Put Down the Mask

 

Just as the season of Lent lingers, so does the season of exploring and experimenting with being an Easter-ing people.  Lent is forty days from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday (February 18-April 5 this year, not including Sundays.  If you are wondering why, it's because we live on the other side of the first Easter; so we do not count Sundays in Lent.  Every Sunday is supposed to be Easter Sunday, even in Lent.)  Lent lingers like a house guest that hasn’t caught on to the social cues that you’d like them to leave.  Even when you turn off the lights and start cleaning up the kitchen, Lent comes in and has the gall to start drying the dishes, patiently/persistently waiting for you to listen to your shy soul.  Lent prepares us to roll back the stones that block and barricade our lives.

 

We live in a culture where vulnerability is seen as a liability.  We deny and dismiss our own biases and brokenness.  We don’t like to admit that, like Lazarus, we are bound by the wounds and wants that keep us up at night.  And lest you think that you are beyond shadow boxing with yourself; lest you think that you have dealt with your own demons that make every day Halloween; I want to invite you this week to listen to the stories you tell about yourself to others.

 

Do you tell stories about how you have it all figured out, and people just need to listen to you?

Do you tell stories about how someone else has done you wrong, and your life is always singing the blues?

Do you tell stories about how you continue to succeed even when others are out to get you?

Do you tell stories about how you are such a bumbling, stumbling idiot that, amazingly, you can dress yourself?

Do you tell stories that cause you to puff out your chest or hang your head or maybe you find yourself on the sidelines silently praying that people will notice you, and at the same time hoping they don’t see you, because you don’t know what you’d say?

 

We are complex, contradictory, and compartmentalized people.  We often think that we should be further along than others in our comparison-addicted culture.  Then, in the stillness of the night, when all the words we say to someone else, or we replay the words we absorbed from others, we wrestle with our shadow. 

 

Easter lingers even longer than Lent.  Easter is fifty days.  Easter began a month ago and still has a month to go until Pentecost on May 24^th.  At the halfway point, can you and I listen to the words that fall from our lips and the ones that we think but don’t dare say aloud?  Sometimes we can put on the mask of kindness while in our minds we are fuming and frustrated.  Sometimes we let loose our tongue with anger and judgment, thinking we are prophetic or righteous.  Sometimes we don’t know what to think, say, or do, or be in this world today. 

 

Pause and breathe in.

 

You are the beloved of God.  Full stop.  Period.  This claim was affirmed at your baptism and can be celebrated with every splash in the ocean, washing of your hands, and sip of cool water as the weather turns warmer.

 

How might you live as God’s beloved Easter-ing person this week?  Let that question interrupt and intercede in your life this day and in the days to come.  Amen.

Prayer

 

What Creation Preaches

 

The unfathomable cosmos came into being at the word of the Eternal’s imagination, a solitary voice in endless darkness. The breath of God’s mouth whispered the sea of stars into existence.
God gathers every drop of every ocean as in a jar, securing the ocean depths as God’s watery treasure.

Let all people stand in awe of the Eternal; let every man, woman, and child live in wonder of the Creator/Gardener/Composer of the symphony of life.  Psalm 33

 

Creation is God’s first testament.  Before there was a Bible, there was creation.  The world around was alive with the glory of God.  Before people read the Bible, birds preached through songs, while the stars above drew people’s attention to the vastness and unknowingness of the world.  Before people gathered around a book with leather binding and tiny print that is getting harder for me to read, it was a campfire under starlit nights that called people to ponder the meaning of life.  To be sure, I can be lost in wonder, love, and praise while gardening or mowing my grass or hiking in a forest.  This is not my everyday experience.  Too often, I am sheltered (and I think I am shielded) by cars, roofs, and walls.  Too often, this constant disconnection from the earth leads to disorientation and even dis-ease within me.  I can be lured to believe that rain, which is needed and necessary, is an inconvenience to my plans.  I can be lured to think that I can weather and withstand every storm ~ but some are stronger than a hurricane or hurt worse than baseball-sized hail.  I can be lured from interacting with the world, which continues to be how God shows up and sings out each day.

 

Today, I invite you to go outside.  You can go for a walk.  You can wade in the water.  You could sit on a chair on your porch/lanai/under a tree.  The invitation is to pay attention to what you are seeing/smelling/hearing/tasting/experiencing.  Let your five senses be open to the One who can be encountered in more ways than we can explore or exhaust in one life.  Let your mind, heart, and soul find alignment with the world that is mysterious and marvelous.  Let Creation connect to you, because you are part of creation.  Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor says, “The body is a great focuser, whether the means is pain or pleasure. The body is a great reminder of where we came from and where we are going, on the one sacred journey that we all make, whether we mean to or not.”  Today, connect with the creation with which we are caught in a web of mutuality.  You cannot exist without water, or the nutrients of the carrots that grow in the dirt, or the oxygen invisibly floating around you/yet sustaining you, trees to absorb your carbon dioxide, and the sun that warms your skin.  Listen to our original Gardener, who is still tending the garden of your soul.  Amen.

Earth Day and Easter

 

Happy Earth Day ~ consider the soil in your soul ~ the good earth from which God fashions and forms you into being.  Consider the water that renews and re- stories you.  Pause ~ how can water help you write another story that is soaked by the sacred of God’s baptismal promise to you?  Consider the birds singing, the tree of your life growing in the forest of others.  Slowly read these words:

 

God’s glory is on tour in the skies, God-craft on exhibit across the horizon.
Madame Day holds classes every morning, and Professor Night lectures each evening.

Their words aren’t heard, their voices aren’t recorded,
But their silence fills the earth: unspoken truth is spoken everywhere.  Psalm 19

 

Day and Night have something to teach and tell us.  Too often, we are tripped up and trapped by an either/or view of the world.  We classify and compartmentalize everything (and everyone).  Yet, day and night each preach and proclaim truths for our life, the Psalmist says.  Day can teach us to notice and name what we might miss when the sun sets.  Daytime can help expand our gaze beyond the intimate and immediate ~ to the horizon.  Daytime is when the subtle, even subversive, details come into focus.  And daytime can blind us if we stare at the blazing sun too long.  Daytime can lure us into complacency, especially when the surroundings are familiar.  We can push our bodies too far during the day, thinking that “we’ve gotta make hay while the sun is shining.”  Such overstimulation from over-caffeination causes our souls to grow weary and worn down.

 

Night can teach us to slow down and focus our attention on the next step, because we cannot see for miles and miles.  Nighttime reveals the stars that are always there, but are shut out because of the brighter sun.  Nighttime invites the body to reset, renew, and rest.  Night sharpens our hearing.  Night can also be when all the things we said and did that day come back for a visit ~ not always in a way we welcome or want.  At night, we can rehearse and replay a meeting where our jaw was set on edge or face the uncertainty of a medical condition.

 

What else would you add to the above lists?  What are the blessings and brokenness of day and of night?  What causes your soul to leap in joy in day and at night?  Ponder what Madame Day and Professor Night are trying to tell you?  Listen.  Lean in.  Learn from the power of every hour, for each moment is saturated and soaked with the Sacred.  Amen.

What Tree Would You Be?

 

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season.  Psalm 1

 

I often wonder if the Psalms were written while the prophet/poet was wandering in the wilderness of the world.  Psalm 1 draws on the image of creation ~ God’s creativity seen in clouds and heard in birds and felt in breezes with the sun on our face, which in turn can infuse and inspire our imaginations of faithfulness.  When we read the Psalms inside under the hum of fluorescent lights and the breeze from air that has been filtered and conditioned with chemicals to keep us cool, we might miss the metaphor.  Please don’t hear me complaining, I couldn’t live in Florida without air conditioning!  Yet, the Psalmists lived closer to the earth, soil, dirt, and dust from which we are all made.  The soles of the Psalmist's feet touched the sandy soil of the earth, felt the fear of storms raging in their face, and knew the beauty of a starry night where no light pollution could drive away the darkness.  The Psalmist was intimately interwoven with creation.  The very first Psalm draws on the image of your life being like a tree.  This gives the reader pause:

 

What kind of tree would you like to be?  A redwood?  A sugar maple producing delicious syrup?  A dwarf willow that creeps on the ground rather than reaching for the sky?  An ordinary tree that blends into the background?  A palm tree waving in the salt sea air?

 

What would the bark of your tree feel like, look like, taste like?

 

What about the rings of your tree?  Have there been years of tremendous growth when the circle in your soul is wide and years of scarcity where the ring is narrow/tight, trying to conserve energy?

 

Today, go out and touch a tree, listening to the wisdom of creation ~ absorbing the holiness of this part of God’s creation.  Consider what is nourishing your soul?

 

Where are your roots twisted and tangled with others in the forest of life?  Your tree is connected to those in our church, neighbors, friends, family, and people whose path you cross now and again.

 

What fruit comes from your tree?  Is your fruit sweet or savory or maybe you are in winter right now, where there is no fruit, as your roots are conserving energy?  Is your fruit ready or still slowly ripening? 

 

Let this metaphor infuse and inspire your imagination, deepening your faith in these days. Amen

Resurrection and Creation

 

As we celebrate Earth Day this week, I love how the resurrection mystery and marvel happen outside the confines of air conditioning.  Resurrection doesn’t happen in cramped and confining buildings, but in the beauty of God’s creation.

 

Consider John 20, which we heard on Easter, where the setting is a garden, echoing Genesis 2 and 3.

Consider Luke 24, which we heard on Sunday: Jesus appears to Cleopas and his friend, partner, or companion on a dusty road of life.

Consider Matthew 28, The Great Commission to the disciples (who let’s face it had serious doubts about the resurrection ~ which can give us hope) happens on a mountain, echoing the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7)

Consider John 21, where Jesus cooks breakfast on a beach for the disciples, trying to process the pain and promise of being an Easter people.

 

Creation amplifies one of the formational and foundational truths of Easter because creation displays and helps us discover/discern the cycle of birth, life, death, and resurrection each year, called “The four seasons”.

 

During Lent, I invited you to ponder the season of your life connected to the image of a grape vine.  I offered a brief description of how a grapevine goes through the seasons.  Here is a reminder:

In Winter ~ the grapevine is pruned.  It is common to remove 80-90% of the biomass during pruning.  But great care is used not to cut the buds that will be next season’s growth.  It takes a prayerful, careful eye and skill not just to whack randomly on the vine, but to notice the small green shoots that need the nourishment of the winter resting to begin to grow.

In Spring ~ the buds now burst and break forth in growth.  The bud swells and reveals new leaves.  There is a flowering that happens.  The vine continues to absorb water and nutrients through the roots as the leaves undergo photosynthesis ~ note there are no visible grapes yet.

In Summer ~ the grapevine flowers begin to bring forth young grapes that will swell, ripen, and gain color and flavor.  Vine growth slows down as the focus shifts to sending all the energy, nutrients, and resources to the fruit.  There is a slow ripening on the vine that cannot be sped up.

During Harvest season, it is all hands on deck ~ trying to get the fruit off the vines ~ note that this is the busiest time.  And note, this is where modern life tells us to live all the time!!

In Autumn ~ the grapevine begins to rest, the vine slows down to conserve energy.  The leaves change colors and fall away.  This is a dormant state of rest for the next season.

 

Do not forget that there is a weathered and worn fence that supports the vine.  This is what holds you up every season.  The fence may look different.  Your fence is made up of friends and family, authors who give us new ideas, and the church as a safe space to be who you are and what you are.  The fence can also be out in creation, breathing in God’s love next to a tree that has weathered many storms and sunny days. 

 

Today, consider how resurrection happens outside and venture out to stand in the sun, soaking in the vitamin D that we all need ~ because our souls are solar-powered.  May the One who wrote the truth of life into the seasons be felt, experienced, seen, and encountered this day and this Earth Day week.  Amen.

Prayer