Prayer for the Stretched and Stressed

 

Perplexing, puzzling, playful, praising God, thank you for words of wisdom that meet us where we are, stretch us to new shapes we did not think possible, and for new insights that dance in our hearts.  Help us, for we are always trying/striving/searching to reconcile the Sermon on the Mount with the Gospels of the World.  We are continually formed, not just in Your image God, but by a world that grumbles about gas prices, exhausted by our own busy schedules because we are not sure how to say, “No”, and feeling that “not enoughness” even as You continually call to us with “belovedness”.  God, we pray You would gospel our lives with the Sermon on the Mount, meet us in moments of fascination and frustration and form us to faithfulness with Your light of love.  Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, for the living of this day and the days to come, O God of grace and glory.  In the name of the One whose words we have wrestled with and sought a blessing from, Jesus the Christ.  Amen. 

The Persistent Insistent Sermon

 

The Beatitudes, far from being a new set of virtues that further divide the religious haves and have nots, are words of hope and healing to those who have been marginalized.  James Bryan Smith.

 

When God wants to sort out the world, as the Beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount make clear, God doesn’t send in tanks. God sends in the meek, the broken, the justice hungry, the peacemakers, the pure-hearted and so.  N.T. Wright

 

“Jesus understood that God does not play by our rules. Jesus’ God is a generous God, who not only allows the sun to shine on both the just and the unjust, but also gives us the ability to live into what should be rather than what is. The parables help us with their lessons about generosity: sharing joy, providing for others, recognizing the potential of small investments. His God wants us to be better than we are, because we have the potential to be. We are made but a little lower than the divine (Ps. 8.6; see Heb. 2.7); we should start acting in a more heavenly matter. Those who pray, “Your kingdom come,” might want to take some responsibility in the process, and so work in partnership with God.  Amy-Jill Levine

 

Imagine a world in which people really tried to live by the Beatitudes. Well, we can do more than imagine it. We can help bring such a peaceful, loving world into existence by following the One who told us how we can be blessed. And we can begin today. May it be so.  Anonymous

 

The above quotes are offered, not to help you ‘solve’ or ‘resolve’ the Beatitudes.  Jesus’ words are not just speechifying but showing us the wayless way of life and faith mixed messily together.  There is no way one week of morning meditations or five days of re-reading the Sermon on the Mount will make everything more palatable and polite.  These words have a rawness to us, an unfinished/unvarnished edge that might give us splinters.  Yet, these words can be foundational to our faith.  These words can form and reform us as we re-read them.  In the coming weeks we will continue to explore the Sermon on the Mount.  For today, re-read chapters.  Revisit what you wrote down on Monday for what perplexed you and what inspired you.  Whereas Monday you might have been shouting, “Amen” to the line about “Blessed are the pure in heart.”  Today, you might be holding your wounded heart from someone trampling on it with their good advice for which you did not ask.  Maybe someone stomped on your idea at a meeting or generally decided to pass along their pain to you ~ and now you are lugging that in the luggage of your life.  We come back to the words of Jesus time and time again to let the words find us right where we are.  May God move in each syllable and sentence and in your very soul this day.  Amen.

#Blessed??

 

Blessed ~ what comes into your mind when you hear that word?  Is blessing based on external evidence that we can point to and prove your point?  Is blessing tied and tethered to the balance of your bank account or vacation plans or everything going according to your plotting and planning?  It is good to remind ourselves that within Christianity there remains a stream of thought that is called, “the Prosperity Gospel” …and essentially that is what you get when you mix capitalism and Christianity in the laboratory of your life.  You will hear things like, “God wants you to be rich or live your best life ever!”  What is so difficult/demanding is that there is part of us that wants to believe that God and Goodness are infinitely tied together.  Yet, goodness is not perfection.  What is good, may not make it into our top ten moments of life ever!  Good can be a sip of coffee on a chilly Florida day.  Good can be a hug that comes at just the right time, even though it doesn’t duct tape your broken heart back together.  Good can be breathing and being, showing up even when you are not convinced it made a difference. 

 

And, to name the elephant in the room, the goodness Jesus speaks of in the Sermon on the Mount are the very experiences and encounters we tend to question whether God really exists.  Jesus juxtaposes contradictions.  Blessed are the poor?  Well, maybe when they have a good job and house, but not when scrapping together.  Or, we can idealize poverty as somehow being closer to God, like monks and nuns who take vows to never own anything.  I believe the Beatitudes should feel like nailing Jello to the wall, because these words are not just spoken to our minds, but to our whole lives.  This is not just intellectual ascent, but a reordering of a whole system (political, economic, social, and religious) that might cause us to question why we are doing what we are doing.  And of course, most of the time, people like the status quo and prefer that you not ruffle their feathers, thank you very much!

 

There is no one way to solve this Rubix Cube-like puzzle of faith.  I imagine the disciples’ jaws dropping when they heard these words.  “What in the name of Yahweh are you talking about, Jesus?”  God continues to surprise earth with heaven in ways we don’t understand but we stand under to guide us.  I invite you to pick one of the beatitudes today and sit with the mystery shoved in a puzzled stuffed in an enigma that it is.  And I would love to hear your insights and questions into what you uncover as you do this.  May God’s wisdom continue to challenge us in life-giving, discipleship-forming, and never-finished-with-us-ways in these days. Amen.

Sermon on the Mount

 

Yesterday, we read the whole Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5-7.  I invited you to sit with places Jesus’ words fascinated you and where these words frustrated you.  I invited you to hold places where you wanted to know more and where you were ready to storm off the mountain side in a huff.  Following Jesus is not always smooth sailing on calm seas.  The life of faith is not an insurance policy or money back guarantee to the “good life”.  If anything, God is continually turning our world upside down…or I am convinced…right side up.  We heard this a month ago at Christmas, when we pondered, what if we had the courage of Joseph to stand with those who are poor and poor in spirit, those who mourn and are meek (which can also mean strength under control), those who are hungry and those who are hurt by systems of oppression?  This will not earn us fame or fortune or followers on social media.  Oh, sure, initially you can make a splash by sharing love and at some point, people will be saying, “That isn’t the way we have done things around here.”  Jesus starts off the sermon with the Beatitudes, Matthew 5:1-12.  I invite you to re-read those today.  As you read, pause after each verse and ponder who you know or how your story finds space and a place in what Jesus says.  Or maybe where the statement so shatters the status quo of the place we call “home”?

 

For example, as you read, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”, who are poor in spirit?  What does that phrase, “poor in spirit” even mean to you?  Does it mean that the person’s soul is empty?  Or there are too many cobwebs amid the cardboard boxes of emotional life shoved into the corners (that describes me all too often)?  Is poverty a financial condition or a way of being in the world?  I know people who take endless vacations to exotic destination and locations but often come back mumbling and grumbling that the plane was five minutes delayed, and the food was meh and the biggest ball of twine is sooooo overrated, even though they snapped countless selfies in front of it and posted online that it was the, “Best. Day. EVER!”.  Poverty is an expansive and evolving word.  We don’t need to confine the definition of poverty to one box.  Who and where and how has the word, ‘poverty’ been a lived reality in your life.  I can think of my childhood when my dad lost his job, and we had to go on food stamps and had grilled cheese sandwiches with block cheese we picked up from the Union headquarters trying to help us out.  I think of my parents barely making ends meet.  And I think of the beloved of God I saw this morning in a sleeping bag on the streets.  Thirteen words of Jesus can stir so much within us when we sit with, hold and are held by these words. 

 

When have you mourned and what are you grieving right now, because grief is always a thread and theme in life.  Where are you feeling meek, maybe silenced on the sideline, what are you hungry for both in your stomach and in your soul?  Where do you long for mercy and where do you resist mercy for another?  I pray you will let these words simmer in your soul and sing to your heart.  May your mind, heart, soul, and life start to discover/uncover ways of blessing in the very places/times our world says have no blessing at all ~ because God is everywhere ~ especially in messy manger and unpolished/less-than-perfect stables of your life and mine.  With God’s love.  Amen.

Sermon on the Mount

 

As January winds down and wraps up, as 2025 continues to unfold in unforeseen and uncertain ways, we may wonder, where might we ground ourselves amid the shifting sand of the world today?  What can guide us in ways that are life-giving?  Are we searching for comfort and confirmation or that God will stretch us and shape us in new/sacred ways?  Over the next few weeks, we will focus on the Sermon on the Mount ~ a collection of wisdom Jesus spoke on a mountain to his disciples then and to you/me/we as disciples today.  I invite you today to read the whole Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). 

 

Wait, you think, can he assign homework in these morning meditations?

 

To be sure, you don’t have to do this.  In fact, if life is too frenzied and fragile right now, maybe you take a hard pass on this.  Or maybe, if life seems to be unraveling like a sweater caught on something…if life is spreading you thin ~ like too little butter on a piece of dry burnt toast (thanks to J.R. Tolkien for that image), this might actually be a way to center yourself in wisdom beyond the color commentary in your mind that keeps pointing out all the places you bumble and stumble and fall flat (splat) on your face.

 

Slowly read Matthew 5-7.  As you do, where do you find your soul strangely warmed ~ write down chapter and verse.  Where does your inner defense attorney yell, “Objection” to what Jesus is saying?  Where do you roll your eyes thinking, “Nice try, Jesus, but that ain’t going work with Ted, because we all know Ted just love to stir the pot and get people’s goat!”

 

Where do you find your eyes glazing over as you read these three chapters?

 

To be clear, I can find the Sermon on the Mount perplexing and provocative, stretching me sometimes in ways I don’t want to be stretched (says my inner teenager protesting and slamming the door to my soul).  And yet, I come back to these chapters as central to our shared faith and ways to embrace/embody the faith today.

 

Sit with this sermon.  One of my favorite quotes about the Sermon on the Mount comes from Amy Jill Levine who says, “If Jesus had preached this whole sermon at one time…the disciples’ heads would have exploded!”  It is too much…which is why we are going to slow down with this wisdom of Jesus to see what is provoked and evoke within us.  Today, I invite you to get an overview ~ see the forest for the trees ~ to see what threads and themes you can pick up on in these chapters.  As always, if you want to talk, my door is wide open to chat ~ as a Bible nerd there is nothing, I love more than diving and dwelling in Scripture.  Happy reading…with God’s love.

Dr. King Week Conclusion

 

Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely rational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this 'hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

 

In the musical Rent (I know SO MANY musical references in the same week!), there is a hauntingly holy number that is simply a repeated refrain sung over and over.  The words are:

 

Will I lose my dignity?

Will someone care?

Will I wake tomorrow

From this nightmare?

 

These questions for me get to the heart of the human condition.  We all wonder about losing our dignity, identity, respectability, getting voted off the island and having our torch extinguished.  We lose our dignity when we say something that is immediately rejected or when a family member does something to hurt us or when a friend doesn’t call back.  We all wonder who cares and we want to wake from the nightmares individually and collectively ~ the struggle and strife stirring in your soul today.  The fact that these words were written in the early 1990s but are still as relevant and resonate within our souls today says something about the human condition.  Where and with whom do you worry about losing your dignity or don’t feel you can act with integrity (which is to say with your heart, head, soul, and body in alignment)?  Where are you wondering if anyone cares or sees you?  What do you want to wake up from?  What world do you long to wake up to?  Who rules that world where you long to live?  Money?  Fame?  Followers on social?  Or God’s vulnerable compassion and care born in a manger?  May God, who doesn’t always offer immediate answers, but helps us live the questions day-by-day continue to stir and swirl in your heart as the first month of 2025 begins to wrap up and wind down.  With great love and care to you!  Amen.

Dr. King continued

 

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."  

 

Continue to dwell with me in quotes from Dr. King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail.  The process remains the same today.  I invite you to read it first to see what word or sentence jumps off the page at you?  What emotions are provoked and evoked in the reading.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a second time, this time pondering where do these words challenge you. Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a final time to see how God, who is still speaking, is singing to you in these words. 

 

Where is justice being denied right now, today?

Where do we shout, “wait” and really mean “never”?

Where do we drag our feet, both as a country and as a church?

Where do we dig in and pour our energy, especially as a church who has three covenants with God and each other to live?

How might we embody our covenants individually and collectively?

 

I pray Dr. King’s words continue to spark and fan to flame the passion to be God’s people of justice, love, and especially follower of the Jesus way in these days.  Amen.

Dr. King continued

 

You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling, for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks to so dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking.   But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth.

We continue to dive and dwell into Dr. King’s words from a Birmingham Jail.  So far this week we have considered the challenge to find the network of mutuality amid the fraying state of our countries ties to each other across neighborhoods, state lines, and especially the political divide that is wider than the Grand Canyon.  I find myself confessing that as a country we have been a people who often choose violence over love.  I find myself confessing how much loathing has an exhilaration to it (Yes, that is a quote from a song from Wicked, bonus points if you caught it).  I find myself confessing that my clinging to information as a weapon of transformation doesn’t work and isn’t helpful.  Today, the quote above teaches us about non-violent actions.  As with the previous days, I invite you to read it first to see what word or sentence jumps off the page at you?  What emotions are provoked and evoked in the reading.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a second time, this time pondering where do these words challenge you. Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a final time to see how God, who is still speaking, is singing to you in these words. 

Where do you find constructive, nonviolent tension necessary for growth in your life today?  Where can the church lean in, learn from, and live out these words in ways that continue to share God’s care for all people and all creatures. 

Where might this tension push some people way?  Dr. King wrote this letter to white ministers who were uncomfortable with his presence in Birmingham and called for him to “wait”.  Too often we want to kick the can down the proverbial road rather than deal with the brokenness of the world before us.  Too often we stand silent on the sideline rather than engage in conversation that awakens all kinds of emotions within us.  Too often we get cynical and critical of efforts because, in a world where we crave immediate and instant gratification and resolution, we don’t like messy mangers ~ even though that was where God is born.  There is no perfectly polished law that will solve everything, regardless of what a politician tells you.  There is no magic wand to take away all the wounds of the world.  What there is God working through us, especially when we are open to God’s guidance and grace each day.  May these words continue to challenge us and call us to be God’s people in these days.  Amen.

Dr. King continued

 

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action. 

 

This week we are letting the words of Dr. King unsettled our souls, move us from complacency into engaging the broken/bruised/beloved world God cares so deeply about.  Each day, I will offer a quote from the letter.  I want you to read the quote three times.  Read it first to see what word or sentence jumps off the page at you?  What emotions are provoked and evoked in the reading.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a second time, this time pondering where do these words challenge you.  For example, how do you collect “facts” on days when we are caught in the spin cycle of cable news?  If agreeing on the “facts” isn’t hard enough, which it is, what do we do when people disagree about the injustice taking place?  Too often, even if we can come to consensus on the evidence, the direction and destination that takes individuals is drastically different.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a final time to see how God, who is still speaking, is singing to you in these words.  One of the important parts of Dr. King’s words for me is “self-purification”.  This is not self-improvement; this is not self-assuredness.  To use a word that has fallen out of favor, this is “confession”.  Pastor Tim Keller once said, “If your god never disagrees with you, you might just be worshipping an idealized version of yourself.”  It is not God on our side but being on God’s side which will always stretch us beyond our own self-limiting abilities.  How might you engage in these four steps?  Or maybe you disagree with these four steps.  Or maybe there needs to be more than four steps.  Hold the wisdom here in these words. 

 

Bonus, Bible Nerd Fun challenge, compare Dr. King’s words to Matthew 18:15-17:

¹⁵ “If your brother or sister sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If you are listened to, you have regained that one. ¹⁶ But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. ¹⁷ If that person refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church, and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a gentile and a tax collector.

 

May God’s presence continue to infuse and inspire our living in these days.  Amen.

Dr. King

 

Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

 

Today our nation honors Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Today our nation inaugurates a new president.  Today our nation still struggles with segregation and separation, with hatred and harming each other.  Today our nation still wrestles with the question from the musical Hamilton, “Are we a nation of states, what’s the state of our nation?”  That is, what really unites us? 

 

Pause…pray that question.  What really unites us with neighbors, community, from sea to shining sea?

 

Unfortunately, my mind wonders if it is money and our desire for just a little bit more?  Scanning the news, I wonder if it is the way we continue to “other” people, because we are all convinced that “they” are the problem?  Is the way we refuse to recognize that we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality ~ that our Seamstress God has woven us together along with all creation with threads of love that have become unraveled and revealed a world that most of us were not taught in school about what our nations is all about? 

 

This week, I want to return to the words of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Letter from Birmingham Jail.  If you would like to discuss the whole letter, which is very much worthy of a read in such a time as this, please join Sacred Conversations on Race this Wednesday at 3 p.m.  Each day, I will offer a quote from the letter.  I want you to read the quote three times.  Read it first to see what word or sentence jumps off the page at you?  What emotions are provoked and evoked in the reading.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a second time, this time pondering where do these words challenge you?  For example, how in the world do I live in our country today where the “outside agitator” ideal is played out nightly on the news?  That stretches me beyond my own ability.  Pause, sit with what is stirring in you.  Read the words a final time to see how God, who is still speaking, is singing to you in these words.  I pray you find ways to let Dr. King’s words settled, sting, speak, stretch, and search your soul and mine as we seek to be the people of God in such a time as this. Amen.

Baptismal Prayer

 

God, You sang and surfed over the watery chaos in the beginning.  Sing to the places and spaces that slosh and surge with chaos within and around me.  God, You set a rainbow as a promise in the midst of the flood, let Your colors of creations remind me of Your presence as I try to keep my head above water.  You wrestled with Jacob and blessed him (and set his hip out of place), but bless me in our holy wrestling God, even as I limp right now.  Sea parting, tree planting by waters, weeping, always washing over us God, let Your baptismal love drench me right now.  Saturate and soak me in ways that renew me to be full of Your love.  When the voices of my inner critic start to clamor, help me breathe.  When the world out there seems too uncontrollable and chaotic, help me be.  When I want to run away, help me be a presence in the world in a way that shines and shares the truth that You are not finished.  Meet me in this moment and every moment in the days to come.  Remind me that You call each of us, “Beloved” to our aching hearts and wanting souls and less than glimmer lives.  Let each of us rest in You now and in the days to come.  Amen. 

A Baptismal Blessing for You

 

As we continue to hold and be held by our baptism, I invite you today to hear these prayerful and powerful words of Jan Richardson:

 

As if we could call you
anything other than
beloved
and blessed

drenched as we are
in our love for you

washed as we are
by our delight in you

born anew as we are
by the grace that flows
from the heart of the one
who bore you to us.

Beginning with Beloved ~ A Blessing

Begin here:

Beloved.

Is there any other word needs saying,
any other blessing could compare with this name,
this knowing?

Beloved.

Comes like a mercy to the ear that has never heard it.
Comes like a river to the body that has never seen such grace.

Beloved.

Comes holy to the heart aching to be new.
Comes healing to the soul wanting to begin again.

Beloved.

Keep saying it and though it may sound strange at first,
watch how it becomes part of you,
how it becomes you, as if you never could have known yourself anything else,
as if you could ever have been other than this:

Beloved.

 

May this truth of who and whose you are wash over you this day and throughout the rest of the year.  Amen.

Baptismal Belovedness Part 3

 

We have been to the wilderness, waded in the Jordon with Mark and Luke so far this week to hear of Jesus’ baptism.  Today, we lean in and listen to Matthew who expands on the narrative of this sacred ritual.  From Matthew 3

 

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him.  John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”  But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for it is proper for us in this way to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw God’s Spirit descending like a dove and alighting on him.  And a voice from the heavens said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

 

I love how Matthew has John the Baptizer protest that the roles need to be reversed.  There are many moments in our lives that we can feel in over our heads or like an imposture.  We can feel like everyone else got the manual for life and apparently, we were absent that day from school (darn chicken pox!!).  In a culture that thrives on comparison and competition and who can post the best photo/video to social media to increase likes and followers, it feels like we are skimming the surface of life in many ways. 

 

Today, I invite you to take a coffee cup or glass or Tupperware container ~ anything where there is an outside and inside.  Think about the names/roles/ways you are perceived and received by the world.  If I had a sharpie, I could write on the outside of my mug words like, “Husband”, “Father”, “Pastor”, “Writer”, “Jogger”, “Amateur Photographer”, “Wannabe Poet”, etc.  But what to write on the inside?  This is where it goes a bit more personal, even uncomfortable.  Because I might write words like, “Addicted to work”, “Sometimes I feel like God’s employee not God’s beloved”, “Thirsty for joy”, “Longing for peace”, “Hungry for hope”, and “Praying for God’s love to turn the world right side up.”  We all live on the inside edge of life, with one foot facing outward to others and one foot firmly on an internal world we are not sure we can share with others.  Today, hold your one wild and precious life.  Or better yet, go to the water, to be buoyed by your first, middle, and last name, “Beloved” which is how God sees you and hold you every day.  Amen.

Baptismal Belovedness Part 2

 

This week we are exploring, and I pray experiencing afresh, our baptismal truth that claims our life.  We are prayerfully seeking to live our belovedness ~ as our first, middle and last name.  Yesterday, we waded in the water with Mark’s telling of Jesus’ baptism.  Today, we turn to Luke 3:21-22 ~ But before John’s imprisonment, when he was still preaching and ritually cleansing through baptism the people in the Jordan River, Jesus also came to him to be baptized. As Jesus prayed, the heavens opened, and the Holy Spirit came upon Him in a physical manifestation that resembled a dove. A voice echoed out from heaven. “You are My Son, the Son I love, and in You I take great pleasure.”

 

One detail that leaps off the screen and lands in my heart is that baptism is a ritual for cleansing.  We know that water cleans our bodies, countertops, clothes, and dishes.  We know water renews and restores the earth through rain.  We know water hydrates and is essential for all life (from the smallest snail sneaking along the sidewalk to the manatee swimming in the ocean).  Every time we encounter water both externally and drink to nourish us internally ~ this is a ritual of cleansing.  Is there a place right now you long for renewal or reconciliation?  Last week we held the central scriptural passage about loving God, others, and self.  What if today, you took time to write down where you long for healing with yourself, another, and God.  Maybe your inner critic has been cracking a whip demanding and decreeing you get going on those New Years resolutions.  Maybe you are pushing yourself so hard, to the point of exhaustion.  Maybe your anger at another featherless biped, with whom you share DNA, keeps consuming your thoughts ~ spinning like a hamster on a wheel.  Maybe you are angry with God that the world is unjust and why doesn’t God swoop in and save us because we could use a little help here! 

 

Let your life speak to you.  Let your heart, soul, body, and mind come together like a choir to sing ~ even if they are out of tune.  And hold where you, like Christ, long to gather at the river to be renewed as we approach the halfway point of the first month of this year.  May you open your heart/ears/life to hear God saying, “You are my beloved” and may you and I live from this place of truth.  Amen.

Baptismal Belovedness

 

I remember my brown corduroy jacket with patches on the elbows.  I remember the ruby red shag carpet in the sanctuary and the dark wood.  I remember the sun streaming in through the large stained-glass window of surfer Jesus (with blue eyes, white skin, looking and gazing heavenward with long, flowing brown hair) praying in the garden of Gethsemane.  I remember my parents, brother, aunt, and uncle all standing around me at the age of eleven, as I was sprinkled with the baptismal water.  There was no booming James Earl Jones heavenly voice that moment.  There were no doves swooping and soaring around.  I don’t remember feeling different after my baptism but seared into my soul in that morning was God’s love.  I am not sure why my parents waited until I was eleven to part-take in this ritual.  I belong to a tradition where usually this sacrament is celebrated soon after the child is born.  In many ways, I am grateful I have that moment etched in my heart.

 

When I hear from Mark, “At this time, Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. The moment he came out of the water, he saw the sky split open and God’s Spirit, looking like a dove, come down on him. Along with the Spirit, a voice: “You are my Son, chosen and marked by my love, pride of my life.””  God claims Jesus in the Jordon as he is cradled in John the Baptizer’s arms.  As they wade in the water (which is a reference to Genesis 1 where God surfs and sings in a duet with the watery chaos or in the time of Noah or wrestling with Jacob by the riverside).  Water is a sacred site.  Jordan is even more holy because that was where Joshua parted the waters, and the people of God crossed over into the promised land. 

 

There is the delicious detail in Mark about the sky splitting open and a Spirit descending.  Is there a place right now where your life is feeling split open?  This can be in life-giving or life-draining ways.  The splitting can be a shattering of a relationship/health/faith/community/family and so many more ways.  The splitting can be a holy opening that wasn’t there before, the proverbial window that opens when the door you wanted to use was locked tight.  Thirteen days into 2025, what is shifting, splitting, stirring within you?  How might God be amid that chaotic movement, just as God was in the beginning?  I encourage you to go to the waters today and maybe even wade in those waters (unless it is below 60 degrees, then just sit by the pool in the sun and imagine this).  As you listen to the water, maybe even splash some on your face, or take a bit of water and make the sign of the cross on your forehead.  Remember your baptism, maybe not literally, but that moment of God’s claim.  God says to everyone, “You are my beloved ~ my joy, with you I am well pleased.”  This is the truth from which we live our lives moment by moment.  May the God who meets you in the waters with grace and love that never lets you go surround and soak and saturate your life today.  Amen.

Prayer

 

This week, I invited you to let the passage from Matthew about loving God, loving others, and loving self, sing to your soul and shape your everyday life.  There are thousands of practices and ways of letting this scripture passage sink into our souls and steer the ship of our lives.  You can practice the examen where at the end of the day you name where God showed up (one specific place), where God felt distant, where you wish you’d done something different (word or action), and one intention for the next day.  For example, God showed up for me this week in Bible Study, felt distant at a meeting which is also where I said something I wish I had not, and I set an intention to breathe before I speak, to pause before I pontificate!  Or you can continue to ask yourself, where did you feel like a fountain this week and where did life feel like it was going down the drain?  What filled you with energy and what left you gasping for air?  Or you can name and notice how family shared God’s love and where they pushed the nuclear code and set the tiny vein in your neck pulsing ~ because those closest to us often have the secret key to our emotions.  Keep turning and twisting this one verse of scripture of in these words is God’s wisdom for our lives.  Let us pray:

God of love that is found in the rising of the sun to the going down of the same.  God who is a genius at play, help us be more playful as we are prayerful.  Help us recover the child-like wonder of trees swaying or hearing birds singing or seeing a butterfly flash before our eyes.  Slow us down to listen and lean in to music that stirs our souls and conversations that warm our hearts.  Help us be present to this day, for in the hours ahead is exactly where You wait for us and You are here right now with the dirty dishes piled in the sink and the long to-do list and the feelings of loneliness and emotions that are all over the map.  On this 10^th day of a New Year, God, we need thee every hour, come and abide and fill us with Your power, help us in the moments when life turns lemon-sour, and always help us sense Your love like a flower.  Help make our verses rhyme, even it seems silly at the time.  Let Your grace and love be what feeds and fuels our lives every day.  Amen.  

Circle of Others

 

Yesterday, I offered a few questions to help you explore the mystery of your life.  One of the questions was about five important people.  Today, I invite you to pick one and write that person a love letter.  Don’t worry, you don’t have to send it.  There is no “should” or “have to” or earning a badge for your heavenly sash.  This is a chance to let loose the love in your heart for another person.  You can write to a person who is alive or in God’s eternal embrace.  I do encourage you to write the letter by hand.  I know that is old school.  Don’t worry, I am not asking you to go buy a feather quill and ink or fancy paper made from Egyptian plant fibers ~ I mean if you want to, go ahead.  Know that the back of an envelope will do, or you may need several.  You could start this letter by expressing gratitude for ways this person shared God’s love with you.  I encourage you to be specific.  Thank the person for making you laugh so hard, especially that one time at school when milk spurted out your nose.  Thank the person for handing your hand and not trying to fix/solve/dismiss or diminish your pain when the marriage ended.  Thank the person for giving you that gift you treasure or going with you on that car trip to see the biggest ball of twine.  Or maybe you thought of someone who you have a rocky relationship with, who you love, but sometimes frustrated you.  Ask for forgiveness for your participation and let go of the pain (note this is rarely a one and done process ~ often it is the slow ripening of the soul that forgives bit by bit each day).  Maybe you want to tell this person about an ordinary day you just had.  Your letter doesn’t have to be spectacular; it probably won’t be published or the Smithsonian probably won’t ask you for your letter to store in their archives.  This is a chance to be honest, open, and willing (that is where HOW is a acronym for living life ~ H for honest, O for open, and W for willing).  And prayer practices like writing letters to people who left fingerprints upon your heart help remind us how love shows up in our lives.  With God’s love to each of you.  Amen.