How Full is Your Lamp?

Just before worship started, I was talking with someone about the modern understanding of the word, “Gospel.” Oftentimes today it is interpreted as “good news” and it is, and yet that good news is seen as being words that affirm and uplift us and tell us we’re ok. Yet sometimes, the other function of the gospel is to speak truth- a truth perhaps we need to hear, spoken in love but not comforting. If you came to church today expecting warmth and comfort from the lessons- Sorry.

This past Wednesday I asked the folks at Table Church to sit and wait for a minute. I’d like us to do that as well.

You all did pretty well, but the truth is many of us don’t like to wait. Including your pastor who as you noticed checked her watch pretty often. On Wednesday, about halfway through many were starting to fidget, and at the end of the minute a couple kids commented on how hard waiting is, especially without Xbox or something. And I suspect a couple adults were wondering what would happen to that hot food if the pastor was going to make us wait. That minute felt long. Waiting can be hard.

"What will we do while we wait?” is the question Matthew’s gospel is addressing today. We’re waiting for Jesus to return- much longer than Matthew's original hearers.

SO what should we learn today? HAVE ENOUGH OIL.

While that seems like something to do, I want to suggest that it is not just about cornering the market on something. The oil is not the kind we watch the news to see if prices are up or down. Literally it’s Olive oil. Perhaps you hadn’t thought this but, literally, the answer to, "What shall we do while we wait?" is "Make sure you have enough oil for your lamps."

In an age of electricity, where we no longer need to put oil in lamps, what can that mean?

The five foolish bridesmaids ran out of it and the five wise ones had enough to go the distance. But what does the oil represent?

Martin Luther thought it represented faith- don’t run out of faith. I don’t agree with Luther. Because Faith comes from God- can you run out of faith if God is the provider?

Others think that the oil represents good works. Don’t stop doing good works.  But then what of grace? Imagine the frenzy of last minute good deeds- that seems to suggest if we do enough, we earn it. I’m not sure good works is quite right. Which speaks a word to lots of people today focused upon community service, especially young adults. Good works are good-and we all could use all we can get. At the same time, when the project is done, what is beyond it? What is the sustaining presence for all the other moments? The ones without projects?

Still someone else suggested the oil seems to be a generic reference to faithful and obedient discipleship as defined by the whole gospel. To be like the slave who elsewhere actively, faithfully, and obediently carries out what he has been instructed to do. It’s about trust. But where do we buy more trust?

Obviously there is something to being active in waiting, and in trusting, but maybe it’s not about doing those things as much as its about not running out of the power to do them.* We who are told to tend the light are also told to go and be light for the world. We need a power that produces good deeds- the power needed to produce light. Maybe this parable is using "oil" to be our relationship with God, who is the source and power behind our good deeds and our trusting.

And then maybe we can ask- how full is our lamp? Perhaps some of us are burning brightly this day, or perhaps some of us are sputtering out. But one thing is sure- the lamp needs to be tended. Like any relationship. Our relationship with God requires our attention.

To borrow yet another relationship phrase- does your relationship with God have a spark? If you walked into Jesus would you feel like you know each other? Or would you sense only a faintly distant connection?

When our girls were little they only saw my parents at holidays and the rest of the year we faced the challenge of helping them remember who these people who were so eager to see them and bring gifts were. We’d talk about how their grandparents were coming. We’d get the house ready for them. But it took other ways of being in touch while we were waiting to keep their relationship current. Phone calls, pictures, videos, telling those distant relatives what they’ve been doing. Even though those deeds weren’t the basis of the relationship, they were part of letting the grandparents know who their grandkids are and vice versa. To a certain degree as parents we mediated the relationship until it was strong on its own.

“If we understand "oil" as having a close relationship with God -- the power behind our lives -- the power that gives us a "glow" as shining witnesses in the world -- we must acknowledge that it is possible to let that relationship "run out". When the bridegroom comes, it (seems) too late to try and establish the relationship.” And in that context when we hear that those frenzied bridesmaids came back they found the door closed perhaps it’s important to note that although the door was closed, we don’t hear who closed it.

We just know it was closed. God gives us a relationship and faith and while God never closes the door, we can. And while our salvation is assured, we can in this life lose the power and strength we need and long for in this life. Our relationship with Jesus – being known by Jesus- can’t be mediated through other people who have it. I can’t do that for Jane, for example, nor she for me. This is why the other bridesmaids cannot share their oil. Our relationship with God needs us to keep glowing. And as we hear in Amos, it’s about more than just going through the motions of worship an hour a week.

It’s a relationship- God longs for and indeed kindles the spark of our faith for much more. Our deeds then are a response and even help fan the flame, but our works are not the relationship.

Being disciples in this way with God means we are tending that relationship and doing what God desires in an ongoing way. It doesn’t mean we cannot rest- after all , all the bridesmaids rested. But it does mean constantly tending our relationship with God so it has the power and meaning and support we need to avoid panic and chaos.

God wants to have a personal relationship- one where we share our hopes and fears, and where God invites us to share in a meal that reminds each of us- this is “for you.” And the door is open.

God is always striving to establish that personal relationship. One where today matters not just someday- for us and for the world. While we wait we can know the power of encountering Jesus, entering now, inviting us in to participate and celebrate the many comings of the Christ: Jesus' presence in the Word; in the Sacrament;  in the gathering together; in our going out to make disciples; as we minister to the "least of these." This is what we are given to do and to experience. And it’s a lot.

Yet, these are also the connections with Jesus that keep our "lights" empowered for witness and service and keeps our relationship burning brightly. The truth is that we all at times are foolish, and we fail to tend those lamps as we should.  What continually enables us is what God continually gives, summed up in this prayer from St Claude de Columbiere I invite you to join in now. Let us pray:

Jesus, I feel within me  a great desire to please you  but, at the same time,  I feel totally incapable of doing this  without your special light and help,  which I can expect only from you. Accomplish your will within me-- even in spite of me.   AMEN

* Brian Stoffregen, Crossmarks

It's not About What's In Your Wallet ( And it is)

How many of you remember the VISA credit card commercial “What’s in your wallet?” My favorites involved the marauding Vikings on holiday, but they all ended with a bellowing question- “What’s in YOUR wallet?” I think of it whenever I hear this gospel lesson. Because what’s in our wallets is close to us, and important to us. As the Pharisees are being tested by Jesus as much as they thought they were testing him. But what exactly is Jesus really getting at when he tells them to hand him a coin and then tells them to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s but give to God what is God’s?

The short answer is “I don’t know for sure.” But I do think we have Caesars in our lives too.  And by that I mean whatever occupies us and controls us.

The Pharisees and God’s people lived in an occupied land. They were taken over by the Romans who brought their laws, their army and their money. Literally the answer to what’s in their wallet is money that had a picture of Caesar on it and proclaimed he was the Son of God. So much for the people who say they will have no other gods before the Lord. Claiming allegiance to the Lord was seemingly an impossible dilemma. They were allowed to worship their God as long as they also worshipped Caesar. And it seems they are caught and yet, they have no trouble even in the temple of handing Jesus that coin. The one they tell others they can’t have in the temple and must exchange for temple money for a price. They have a lot of those Caesar coins and they’re not sharing. And they have no trouble going to the occupying leaders about Jesus. Their words about God and their actions have gotten pretty disconnected. Frankly, they’ve spent an awful lot of time cozying up to the very thing that threatens them.

We are not occupied in the same way, but we are also living in a system that demands much it seems. However we answer the question of what occupies us affects our decision making, how we see the world, and tells where we place our hope. Often it is in our wallet. Even though our money boldly says “In God We Trust” on it.

But I wonder if anyone has looked at those words when you’re buying something, or before you spend money. Does anyone stop and look at those words “ In God We Trust” and ask if this decision lives that out? Anyone? Me neither.

With credit cards and electronic purchases becoming the norm kids today perhaps no longer will even see those words. They won’t even cross our minds.

We’re all far more likely to pay attention to the words of the brands we are loyal to. Now advertisers have gone beyond trying to convince us of a brand- it’s about creating a whole community. There are Nike people. And I-phone people. There are Weis shoppers and Redners shoppers. There are whole systems based upon these loyalties- there are even loyalty cards. And while some offer us a deal here and there, they are mainly just tracking what we buy to get us to buy more of what it seems we can’t do without. I keep waiting for my loyalty to Turkey Hill really give me the better gas discount. They tell me to keep spending. Getting us to cozy up to their system and treat the connections as real. To be the thing we want most. But they’re not real connections.

What’s in our wallet says a lot. It says not only what we are loyal to, but I think it says where we place our hope. That’s why retail therapy is a thing. For those of you who don’t know, that’s shopping at a favorite place to feel better. The next product is bound to make a difference until maybe we do realize that VISA really does own us. There’s even a spoof on the Viking commercial where the person realizes how much they owe and the Vikings come back and smash it all.

The truth in this is that there is an obvious tension in life between how to live a life of faith in the world and how to live in the culture of our world. How to live without letting the culture own us.

And I wonder if maybe the real question Jesus was asking the Pharisees and us is, whether we think the pull of the culture is so strong we don’t even try?

Maybe we begin to think it’s too much to ask how faith shapes our decisions in life about spending and saving and giving. That’s a place of no hope in the end. Yet Jesus says give to Caesar what is Caesar’s but give to God what is God’s.  Which may be a way of reminding us how our coins and our cards do not define us.

Because God does. We belong to God.

Jesus invites and even demands us to engage these words we say about God and ourselves- to speak of our Lord in terms of a real living relationship. And a source of hope. Because while God wants all of us, the good news is that God first says- you are mine. It’s a promise not a threat.

Words that are intended to reassure us that we are more than our money and don’t have to live in fear of having it all.

Perhaps now more than ever these are words of community and comfort and direction we need to hear. That our hope is not limited to what we can buy. That we can live in faith that God loves us, provides for us and saves us and we can believe there is a future and hope. Now more than ever as we look at our world and feel powerless we can be a community that continues to gather together around what is real- God’s love and promise today and forever in Christ’s work of the cross. That’s our hope. And it’s real.

In a few weeks, we will be gathering for our annual meeting, and voting upon a plan for how we will carry out ministry in the coming year. The time honored term is called a budget. And it often feels that our thoughts about bills and coins are the only way we see this process. But I want to suggest we view it as a statement of trust in God and as a statement of hope.

That the choices we make in our commitment will be based upon our trust in God so that we can support it financially. And that the choice we make in shaping ministry will be based upon what we believe God is calling us to do, not only what we feel used to doing.

Because we’re liberated by God from the weight of whatever feels like it occupies us. We are liberated! And our primary response is to say thank you! Thank God! And trust God’s providing as we carry out the gospel for others. So they can feel liberated and thankful too.

And this is who we CAN be because God claims us, loves us and empowers us to respond.

 

Let us pray- Lord God, sometimes we are unsure about how we can respond to your calling. Help us to surrender ourselves, and be thankful because we are yours, and to trust that you love us and provide for us, so that we can break free from what holds us back and share of ourselves for the sake of your world.

In Jesus’ name. Amen

 PS- here's the Vikings!

 

Listen, Remember and Live

Listen. From the very beginning God has been saying we should listen. Our brains are capable of listening to about 125 words a minute, but thinking about 1,000 to 3,000 in the same amount of time. If you search for resources on effective listening, there are 1000’s of entries because most of us are preoccupied or distracted about 75% of the time. So many choices.

Listen, Adam, Remember and live. He must’ve told Eve once she was created. Because when the serpent comes, saying- “So you really think you can’t do that? You think you’ll die?” She remembers, “That’s right, and we’re not even going to touch it.”  

No one told Adam not to touch the tree. Those brains were already thinking. “Are you sure? You don’t really believe that do you? Eat it and you’ll be like God. Then who needs God?” In a modern world, they would have gotten on the internet and Googled trees to see if what God said seemed right. When we want to go our own way, we choose who we listen to.  

Adam and Eve don’t die, but something’s different. They’re ashamed and nervous. They try to fix it. And that’s when they decide to sew together the fig leaves. And I wonder whose idea THAT was. The first generations of people hearing the story would’ve laughed hysterically. “They did what? They used fig leaves?!” Fig leaves on bare skin would have felt like sandpaper. Scratch, scratch, Hurry up before God gets here. Scratch, scratch. We don’t want to be caught, Scratch. Scratch.

Like that would work. While God is angered, God gives them real clothes.

When we humans think we’ve become like God we usually show we really cannot handle the knowledge. Sadly, our track record shows that those scratchy fig leaves are the least of it. God made us to prosper, serve and to care for- but we’d rather control and plunder and take over. Forgetting God’s promise to sustain us. The scratching leads to clawing and fighting and killing. Too many examples abound.

Lent offers time to stop and listen to God and find our way, which is about our identity and purpose. Adam and Eve received an identity and a task, assured they were provided for. But that fruit looked really good to eat, what could be wrong? And that’s how evil works. We’re most often not enticed with things that appear to be bad, but things that seem good.

There are two things at work- God testing and evil tempting. We often see them the same because we don’t want either. We want to go our own path. God’s testing stretches and encourages us. It strengthens us to trust God and to follow a framework for living. God wants to show us that we are able with God’s help to be faithful. And that God desires life for us.

At the same time however, the Tempter’s purpose is to convince us that’s a horrible idea. To try and cause us to make a mistake, to sin. God’s purpose is to strengthen faith. Satan’s purpose is to weaken it. We must always ask-what are we listening to? Will it draw us closer to God or cast us farther away?

And here’s the thing-temptation is not coercion. No one forced the first humans to eat, or Jesus to eat bread. Tempters can’t make us do things, but they can convince us to want to. They don’t take away our will, they try to change it. Usually it’s not about not knowing what to do, just wanting to do something different. And picking who we listen to.

Even worse, the choices are blurred-decisions that can be good involve the wrong timing, or have large scale consequences we might not grasp. If we do not continually listen to God’s word and remember, we lose perspective.

Worship is the key way we listen and to remember God’s words for life. Notice I did not say “church.” Deciding to go to church is like deciding to go to the mall. Coming to worship God is different.

Deciding to go to church is about whether anything really big is happening, or who we want to sit with. We can then choose to not come when it’s not tempting enough. Because we don’t need church to worship God. We can listen to the voice saying spending time with family or catching up on rest is better. After all we won’t die if we don’t come. And worship is not just an hour on Sunday, but every day of our lives.

Is the timing of our choices rooted in worshipping and serving God? Do our choices sustain our relationship or not? Will sports or travel or anything else have the power to save us, anymore than bread alone? What would it mean for us to test our own resolve to truly listen to and serve God?

After Jesus was baptized, the very first thing God says is- This is my Son- listen to him. And today if we do, we see that the core of the temptations Jesus faced, was not about whether he was the Son of God but whether he would rely upon his power in self serving ways that would lead him away from his mission. His responses stay true to his identity and mission. He remained steadfast in believing in God’s power and providing.

The core of what we face is not about whether we are children of God but whether we rely upon self serving ways or God’s power in our lives. Where are we self-serving? Where are we struggling with trust in God? Where are we angry with God for not simply acting according to our demands?

You are probably wondering where the gospel is this day. Here is the good news- 

Jesus after 40 days in the wilderness fasting surely was tempted. But shows not only his identity but his obedience, even to the cross. Knowing what he endured, and what was to come, and knowing our track record as humans, he gave his followers a prayer.

A prayer that meets us wherever wilderness is, and whatever temptation looks like. So we can listen to and remember God’s way. And strengthen our faith. Not only in Sunday worship but every day.

Martin Luther suggested we begin each day by thanking God, then saying the 10 Commandments and saying the prayer Jesus gave-the Lords Prayer. Every day- first thing- to shape the whole day. I imagine how some days, our attention would be caught by different parts of the words. Perhaps not unlike how Jesus felt in those 40 days. Practicing for when the tempter came. So he could hear God’s words more strongly than others.

I invite you on this day we have all lost an hours sleep, to close your eyes, resist sleep, and let’s listen.

“I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, your Dear Son, that You have kept me this night from all harm and danger, and I pray that you would keep me this day also from sin and every evil, that all my doings and life may please you. For into your hands I commend myself, my body, and soul and all things. Let your holy angel be with me that the evil one may have no power over me. Amen.”

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery

You shall have no other gods before me,

You shall not take the name of the Lord in vain,

Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy,

Honor your mother and father,

You shall not kill,

You shall not commit adultery,

You shall not steal,

You shall not bear false witness,

You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife,

You shall not covet anything that belongs to your neighbor

Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name

Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, On earth as in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory

Forever and ever

Amen

 

What if those were the first words we heard each day?

And what if every week when we saw how we did or did not reach those words, we were then here to listen, remember and be strengthened,  wherever the week had gone to hear-

This is my body given for you, this is my blood shed for you for the forgiveness of your sins. Remember.

This is for us.

Listen, remember, and live.

Overcoming the Whispers

So today we catch up with the people who are NOT in a wilderness, they are not really in a bad place. They’re pretty settled. Because God has already done the rescuing. Life’s Ok, and now they’re being asked to remember all the bad stuff they’ve lived through. In Deuteronomy we hear people being told to remember a past they really would rather not. Who wants to remember wandering in a strange land, isolated, confused, unsure? Can’t we just put that behind us? They’re called to come together and remember. Then respond. Told to bring an offering that confirms that God fulfilled a promise. Remember- remember that real moment of vulnerability. When you were really doubting and the Lord heard and responded. Remember your history not so you can be stuck there, but so you can focus upon how God responded. Remember that God has the power to provide, and to deliver and to give a future. Because you will need that. Because doubt will show up again. Remember your past and celebrate your present, you remind yourselves you also have a future with God. Because you’ll need to trust God’s history even more than your own. Your capacity to see that future will depend upon your connection to God. Remember. Strengthening that connection is as important in non-crisis moments as in critical ones.

Because lots of other voices out there will convince you otherwise. And in Scripture, those voices are called lots of names, the devil, the tempter, Satan. In the Hebrew language, the word for devil is Satan. But interestingly there are lots of satans. But there is one Ha Satan. The word satan means “adversary”. Ha Satan is THE adversary. Picture if you will being surrounded by adversaries. Maybe life feels like that sometimes. Like a contest.

Other times thought it might feel more like how the religion of Islam describes the devil. Shaytan, is the whisperer- the voice that when we listen to it, takes us from hearing God. The whisperer.

Maybe that is more like it for many of us. Being surrounded by whispering voices. Times when like the psalms we hope God will keep us free from the trap. Or we hear enemies whisper and suspect the worst before knowing if it is truth. Or fear others will turn against us. Or in Proverbs, a whisper separates friends. All ways of getting at our capacity to trust God and each other. Or not. The whisperer shows up in our doubts.

Who are you gonna listen to?

The people beyond the crisis are told to practice how to respond even when all seems well. Give thanks to God , remember and give the first of the harvest. Not something brought because the harvesting is done and you can see that it’s OK to give God a little. Come before you know the outcome. Because when you do you confront your doubts and meet God. Because if something happened to the rest of the harvest you have now given up your future for God’s in faith that God has you covered. This is where the whisperer starts.

What if a storm comes? You don’t know everything, you don’t have enough, you’re not in charge, you might go hungry. Can you hear the whispers? Who are you going to listen to?

Even if we’re not terribly stressed our world suggests that any threat to our sense of individualism or desires is a potential threat. We cannot be vulnerable. We don’t like the word loss. It makes life sound like a contest. And even God is our adversary. So when God says Come and give thanks like that and then live with everyone. Even those who are not you. Together. It just doesn’t compute. What if they need more? What if I have to sacrifice? They might mess with my tradition, my rights, my money. Or whatever else it is that I hold dear. I need my promises first. I need to fill my hunger first.

Can you hear the whispers? So many challenges where we feel alone trying to decide. Now imagine Jesus, seemingly alone when the whisperer shows up.  Tempted. Since you are the Son of God… go ahead. Do it! What difference does it make? Confronting and whispering to Jesus- you have the power, aren’t you hungry for it?

Jesus faces all our emotions and challenges.  I need to take care of me, I need to have control, I need a thrill. All things we do when we listen to the voices that say our doubts should fuel our decisions rather than our trust in God. Because sin in the end is listening to those whispers, and falling for the trap.

Jesus came and walked our wilderness and conquered to free us from this. For us to live in that belief takes practice. It takes being surrounded by others who support us, and it takes that connection to God in prayer. Jesus not only shows that God gets what it’s like to be us, Jesus shows us how to respond.

What gave Jesus the strength in the wilderness was the power of the Holy Spirit, and the word of Scripture, and the strength of prayer. I imagine him praying those same psalms for support. And it took the care of others, for him, the angels. For us it is each other here. To help each other remember who God has been, who God is and to trust God is our hope and future.  Responding to God and trusting takes community and practice. Lent is a time for us to strengthen our walk with Jesus. Together. By remembering what is really powerful and sustaining. That God’s history and power are stronger than our own.

 

So take a moment and think of something in which you feel life is pretty settled and blessed. A part of life where you feel God’s support- something that matters like love, job, relationship. Whatever you have thought of, this is a place of trust. Now think of a part of your life where it is a struggle. Something in your life that matters but that feels like not within reach. This is your place of doubt. Now ask yourself why you find it easy to trust God is in the one and not the other? And then I invite you this week to take home these lessons and to read them and ask God in Prayer to help you listen and trust that God is present and active. Practice. May you  sense Jesus walking with you in all things and filling your deepest hunger.


( Thanks to David Lose for the exercise at the end, though slightly modified)

God When We're Hanging by a Thread

Each Wednesday in Lent, our midday service will explore the psalm from the prior Sunday's appointed lectionary. This week we consider Psalm 25. Note to Hebrew geeks, "soul" is nephesh- which is much more than saying "soul"-it is life breath, essence, source of life

On my morning walks with Toby, I get the chance to see things I might normally pass by. Especially in the morning light, one of the things that I am mesmerized by are spider webs. I admire their beauty and how intricately spun they are. But they defy understanding. When covered in dew, they look like lots of tiny little dots that cling together. It all seems incredibly fragile and yet webs are designed to sustain winds, rain and being buffeted about by forces far greater than they are. I am mystified, seeing the spider in the web. How can that spider can just hang and twist in the wind, sometimes by one slender thread, working methodically to build and repair? God created and gifted the spider with a mechanism for making, and rebuilding the web, over and over again. The spider seems able to wait it out even in the tension of threats that take things to the breaking point. That kind of waiting and trusting is hard. I’m not sure about you, but I wouldn’t make a very good spider.

Waiting in the tension, enduring people and places that seem to test us to the breaking point takes more than the other times in our life, It is less of a challenge to ask God to hear us and show us the way when life is going good. But when our whole web of existence is threatened, having someone tell us a cliché like “you’ll work it out”, or to “just have faith”, rings hollow in the midst of it all.

These places demand something deeper. Most of us have been in such a place where we had to wonder what we can count on. For one woman  it was when her daughter ended up in the emergency room with a serious stroke. Not only was she overwhelmed, she wondered if there was something she’d done wrong or should’ve done differently. Yet, as I waited with her in the consultation room, after the doctor gave bad news and left, she almost instinctively whipped out a rosary from her pocket and pulled me down onto the floor with her, and together we prayed on our knees. This was, for her, a well tuned response to whenever she found herself in a place where other ways to keep calm would not do.

Something to hang onto.

Someone once said, ““You can't connect the dots looking forward; perhaps you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect…You have to trust in something.”

The psalmist is in such a fragile place and would say the something we trust is someone-It’s God. While it sounds lovely to say “I lift up my soul to you,” this psalm prayer goes much, much farther. In the fragile places straining to survive, this prayer recalls: 

God breathed life into us in creation, and now that very existence is on the line. How we're counting on God to stay connected. It’s a place that responds to the unspoken question of “how will this end?” and says- “I’m hanging by a thread, my hands are empty- I have nothing left. I lift up everything that I am- my very essence. I’m entrusting even my next breath and beat of my heart- to you.

God, ALL of my hope hangs upon YOU.”

This is not a simple prayer to pray. Embodying this level of trust and hope while waiting for God in the tension takes practice and faith there is something to rely upon.

Perhaps we can then hear the words, “show me, lead me, guide me, walk with me” as a request to internalize the words we say when we cry out- “Get me through this God.” These words are critical.

This psalm is a teaching psalm and reminds us why deepening our prayer life on a regular basis is so vital. It's training us to respond so that when and if we really need to know it, we can engage it. So this pattern becomes such a part of who we are, that even in the midst of a challenge, we remember what God has given us. We have something to hold onto when we feel like we’re hanging by a single thread. And that we can rely on this even if we had a role in how we got to that place.

As we do this time and again, we deepen our faith- what God has given us. We too are created and given a way to tend our web. When we pray this psalm, we hear ourselves telling God who God is, but more so telling ourselves that God will remember us. To try to live our faith surrounded by those who do not, remembering God’s desire for us. God gives us this way to connect, to build and to strengthen our picture of God. To shape our faith, both for us as individuals and us together.

By continuing to turn to God in all things as a discipline, we can more deeply internalize the response of faith- turning to God and lifting up all of our desires and emotions to God. In hope, in trust and waiting. Deepening our ability to withstand whatever feels threatening to us. Believing we will not be abandoned. Even when it seems like we are just mouthing the words. God meets us there and helps us remember who God has been and is. A God who won’t decide to walk away and leave us swinging in the wind. 

 "We know that is not you, God."

May we remember that from eternity God is lovingkindness and goodness, and God remembers us for who we were created to be. In all of the strains, and tensions, and things that toss us about. God continues to walk, to teach and to guide. God is the source that shapes all of our hope, all of our trust, and all that we are. And God has promised and brought salvation and deliverance- Christ is the message that God is forever guarding this promise as God’s very essence loves and protects ours.

This is you and only you, O God.  

Patient Trust

I decided to make this retreat as a way of stopping and taking stock of my internship year at the mid point. As it turns out, I have completed seven months as of the weekend of my time apart. A time to reflect and pray about all that has gone on my life these last seven months in a large parish that has been around since 1730 with a staff in the double digits. There is a very different perception of time and of timing.
A vicar's time in the parish is short- a year.
The ongoing work of the collective body spans a much larger and longer spectrum. Vicars spend time in class preparing to integrate learning.
Time in the parish shows that the flow of integration in real life in the parish is vastly out of sync with the world of the semester. None of this is earth-shattering news, and yet reality "on the ground" must be processed.
Where are the joys and moments of God's grace?
Where are the challenges and how might God be speaking in them?

"Patient Trust"
by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new.
And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made
by passing through some stages of instability-
and that it may take a very long time.
And so I think it is with you;
your ideas mature gradually-let them grow, let them shape themselves,
without undue haste.
Don't try to force them on,
as though you could be today
what time (that is to say, grace and circumstances acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming in you will be.
Give our Lord the benefit of believing that His hand is leading you
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete.

Consumers of Worry

This past Sunday's gospel reading in the Revised Common Lectionary, Matthew 6:24-34, is rich with messages for us to ponder. The last couple of days have brought many thoughts to mind, in Memorial Day gatherings and parades, and the continued burgeoning of nature here in my part of the world. In the backyard world, the starlings have arrived.

This is a sad development for the smaller bird community, cute little songbirds, finches, sparrows, wrens, and bluebirds, have found themselves brushed aside in the quest for the bird feeder by the starlings. They are new to our yard, so I have had to brush up on them. Even their name sounds harsh- Sturnus vulgaris. According to e-nature.com,"hordes of these birds create much noise, damage vegetable or fruit crops, and do considerable damage around feedlots, consuming and fouling feed, and have proved difficult to drive away.
Starlings compete with native hole-nesters for woodpecker holes and natural cavities. It often seems that every time a woodpecker drills a nesting cavity, a pair of bully European starlings comes along and drives the woodpeckers away. Time and time again, I have watched a pair of red-bellied woodpeckers, northern flickers or red-headed woodpeckers, spend days drilling a hole in a tree suitable for nesting and raising young. Just about the time the cavity is ready for eggs, a pair of starlings will take over the cavity and keep the woodpeckers out.

Even worse, after the starlings have won the battle, which usually takes a couple of days, they will often occupy the cavity for only a few more days, and then move on to the next conquest. By the time they vacate, the woodpeckers have drilled another nesting cavity, and the vicious cycle begins again. The same scenario may occur with bluebirds trying to settle into a birdhouse."

Here we have seen them purposely bully the smaller birds, not simply into waiting longer to feed, but gathering loudly and chasing away all competitors, spilling food in the process of the gobbling frenzy, even chasing away other birds when they, the starlings, have no intention of eating now, just to establish global domination of turf. As though their worry triggers some over-consumptive pattern.

In the human world, I can't help but see the comparison to the ethanol market and our own greedy stockpiling of corn, at the expense of the food supply of others, as one example. And what about on a more personal level, in our ordering of lives and relationships? Can we be the starlings? At the feeder, there is plenty to go around, but the starlings seem incapable of sharing, as though all of that striving is really necessary. In our lives, I wonder if all of our striving and worrying about winning the game of who has the most toys or the last word, is not a modern day version of what Jesus is teaching in this text. Are these things our panacea for worry, as though we somehow really can have total control? Is this behavior our solution for the peace we seek that only God can give? Can we even become voracious consumers of worry? There are indeed worries enough for any day, including the natural disasters around the world and here on the homefront. But in a 24/7 media frenzy, do we find ourselves spending more time listening to the escalating "what-ifs" of the talking heads, or spending more time in prayer and social action?

I wondered this as I went on my way to two Memorial Day parades. At each parade I felt certain that those Gold Star mothers, and families of men and women who have been killed or are missing or are fractured souls, would tell us, that one more day with the person they sent off would be worth more than all the stuff in the world. And then I ran into former divorce client. She and her husband engaged in a nasty, passive aggressive divorce, which threatened to tear apart their extended family, each person jockeying for stuff and control, all magnified by life in a small town where everyone is a spectator. That was two years ago. By last year, it was all done but the last shouting. We lost touch as I went off to seminary. I saw her at the Park- the speaker was her son-in-law, a well decorated veteran. Her ex-husband is now the mayor of our town. There she sat, with her daughter, her grandson, and her husband's new love. All together for the big speech. Afterwards she told me she had over the winter suffered a stroke. And somehow when that happened, in spite of all of the bitterness and adversity of the past, the whole family had come together, in their congregation, and in their now slightly reshuffled lives- because they realized what was really important. And it was not stuff-it was relationships with God and each other.

25“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear.All that worry about coming out on top, where does it get us? For each of us- nowhere. 27And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? Clearly my client, and many others have found out the warning sign of "no." 33But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34“So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today’s trouble is enough for today.

Trouble enough indeed, but thanks be to God that we have the true peace in the knowledge of resurrection victory and the unending love and grace of a God who waits for us, who says, "Stop worrying so much- trust in me." A God who sent His Son not to do what we wanted, but what we needed, and who provides for us still.