Beauty and Broken

As the bread was broken,
You could see the priests hand work hard,
She sunk the tips of her fingers into the crust,
The tightness of her grip as she tugged,
Crumbs scattered across the white clothe.
It was like brokenness in our own lives.
When we face that which pushes through our tough exterior.
When a word sinks deep into the crust of our skin.
When our hand forms a fist and our soul grips.
When crumbles of our five-year plans scatter and shatter.

Broken bread can be like our lives.
Broken bread is what we see around us.
Children hurting and crying and hungry.
Fellow humans hurting and harmed.
People seen only as a means to an end.
Respect, love, God-bearing become like crumbs on the clothe of our common humanity.

But that is never the last word.
Christ takes a cup.
Ordinary yet beautiful.
Everyday yet extraordinary.
Overflows that cup with more than a trace of God's grace.

We come with hands in the form of a cup ready to receive.
We come ready to take the brokenness we know all too well
And then soak, saturate that bread in the juice.
With the child-like wonder of dunking a cookie in milk.
Because this is life.
Bread and juice.
Hurt and hope.
That which can never be put back together (a broken loaf of bread)
With that which can always be poured back, even when divided (a cup of juice).
Beauty and brokenness together.

This is communion...God's prayer for all creation.
God's dream for today.
Taste and see, God is good ~~ there is more than a trace of grace in this holy moment.

Amen.