting St. Peter at the pearly gates, kids songs about rolling through the pearly gates on roller skates, or a Southern preacher preaching up a storm on Sunday afternoon T.V. revival -preaching glorious crowns and mansions to fill every human desire ---we have all, from a very young age been exposed to images of heaven as images of grandeur.

I enjoy going to Queen of the Apostles Retreat centre, where long halls contain tiny cement blocked rooms, each containing a single bed, chair, and desk. Each room has an attached washroom but shower facilities are shared and when you leave you strip the bed and put new sheets on for the next guest. It is the getting there that is troublesome.

The opulence of the houses, the ridiculously ostentatious gates are enough to make me want to puke.

I have a confession to make to you this morning, our Gospel reading gives me a similar turn in my stomach.

Not because of what it says, but a reaction caused by almost 4 decades of me hearing the kingdom of God being described by Christians in an ostentatious way: a word that the dictionary defines as marked by a vulgar display of wealth and success designed to impress people.

Jesus says to the disciples: I am the gate.

I think about a book that I read as a teenager for high school English. The story was about a girl of about 13, who was pretty close to living on the street, as her home was unstable and chaotic. She went to the local catholic school, the only school in this poor end of the city. The girl loved beauty and she set about finding a place to call her own. Beside the nunnery there was an abandoned lot, fenced in on two sides by buildings and the other two by dirty brick walls. At one time the space had been a garden kept by the nuns, supported by the church –but those days were in the distant past. The girl happened upon the derilict space one day by accident –she pushed through the rusty gate –that was hanging lop-sided on one hinge; to get away from a group of boys who were teasing her.

This gate was so unlike the gates in Mississauga. It was shabby. Rusty. Broken.

Over the months the girl transformed the space into a creative masterpiece. She collected the old pieces of fallen marble statuary and used them to mark off paths. She moved and repurposed debris into a myriad of uses. She made sitting spots, and talking spots. Places to rest. Places to feel joy. Places to feel love.

She would enter in and out of the gate, often bringing with her treasures that she found...she walk around town looking for handfuls of dirt, which she put in her pockets and would empty into her space as the ground was too tough to grow anything. Eventually the girl found a shovel without a handle and a discarded bean. She planted the bean and watched it grow. One day when she arrived and came through the gate a bright red geranium sat in the middle of the garden –it was just there –a love gift from who knows where. She took such care and delight in the plant, in the whole space, and when it was finished enough she invited other outsiders to come and relax in the space; invited them to come and have a place to belong. All came through the rusty gate –that was hanging lop-sided on one hinge; broken.

but once daring to enter through the rusty gate, all found in the space joy and belonging. When leaving all left with at least part of them being less broken.

I have a confession to make this morning, the Gospel reading sits well with me.

Not because of what it says, but the reaction caused by a memory that reinterprets the image of the kingdom of heaven and the gate that one goes through to enter.

Jesus says to the disciples: I am the gate.

Last May I took a course on 20^th Century theology and theologians, at Acadia Divinity College. The first class was opened with devotions presented by the professor. He highlighted Bible passages that he interpreted and translated into his theological understanding of God’s kingdom. He spoke about theologians and that to understand anything they say, it really boils down to grasping their understanding of kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven. To end his devotion he chose a hymn that best described his understanding.

Reading scripture. Interpreting texts. Choosing hymns. Preferred prayers. Living Christian lives –are all done in accordance to our understanding of the kingdom of heaven; beginning with what kind of gate one enters through and is the gate in the future or in the present or both.

It was quite clear through class discussions that our final paper would have to address our vision of the kingdom, and yes to get top marks, it would include finding a hymn that best represented our understanding.

My understanding really goes along with the rusty gate, lop-sided –hanging on one hinge; broken.

Jesus said to the disciples: I am the gate.

The gate was not one who was crowned with a golden crown, but rather a crown of thorns. The gate was not dressed in regal attire, but rather a cast off robe. The gate was not set aside as something beautiful and untouchable -the gate was public, around crowds, around the poor, touchable, go-through-able; no one was turned away from the gate. And in the end the gate was broken on a cross.

And then when the sun/Son rose three days later, there were no pearly gates, no kingly entrance...just open arms, "Peace be with you"; a walk along a road and the breaking of bread.

Because of the gate the whole idea of the kingdom of God changes; it requires a different set of eyes to see through the rust, the brokenness, the cross...and to dare to enter, knowing that it will change our lives forever.

The kingdom of heaven -Maybe it’s not about resting in a big mansion, behind a secure gate, with crowns and trophies for good behaviour....through the gate in the life after there will be worshiping and serving God in creative new ways.

God’s kingdom is not static, a monument to accomplishments, a trophy for a good race –that would make winners and losers. We’re all sinners we’ve already been lost...but through Jesus and Jesus suffering on the cross...the gate has been opened. It remains open forever and always.

Jesus said, "I came that they might have life and have it abundantly." Reflecting on gates I see that abundant living is found not in the fear of needing to secure property, to hide from the world, or to prove something –abundant life is found by a girl who saw the beauty in what was broken and set to giving new life to the pieces. –and then found joy in sharing it with others.

Jesus said to the disciples: I am the gate.

The world is full of rusty gates, lop-sided hanging on one hinge; broken. Dare to open the rusty gate and discover the kingdom of God that unfolds before you and begs you to be a part of. Find beauty in the broken and set about giving new life to the pieces. With the joy you receive share it with others. It is through this gate that you will live and live abundantly.

Bored With Table Grace?

2011-05-11T10:44:00.000-03:00

I never remember a time when my family never said grace before meals. There are favourite graces from my childhood that have stood the test of time and have been used daily in our present household.
As a pastor I get asked to say grace a lot. There are graces that are tried and true but, somehow it feels like one should come up with prophetic words when asked to pray.
This morning I happened upon a web-site that has a vast array of table graces. If you are bored with the graces you are currently using or would like to start giving thanks check this site out:
www.home.pcisys.net/~tbc/mealpryr.htm#prayer11_21

The Road to Emmaus

2011-05-05T14:59:00.000-03:00

This coming Sunday's reading heard through a different medium.

music

2011-05-03T21:35:00.001-03:00

It is a complete God-incident that Fleetwood Macs' "Rumour" album is being highlighted on Glee tonight. The songs are a soothing grace to the emotions I am currently feeling. Music therapy has such healing power; definitely grace. It is just a matter of finding the right music to soothe the troubled spirit.

Easter Sermon

2011-04-24T20:49:00.001-03:00

In my last parish, confirmation students arrived at the church on Tues. afternoons, dropped by their buses after school. The buses never arrived at the same time –so I would have an activity for the students to begin with. One of the activities was put in the kid’s Easter bags this morning.

The activity was a drawing page, where there is a large tree trunk and branch reaching out over a garden. In the background is the tomb with the stone sitting to the side. On the branch is a bird –beak open. The instructions say to write the resurrection story from the eyes of the bird. What happened according to the bird in the tree?

This morning began with yet another interruption in my beauty sleep. As if the raucous band of people entering the garden Thursday night, awakening us from our slumber, scaring us into the air out of our night time rousts, was not enough; Friday followed with a day of weird weather, the sort that had every bird in the district hidden in the nooks and crannies of every tree, the sky was dark in the middle of the day and the air was ominous. As if all this was not enough, this morning, in that time between sleep and awake, I heard faint music, the lilt of women’s voices in quiet conversation. It was beautiful -like listening to crickets, or the coo of a dove – I could have listened all day; but no - then came a sound worse than a blaring alarm clock. The tree shock, rocks cracked, the ground groaned, the women screamed -bang- I was awake.

Yes, as the dust settled and I straightened my feathers, all was not well with the world. I was disturbed, annoyed, put-out. Can I not have one night of real bird sleep? Normal, without interruptions.

But as I watched and felt the morning sun rise over the garden, the air changed, something had happened. And I was right there in the middle of it all.

I overheard Matthew’s version of the story being proclaimed to you earlier. I suppose that is how it happened to the human eye. From the branch of the olive tree, the scene seemed far away, hazy. The story for me is not what I saw, it is what I heard; snippets of songs I had heard before, but now in a new way; snippets of songs sung by my ancestors for centuries –and now human beings had heard them, and were starting to sing them –a little tenuous at first, but as the women left the garden the sound, the first movement of the music started to swell.

The snippets of the creator’s song from that morning were sung in a new light –resurrected. God had never sung love like God sang love on this morning. The angel sang...”do not be afraid” –one of the creator’s favourite tunes. And God sang, not through someone, or something, or a creature, or through the wind...God’s own voice rang clear “he is not here, he has been raised from the dead”; then the angel repeated it to the women, the crickets cheeped it, the ants marched it, the spiders spun it, the dew dripped it, the flowers swayed, the trees waved –the world was alive with God’s growing, resurrected love song. Yes, I was the closest bird...the tune floated to me with the words...”this is my message for you”....and that is the tune I tweeted to the other birds, who in their own languages added to the song, and the message of God dying and rising spread from garden to garden, forest to forest, and ocean to ocean.

Take a moment and think about a time when a piece of music touched you. Think of a time when you heard a song that pulled at your heart, caused an emotional reaction, perhaps tears or goose bumps, or joy so great you had to dance. That piece of music was God’s love song of hope for you at that moment in time. You encountered the resurrected God. God put love in your heart, a lilt in your step, a song on your lips. Isn’t that pretty amazing?! A song, that humans finally heard in a garden 2000 years ago, echoes and continues to be sung now to us, experienced for real, and sometimes even sung through us to others.

For many years I took piano lessons from Mrs. Sudden, who lived in a quaint green house at the other end of the village. You entered her house through the front door, where there was a coat rack, chair and stool –where one waited for their turn. There was a floor to ceiling fenestrated screen that ran from the waiting chair almost to the piano –normal except that there were little mirrors and odd plastic toys twist-tied to it.

As one played the piano, not just plunking out tunes or notes, but when one played a little ditty one started to hear accompaniment. You see, in the darken half of the front room, Mrs. Sudden had a budgie. And did the budgie love to sing, and the better you played the louder the budgie sang.

Apparently the budgie was let out of the cage when students were not in the house. It would take flight, particularly flying up a storm when Mrs.Sudden’s husband played his violin.

The bird loved music. The bird loved to sing. There was no amount of darkness that would keep the bird quiet- when it heard even just a little bit of music.

This is Easter Sunday and we have come to hear the Good News. We have come and heard ALLELULIA, resurrection music. When we leave here today, we return to our lives, to the distractions of the everyday, to those things that trouble us or are weighing on our hearts. The prayer is that this morning you leave with God’s love song of hope resonating in your ears, your heart, your very being –and that at least a little bit of Good News music goes with you, so that despite what darkness may surround you –the music is enough hope that you can do no other than hum, than sing God’s love song that can heal any wound.

We have a story to tell, to sing to the world. The song is one of hope, healing, and resurrection. It is God’s love song, meant to be shared, for there are no copyrights on it. The more we sing Good News, the more we excitedly pass on the chorus –with hummings of hope, jingles of justice, arias of action, rhythms of resurrection - the other budgies will sing; and the better we play and sing, the louder our brother and sister budgies –the world-will sing with us; and ultimately the world will be resurrected through God’s love song.

Good Friday sermon

2011-04-22T13:31:00.001-03:00

GOOD FRIDAY A

It was one of those times; a time of day when the birds should have been singing, when the trees should have been full of birds flitting from here to there, calling back and forth, playing. But it wasn’t. Standing on the porch that day overlooking the treed escarpment and the park below –there should have been birds. But all was silent. That eerie silence that is unsettling; the sort of silence that gives one goose bumps; a silence that says all is not right in the world.

And then it happened, the sky turned a sick shade of green –then from a pregnant pause; a stillness so great one dare not breathe; it came in an immediate wind and the rain began to pour. And at the rain, the immediate world off the porch on which I was standing exhaled the breath it had been holding, a breathe of relief –only rain. But we had groaned knowing the tornado had struck down somewhere nearby.

Friday on the hill, outside Jerusalem –where Jesus and two others with him, one on either side, hang on wooden crosses –the sky has turned a sick shade of green -and one can not but be overwhelmed with the deafening silence.

-silence-

In our everyday lives silence is avoided. We have IPOD’s, Blue-tooths, cell-phones; radios in cars, musak in malls; television or you-tube as background noise. We walk with earphones in, missing the songs of the birds, the tune of the breeze, the rustle of the trees, voices of other human beings. In fact there is so much noise we hear neither God’s love song of hope for a wounded world, or God’s silence.

-neither do we hear, Jesus words: “It is Finished”...or the pregnant pause, a stillness before the last breath.

Where as we stand facing the cross, daring not to breathe we encounter Jesus entering into the fullness of being human –God dares to die –and there is silence

And in the deafening vacuum of silence, Jesus has inhaled in that last breathe -our humanity -pain, vulnerability, suffering, our woundeness...and in the vacuum holds it, holds us...

And sighs out a breathe that is only pure spirit.

And at the breathe, it is as if the sky has opened and the rain begins to pour –tears run down our faces, as we exhale – a breathe of thanksgiving, a breathe of relief – only Jesus. But we have groaned knowing the tornado was meant for us.

After the tornado, after the wind had returned to a breeze, after the sky started returning to a pale blue, the birds slowly ventured out from their hiding places. They quietly hopped from bush to bush, pulled a few worms; a few tweets were heard, slow lament songs echoed on the horizon.

The birds were going to wait and see –

They were going to hold their jubilant song for another day – they, like us, would wait in hope for the su/on to rise.

Maundy Thursday Sermon: April 21

2011-04-21T20:51:00.000-03:00

I grew up in a village, where the lots were quite deep. At the back of our property, just where the swamp began, there was a big old maple tree. It was great for climbing and it held our big tire swing. It was at night as the sun was setting behind it when the tree was at its most magnificent. As evening rolled around, 30mins or so before dusk, the tree was a gackle of activity. Red-winged black birds by the hundreds rested in the tree –singing rocous songs and muting all other creatures in the neighbourhood.

As the sun set, the birds became quiet –the last hurrah for the day was done, and sleep was upon them.

Supper is done and the day is drawing to a close. The last gackle of activity is entering the streets to sing traditional psalms, walk off dinner in the garden, and return to the place where one will spend the night. Jesus and the disciples are out and about migrating towards the garden, just as the birds migrated to the old maple tree. There is singing for awhile but as the sun sinks lower over the western horizon of Jerusalem the garden –the birds, the disciples became quiet – the last hurrah for the day was done, and sleep was upon them.

Well that is how the day had ended so many times before. But tonight was different.

It was the dreams as they drifted off – when one is neither awake nor asleep –when the mind tries to make sense of all the tidbits of songs heard over the past few days –that were an overwhelming cacophony of sound. The disciples minds whirled from all the happenings in the past few days, no wonder they were exhausted: it started with the raising of Lazarus –the disciples trying to tell Jesus not to go towards Jerusalem –for fear that he and they would die; but Thomas had stood up and said “I’ll go, even if it means dying with him.” And that was just the beginning: there was the entry into Jerusalem on a donkey surrounded by a huge crowd, then there was confrontation in the temple as Jesus overturned the tables of the money changers, then the healing of a blind man on the Sabbath and more confrontation with the religious leaders.

Tonight was nice, they had made it to a sit down dinner; in a rented room, where no one knew where they were, and everyone else was busy with their own celebrations anyway. All was good.

But the disciples’ minds, in those moments before sleep, must have thought about dinner and how it was different.

During supper Jesus washed their feet.

During supper Jesus said one of them would betray him.

During supper Jesus said he would only be with them a little longer.

During supper Jesus said Peter would deny him, not once but three times.

During supper Jesus said, “I give you a new commandment that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

And then sleep came and all was quiet.

Quiet until the birds slumbering in the bows of the olive trees were awaken by a noisy group of intruders to the garden. The birds rose upward in a squawk startling the disciples awake.

From here we remember the story, Jesus is carried off for a quick trial and sentencing –the disciples scatter while Peter follows at a distance.

The importance of this account by John is the song that is sung; a song whose melody swirls in the hearts and minds of the disciples enough that through the chaos of the next few days, the song is remembered. It is remembered because the disciples’ hearts didn’t just hear the song, they were invited into it -

Listen...pour water...

Accompanying this melody is the encounter with Jesus –with Jesus hands, with Jesus touch, God’s love song of hope to the wounded.

The action struck a chord, with the disciples –“not my feet”

But God’s music is kind of like a blaring radio, the music is for everyone whether they want to hear it or not, the pounding of a pumped up bass that one feels in their very being –can’t be avoided.

This love song, the disciples remember and it is the song they return to as they form their community. God’s love song, sung through water and Jesus’ hands –plays new variations as it warms, encourages and encounters human hearts. Love blossoms in major and minor chords, swells in arpedigos, crescendos in spirit; God’s love song of hope –through Jesus death –sings through acts of loving kindness; intentional loving of others.

The church, this community, is kind of like the tree from my childhood backyard. Tonight we are birds that have come to rest in a sacred place. As we came in our songs quieted; we settled in for a quiet service –where silence continues well into tomorrow morning.

But God has a surprise for us, God comes to us with Jesus’ command to love one another. We are asked –to start and practice here in a common bird bath – to practice God’s love song of hope with each other; a song to carry us through woundedness, through darkness, through death.

Tonight we are invited to sing love with water, with hands, with a touch.

Come encounter Jesus. Come encounter love.

Dance Your Shoes Off

2011-04-19T11:30:00.000-03:00

"A PERFECT WARRIOR"

2011-04-18T21:40:00.000-03:00

A great movie to redirect one's thoughts and reason for enjoying every moment...
grace was watching this movie and being reminded to walk with one's heart and eyes open.
A whole world of grace opens up when one lives in the moment.

Bright Pink Nail Polish

2011-04-14T16:06:00.000-03:00

Bright pink nail polish, can you imagine that it has recently put a J.Crew ad in the hot seat? The magazine ad page has a mom and her son enjoying an afternoon together. The looks on their faces are full of grace! Looks that any parent would want to exchange with their children. A precious and gracious moment.
Well apparently, people are in a flap because the enjoyment included painting the little boys toenails bright pink. When first looking at the ad, the grace I saw was in the faces and interaction.
The toenails only add to the grace. If a little boy has the self-esteem to wear pink nail polish -go for it. At my age, and being female, I'm still hesitant to wear certain colours of nail polish. To have the grace to be who you are, to wear what you like, and not care what others say...that is awesome. This is definately a lesson I still need to learn and an identity issue to wrestle with.
for the article go to:
www.ca.shine.yahoo/hot-pink-toenailed-boy-in-j--crew-ad-sparks-controversy-20110414

The Power of Words

2011-04-08T09:40:00.000-03:00

15min.

2011-04-07T11:55:00.001-03:00

Look at that! Fifteen minutes in the middle of the day -grace!
I am sitting on a soft leather couch in the church nursery. The sun is coming in the coloured glass windows, sounds are muffled from outside, and it is so peacefully quiet inside. To relax and have a moment to de-compress during the journey to Easter is a gift. My prayer is a few really big sighs, that all might be right in the world as it is in this sacred moment in the nursery where I sit.
May you be blessed with such a moment today. +

MISS READ TEXT

2011-04-04T20:51:00.001-03:00

Today I had a running date with a friend. I was to meet her at her house at 4:30pm and we would run the waterfront. I set out early to run 5k before picking her up.
It was a fast 5k as I was on the heals of another girl who jumped off the curb before me at a stop light. I kept pace and stayed behind her 2 sidewalk squares. She probably was not very happy with me; eventually she pulled over to stretch -my pace bunny who was stretching my capacity was gone. Well, I arrived at my friends apartment buzzer and buzzed; no answer, waited 10 min and tried again, waited a little longer and then set out.
She heard my message and started our waterfront route backwards, almost at her house we met up. Well I was a little on the tired side having now done 10k -she ran the 5k home with me. The GRACE was that I think I would have taken the 2k way home if she wasn't with me. So I did the 15k and feel better for it. AWESOME!

To finish the distance when the pressure was changing, getting damp, and much colder. It was hard to breathe. Thanks for being my grace to day bestie.

(My friend had texted earlier about changing the time, followed by lets do the waterfront. I only read text #two and missed the time change. Missing the text meant a challenge pace run and longer distance for me.)

Diamonds

2011-03-28T20:21:00.000-03:00

Grace is the beauty of priceless diamonds that are somewhat evasive, cannot be produced by human beings, and suddenly surprise. You have seen this precious gift of grace -on a sunny day when looking out over an almost still body of water -the sunshine glistens and sparkles in a fantastic shimmer of light, sparkle, twinkles. It is a breathtaking scene that surprises and delights. The dance of light is brighter than any rock diamond, sequined dress, or disco ball. At the 10.5k part of a run, it is the sigh of a thank-you to the Creator; it is the aha of, "this is why I came out for a run today"; it is the sight to keep one running, in the hopes of seeing the next piece of grace along the way.
May you be blessed with surprising instances of sparkling grace.

when the snow melts away

2011-03-22T20:06:00.000-03:00

Today I was in the front garden raking off the top layer of leaves; the bottom layer is still frozen. Come to discover that the foot board and head board that I had secured to the front of the house, side by side to add dimention to the flower bed, were stolen; both of them. I was disappointed by the discovery and wondered how long it has been without me noticing their disappearance.
What I did find however, was my orange pen that has been missing since December. The orange pen is the one I use when reading to make notes that are my own thoughts, additional to the work being read, that are thoughts related to future thesis writing. That was a fantastic surprise. Better yet, the pen still works.
There were other items I happened upon today that were momentarily waylaid. Grace was in finding the lost!
I wonder if I'll ever find the foot and head boards?

tears

2011-03-17T21:15:00.000-03:00

Yesterday I was sad, close to tears ...just on the brink one might say. But tears are good.
I saw tears today in the eyes of a colleague. I saw tears in the eyes of a daughter. I heard tears from the other end of a phone call. For the past few days I felt tears in the world around me; it rained.
Today amidst the tears sprung sunshine: perhaps it was a lightness of people as they went revelling in green for St.Patty's day, or the crocus and snowdrops, or the distant past being put to rest for one child, or emotions being deflatted ---through tears.
Wet grace.

P.S. never be too strong by holding the tears inside. Let tears fall and share them, perhaps your tears will give permission for someone else to feel wet grace too.

when there are no words

2011-03-13T22:41:00.001-03:00

It has been a horrendous week; in the world, at home, in my very being.
The Prayers of the People, this morning in church, were done during the Kid's Corner. As we sat at the front we talked about sighing -how perhaps during 40 days of fasting in the wilderness that Jesus sighed.
We talked about praying and not always knowing what to say. We talked about the Spirit groaning within/praying when words are too little. So we tried it.
The prayer mentioned the catastrophies in the world - we sighed. as the prayer went on, we sighed more deeply, more prayerfully; tears came and we sighed with thanks for love where we see it and for the breathe of life for this day.
Grace was found where words were gone and all that was was a sigh.

FERN HILL by Dylan Thomas

2011-03-08T09:13:00.000-04:00

Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs

About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,

The night above the dingle starry,

Time let me hail and climb

Golden in the heydays of his eyes,

And honoured among wagons I was prince fo the apple towns

And once below a time I lordly had the trees and leaves

Trail with daisies and barley

Down the rivers fo the windfall light.

And as I was green and carefree, famous among the barns

About the happy yard and singing as the farm was home,

In the sun that is young once only,

Time let me play and be

Golden in the mercy of his means,

And green and golden I was huntsman and herdsman, the calves

Sang to my hornm the foxes on the hills barked clear and cold,

And the sabbath rang slowly

In the pebbles of the holy streams.

All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay

Fields hig as the house, the tunes from teh chimneys, it was air

and plying, lovely and watery

And fire green as grass.

And nightly under the simple stars

As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away,

All the moon long I heard, blessed among stables, the nightjars

Flying with the ricks, and the horses

Flashing into the dark.

And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white

With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder: it was all

Shining, it was Adam and maiden,

The sky gathered again

And the sun grew round that very day.

So it must have been after the brith of the simple light

In the first, spinning place, the spellbound horses walking warm

Our of the whinnying green stable

On to the fields of praise.

And honoured among foxes and pheasants by the gay house

Under the new made clouds and happy as the heart was ong,

In the sun born over and over,

I ran my heedless ways,

My wishes raced through the house high hay

And nothing i cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows

In all his tuneful turning so few and such monring songs

Befor ethe children green and golden

Follow him out of grace,

Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me

Up to the swallow throughed loft by the shadow o fmy hand,

In the moon that is always rising,

Nor that riding to sleep

I should hear him fly with the high fields

And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.

Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,

Time held me green and dying

Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

home spa

2011-03-06T20:51:00.001-04:00

There is nothing better than 11 hours of sleep last night; I need say no more!

Obis form

2011-03-03T20:28:00.000-04:00

Presently it is 8:23pm. For the past hour I have thought of one thing, going to bed as I have been rather tired all day. When I finish this post, I am going to get out fresh Egyptian cotton sheets, strip and remake our obis form mattress. Then I will crawl in with an academic book (as these occupy my thoughts so the mind doesn't go wild when trying to sleep after the light goes out) and put my head on my chiropractic pillow. Ahhh. Grace to be found in surrounding soft comfort. Happy and blessed dreams to all of you.