Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Remember when?


This post, if you're perceptive, will give away my age. Oh well.


Top Seven "Slow Dance" Songs in Junior High

1. Hey Jude (Beatles)
2. Crimson and Clover (Tommy James and the Shondells)





3. Hurts So Bad (The Lettermen)
4. Crystal Blue Persuasion (TJ and the S)
5. My Cherie Amour (Stevie Wonder)
6. These Eyes (The Guess Who)
7. To Sir, With Love (Lulu)

Honorable Mention in the "hard-to-dance-to-but-we-tried" sub-category:
1. Can't Take My Eyes Off of You (Frankie Valli)
2. (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay (Otis Redding)
3. Goin' Out of My Head/Can't Take My Eyes Off of You (The Lettermen)









Sunday, May 8, 2011

Planting Season...

Just in the last 3 or 4 days, the planting season has exploded in Southern Minnesota. A reminder to pray for farmers, for their safety, for continued awareness of good stewardship practices and an awareness of Sabbath, for good weather for planting, for the combination of sunshine, warmth, and timely rains needed for a good crop. I found this prayer and its affirmations very meaningful. Blessings on the farmers...

A PRAYER FOR THE COUNTRY FAMILY

WE BELIEVE that farming is a noble occupation:
The farm home is a most suitable place for a Christian family;
The good earth is the greatest material gift of God to man.

WE KNOW that in this vocation, country people work closely with God in producing the essential elements of life.

In the special graces and opportunities of this way of life,
farm and country families can most readily give glory to God,
and grow in holiness and happiness.

The earth returns greatest honor to God when through their care and labor, it brings forth an abundance for their family's needs and those of society, for this generation and for those to come.

Let us all pray and hold fast to the spiritual values of the farming vocation and resist the materialism of this age from blinding us to them.

WE PRAY that through God's grace we may have wisdom and strength to grow constantly in the virtues necessary for holy rural living:
Faith and Hope, firmly founded in knowledge of God's wisdom;
Love and Patience with the slow deliberate cycle of seasons and years;
Fortitude and Temperance to give us the strength and balance;
Compassion and Mercy with all who we meet and all that we do.

In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.






Prayer from National Catholic Rural Life Conference

Saturday, May 7, 2011

Mother's Day: The Pink Rose

Two years ago on Mother's Day our church's worship service was fashioned around the thematic of "The Pink Rose" --

My sermon is an adaptation of the sermon, “The Pink Rose,” originally preached by Jeanne Stevenson Moessner at a Service for Wholeness in Birmingham, Alabama, May, 1997. The service was jointly sponsored by Edgewood Presbyterian Church (PCUSA) and Resolve, a national network of support for women and men dealing with infertility and loss. The sermon was later published in the Easter 1998 edition of Journal for Preachers. Jeanne was "one of everyone's favorite" seminary professors. I'm proud to call her both mentor and friend.


“The Pink Rose”


The Pink Rose:
An adaptation of a sermon by Jeanne Stevenson Moessner


MOTHER’S DAY 2009
FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
LAKE CRYSTAL, MINNESOTA


Next to Jeanne’s childhood home there stood a stone archway. Red roses grew there. They always seemed to appear there just before Mother’s Day. Like a May ritual, her father would cut a handful of the wild red roses, and she and her brothers would wear them to church on Mother’s Day—the red roses a sign that their mother was living. Remarkable, in retrospect, was that Jeanne’s father and mother also wore red roses for so many years. Her grandmothers lived into their nineties.

It is in honor of all the mothers who are living that I place this red rose in the vase.

In the South, where Jeanne was raised, it is a custom on Mother’s Day to wear a red rose if your mother is still living.

And it is in honor of all the mothers who are no longer among us that I place a white rose in the vase.

For, again, in the South, it is customary to wear a white rose on Mother’s Day for the mothers who have died and “passed over.”

Yet, there are other losses to be remembered. Mother’s Day can be especially painful for women and men who wanted to become parents and could not. Sing, O Barren One written by Mary Calloway traces the theme of barren women in the Old and New Testaments. These were all women who wanted to have children and could not. You may recall them.

Sarah in Genesis 11; Rebecca in Genesis 25; Rachel in Genesis 30; Leah in Genesis 29; the wife of Manoah in Judges 13; Hannah in First Samuel, Elizabeth in the Gospel according to Luke; and Zion in Isaiah 54: “Sing, O barren one, who did not bear; break forth into singing and cry aloud, you who have not been in travail!” This last passage is the one from which the book took its title, Sing, O Barren One. The biblical material focuses on barren women rather than barren men. The barrenness motif or theme functioned to show that the gift of life came from God alone. Barrenness was seen as a curse and humiliation. Fruitfulness was seen as a reward for obedience.

In each of the biblical examples of the barren women, a son was given. Sarah bore Isaac; Rebecca gave birth to Jacob and Esau; Rachel to Joseph and Benjamin; and Leah bore Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, and six others. The wife of Manoah gave birth to Samson; Hannah to Samuel; Zion to the sons of Jerusalem; and Elizabeth to John the Baptist. In each of the cases of barrenness, there is a fruitfulness—the gift of life.

But where does a woman who has not been given this gift of life in children connect on Mother’s Day? Where do the modern-day barren women connect with scripture? The only barren women in scripture other than priestesses are Tamar in Second Samuel and Jepthah’s daughter in Judges 11. Tamar was raped by her brother and lived the rest of her life “a desolate woman.” Jepthah’s daughter, a virgin, was killed by her father as a result of his foolish vow. These are the childless women of scripture. Not a lot of comfort there.

If the red rose represents living mothers, and the white rose mothers who have died, what symbol do we have on Mother’s Day for the women who never bore, for the women still dealing with infertility, for the women waiting for a child to be placed through adoption, for the women whose dreams to get married and raise a family did not materialize? What symbol do we have for mothers who have lost children through miscarriage, stillbirth, SIDS, accident, injury, or illness?

Jeanne Stevenson Moessner tells the story of attending a women’s luncheon where she talked with a woman, a woman she had never met. Within ten minutes, the woman told Jeanne she had lost a daughter nine years earlier…

She was killed in an automobile accident by a young man who crossed the median and hit her car. He was on drugs. Her life, just on the threshold of adulthood and great promise, ended.

There is always a vase of roses on the altar of her hometown church on the Sunday in May nearest the date of her death. That’s often on Mother’s Day. Each year, her parents have added one more rose.

It is for her mother and others like her that I add to the vase the pink rose.
For all the mothers—and for those who want to be mothers—the pink rose.

For those who are foster mothers, and stepmothers, the pink rose.

For birth mothers who placed their children for adoption. And adoptive mothers who received the gift of life through this placement. For those of you facing empty nests at home; for those dealing with children who are emotionally lost to you; for those whose mothers were emotionally disconnected… the pink rose.

On Mother’s Day, the pink rose can also symbolize the “mothers of the church,” a term used in the African-American tradition for the women who hold the church together through nurturing, caring, mentoring. I remember when, as a seminary student, I preached at my home church in Orange City, my mother and my grandmother in the congregation. I remember looking into the eyes of women who had taught me, encouraged me, called me on the carpet. And I remember, now, the strong women of faith who taught me in seminary: Jeanne, who wrote the original version of this sermon (and, for that matter, effectively wrote most of this adaptation); Elizabeth, who introduced me to Hebrew and new understandings of the Old Testament; Marsha, who taught me to preach; and other women—now colleagues—who encouraged me to express compassion, to be myself, and to be honest with myself. I think, too, of the strong women of faith in our own congregation…

For women who are spiritual models and mentors, I place the pink rose in the vase.



Such a wide variety of experiences! What do we do with all of these experiences and feelings on Mother’s Day? May I suggest that we bring our flowers—red, white, pink—to the altar of a God who carries, feeds, protects, heals, guides, disciplines, comforts, washes, and clothes us as children.

Many biblical passages portray God as doing these for us.

Giving birth…
Listen to Me…
You who have been borne by Me from birth
And have been carried from the womb…. (Isa. 46:3-4)

Comforting…
As a child who is comforted by its mother,
so I will comfort you. (Isa. 66:13)

Washing…
I will pour clean water over you and scrub you clean.
I'll give you a new heart
and put a new spirit in you. (Ezekiel 36:25)

Healing…
Look, look, God has moved into the neighborhood. God will wipe every tear…. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more. (Rev. 21:4)

Suffering and long-suffering… caring for difficult children…
The more I called them,
the more they went from me;
Yet it was I who taught these children to walk,
I took them up in my arms;
but they did not know that I healed them.
I led them with cords of human kindness,
with bands of love.
I was to them like those
who lift infants to their cheeks.
I bent down to them and fed them. (Hosea 11:1-4)

How can we re-image God so that we can connect in ways that our more genuine to our experience? In ways which ring true?

“After my surgery,” said a woman dealing with breast cancer, “I could not image God as a male. I (needed) to image God as Mother Hen. (Because) it is only God as mother hen who would know what it is like to lose a wing.”

She was referring, of course, to the scripture passages in the gospels of Matthew and Luke in which Jesus spoke of his desire to gather the children of Jerusalem as a hen gathers her brood under her wings. In a similar way, parents who have lost a child, most often want and need visits from those who have experienced the same. And they need a God who knows what it was like to lose a child.

We can also re-image God as adoptive parent. God is often imaged as birth parent, the One who creates us and even gives us a “second birth”—most familiar is John 3:16. But there are actually more passages in the New Testament that speak of our adoption into the family of faith through Jesus Christ as Firstborn. The book of Ephesians in particular presents God as adoptive parent. God has destined us for adoption as children with an inheritance. God also knows the empty pain of childlessness when someone rejects the gracious invitation to come into the adoptive family.

Various theologians write about the woundedness of God, the vulnerability of God to pain. God lost a son at the place of crucifixion.

The roses mean something different to each of us, based on our experiences. The pink rose, in particular, carries a meaning unique to each of our own experiences.

So in a way, the pink rose is for all us. It would take an all-knowing, all-seeing, vulnerable, and loving God to fully understand the pink rose signifies to each one of us.

And that’s exactly what Psalm 139 says… Our God is a God who formed our inward parts, knit us together in our mother’s womb, and saw our unformed substance. It is from such a God that healing will one day come, a healing that extends beyond childhood, before birth, to the very womb. This healing is to be found somehow in the very womb of God.

Yes, it is an all-knowing, all-seeing, vulnerable, and loving God who is sufficient to embrace what we bring today—the red roses, the white roses, the pink roses—especially the pink roses. This rich and varied bouquet of very real human experiences is an our offering of our inmost selves to God— May this bouquet be held close to the very heart of God.

Amen.

Friday, May 6, 2011

A new poem

"Engulf me”
by Randy Lubbers

A longing, May 6, 2011
Not-quite-after an eternal winter

For a warm fresh-baked home-baked banana nut muffin;
With butter—the real stuff, and more than necessary.
Hot, dark, fresh-brewed breakfast blend;
No cream or sugar—in a mug with a past.
And a passionate morning sun;
Alive and hot; piercing, blazing light—

Finally, getting beyond the muffin
And the butter and the coffee—
Finally, this is the poem—

I need the Easter of the summer sun
On my still-in-the-tomb patio chair
Engulfing me
Holding me
Binding me to that quiet spot at the table
Warming me
Preparing me for dying seeds and a miraculous shoot
Freeing me
Loosening the tightness
In my old
Arms and legs and shoulders
Unbinding me
And
Releasing me
To live again.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

"The Golden Age"



I wished I lived in the golden age
Giving it up on the Broadway stage
Hang with the rats and smoke cigars
Just have a break with Frank and count the stars

Dressed to the nines, we've had too much
Shiny jewels, casino cash
Tapping feet, wanna take the lead
A trip back in time is all I need


Oh!
Sing it out loud gonna get back honey
Sing it out loud get away with me
Sing it out loud on a trip back honey
Sing it out loud and let yourself free

Whoo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo

I'm on my way, gonna make it big
Gonna make these songs for the chicks to dig
It's really hot and a little bit sour
We're getting your strength to the maximum power

Flying away from reality
Whatever-ever happened to gravity?
I see it clear, a shooting star
And I'm really gonna sing it like da-da-da

Sing it out loud gonna get back honey
Sing it out loud get away with me
Sing it out loud on a trip back honey
Sing it out loud and let yourself free

Yeah!

Sing it out loud gonna get back honey
Sing it out loud get away with me
Sing it out loud on a trip back honey
Sing it out loud and let yourself free

Yeah-yeah!
Woah-oah!
Wow!

Ohhh silver screen on a rainy day
Sally Bowles in a cabaret
Shaking sticks, oh what a show
Fresh and jolly, from tip to toe

Rambling down the boulevard
With a fly, a bird, and a wooden heart
My mind is set, I walk the line
But I never really thought that it would feel this fine

Yeah!
Sing it out loud gonna get back honey
Sing it out loud get away with me
Sing it out loud on a trip back honey
Sing it out loud and let yourself free

Sing it out loud gonna get back honey
Sing it out loud get away with me
Sing it out loud on a trip back honey
Sing it out loud and let yourself free!

Yeah!
Hey! Hey!
Whoo!
Ooh!
Oooooaaahh!

Whoo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo
Whoo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Prayer for Palm/Passion Sunday

Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid; cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit—
O God, we need to be cleansed—
We truly desire to be made clean—
even though—fickle as we are—
we find ourselves so often wallowing in the mud.
So cleanse us, heal us, transform us,
so that we may perfectly love you—
O God, so often our love is less than perfect—
indeed, we are often apathetic towards you—
the very opposite of loving.
But we want to love you perfectly.
We long to live our lives
to the praise and glory of your holy name.

Almighty God, draw me nearer to you, deeper into your heart.
And as you do, help me to discover
that my companions on the journey of life
are women and men loved by you
as fully and intimately as you love me.
In your compassionate heart, there is a place for all of them.
No one is excluded.
Give me a share in your compassion, dear God,
so that your unlimited love may become visible
in the way I love my brothers and sisters
(Henri Nouwen).


Heal my fickleness, O God;
Heal our fickle church.
Fill us with your power — power made perfect in weakness.
Remind us of your presence — close, intimate, real.
Make clear to us your purposes —
your vision of our common life and work and mission.
As one body, we pray for those who are lonely or sad, sick or dying, confused or filled with doubt, filled with self-pity or anger or hatred, longing for a sign of your love and grace, near despair in the midst of their trials and temptations, or suffering for their faith.
As one body, we pray for all nations and peoples. We pray for peace in the hearts of all people. We pray for wisdom and inspiration and humility in the hearts of rulers, elected officials, presidents, governors, judges, representatives.
As one body, we pray for the people of our community, our county, our state and nation. We pray for the Holy Spirit to work in fickle hearts to lead people to discover and know the reality of your “un-fickle” love in Christ -
So that hearts and minds and lives may be transformed;
So that darkness may be overcome by the Light;
So that ignorance may yield to wisdom;
So that bigotry may be put out by understanding;
So that the “desire for revenge” may be healed by forgiveness;
So that greed may lose out to gratitude and generosity;
So that oppression may give way to justice;
So that the sick may be healed;
the hungry, fed;
the grieving, consoled;
So that sad hearts may find joy;
So that violence may be crushed by compassion;
So that hatred may be overcome by love.


Patient and understanding, loving and tender, eternal and holy God: Take the feeble prayers of our fickle hearts and transform our requests through the perfect intercessions of our Lord Jesus Christ. Guard our hearts and minds and keep us in your love until that glorious day when your kingdom is fully come — on earth as it is in heaven — that day when Christ will be all in all.

Amen.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Having Forgotten to Bring a Book, She Reads the Car Manual Aloud

Having Forgotten to Bring a Book,
She Reads the Car Manual Aloud

by Naomi Shihab Nye

Do not sit on the edge of the open moonroof.
Do not operate the moonroof if falling snow
has caused it to freeze shut.
(I thought it was a sunroof, actually.)
Do not place coins into the accessory socket.

The cup holder should not be used while driving.
Well, when then?
While parked at home?
Perhaps, at midnight, with insomnia?
Hi, Mom, I think I'll just go have a glass of milk
in the driveway.


If you need to dispose of the air bag
or scrap the vehicle...
Never allow anyone to ride in the luggage area.
Do not operate the defogger longer than necessary.
Please remove necktie or scarf while working on
engine.
Never jack up the vehicle more than necessary.

A running engine can be dangerous.


From A Maze Me: Poems for Girls by Naomi Shihab Nye
Greenwillow Books, 2005


It's a great book if you need a gift for a young girl. My daughter didn't think so, but it is. I have an extra copy if anyone's interested.

Peace, Love & Coffee.... Randy

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

On vacation, prayer, and asthma

Everyone has been asking. And the short answer is: Vacation was wonderful!

I am very grateful for the prayers of our church family and friends in the wider community while we were away. We were refreshed! And now, with Lenten activities and Holy Week and Easter... Oh, wow! Yes, April is a busy time, so "prayers for the pastor" continue to be very much “in order” and truly treasured and vital.

For that matter, prayer, period, is vital, is it not? Our lives... all of our lives and every aspect of our lives, yes, every breath of our lives comes from God.

Prayer is our lifeline, our connection to God in whom we live and breathe. One hymn says, “Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath, the Christian’s native air….”

Just as a fish can’t breathe without its gills which, by some miracle I'll never fully understand, allow it to pull the oxygen it needs from the water, in the same way we need prayer to connect us to the Breath of God, the Spirit of God, who daily renews and refreshes and revives us in Christ.

As I often do, I am preaching to myself here, but see if you don’t agree with this confession: We are too often “asthmatic” Christians.

According to one medical expert, “when you have asthma, two things happen inside your lungs --- constriction, the tightening of the muscles surrounding the airways, and inflammation, the swelling and irritation of the airways…. There is increasing evidence that, if left untreated, asthma can cause long-term loss of lung function.”

When we’re disconnected from the lifeline of prayer we are spiritually asthmatic. We find ourselves gasping for air! Left untreated, spiritual asthma can decrease our capacity to breathe the Spirit in deep, to fully experience God’s love and grace, to see God’s purposes for our lives and for the church.

Disconnected from prayer, we die.

Never Too Late

Most Minnesotans are very familiar with the Little House series of children’s books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. But here’s something you might not know: Laura Ingalls Wilder didn’t publish the first novel in this famous series until she was in her sixties. It’s never too late!

You may have missed Ash Wednesday completely. Maybe the whole idea of Lent has been “off your radar screen” this year… so far. But it’s not too late. The Wednesday series (supper followed by the six-part “Learning Forgiveness” study and discussion) continues through Holy Week. It’s not too late to make plans to attend. It’s not too late to attend Lenten worship on Sundays. And it’s never too late to make a time of prayer a daily habit.

Some folks fast during Lent. If your health allows, it’s not too late to pick one or two days to “fast and pray.” It’s never too late to commit yourself to a Lenten “fast” from being anxious or worrisome, from longing for “all the good stuff so-and-so has,” from withholding forgiveness, from being consumed by anger or envy or pride.

It’s never too late to come to the place in your life where you finally admit that you can’t handle things on your own. It’s never too late to open yourself up to God’s unconditional love.

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Peace in the Desert

“Look to your right,” said Grandma Jaarsma as we drove through the little burg of St. David, “and you should see it in just a mile or two.” And then, there it was: a sturdy wooden 30-foot Celtic Cross appearing almost magically in the desert. St. David’s Monastery lies peacefully behind a grove of pecan trees in a most unlikely and lonely spot just southeast of Benson, Arizona on state highway 80. Like most monasteries, St. David’s had a small bookstore. And since I was driving, we made a pit-stop on our way from Tucson to Tombstone.

It was there I found a souvenir worth carrying home: a hand-painted calligraphy with green grasses alongside the quote from Mahatma Gandhi:

THE SEVEN ROOTS OF VIOLENCE
Worship, without sacrifice
Wealth, without work
Pleasure, without conscience
Knowledge, without character
Commerce, without morality
Science, without humanity
Politics, without principle

Friday, March 11, 2011

The Motivation Behind Works of Social Justice and Compassion

Just thinking..... Is it not Gratitude that is the purest motivation of the human heart towards acts of Compassion and prayers and protests for Justice?

Heidelberg Catechism Q & A 86.

Q. We have been delivered from our misery by God's grace alone through Christ and not because we have earned it: why then must we still do good?

A. To be sure, Christ has redeemed us by his blood. But we do good because Christ by his Spirit is also renewing us to be like himself, so that all our living we may show that we are thankful to God for all he has done for us, and so that he may be praised through us.

And we do good so that we may be assured of our faith by its fruits, and so that by our godly living our neighbors may be won over to Christ.

The very acts of compassion Jesus describes in Matthew 25 -- "whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me": Aren't these the acts we most often see in the lives of generous, tenderhearted, joyful folks who live with an attitude of Gratitude? C.S. Lewis said something along these lines in his book on the Psalms. I'm looking for the quote right now....

Oh, here it is:

I had not noticed how the humblest, and at the same time most balanced and capacious, minds praise most, while the cranks, misfits and malcontents praised least.... (C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms)

Lewis is using different words than we would, but I hear him saying basically this:

It seems obvious to me now: The people who overflow with deep gratitude are the folks who overflow with acts of compassion and who allow themselves to become one with the poor, the hungry, the oppressed, and the afflicted. Gratitude is at the heart of compassionate living. The people who don't give a hoot about others are the same jerks (poor souls) who never say thanks, the ones who say, "Why should I share? Everything I have I earned myself. I'll build bigger barns. I'll eat, drink, and be merry."

Monday, February 28, 2011

Perfectly Love (Excerpt from Feb 27)

Love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might.... (Deut 6)

We believe that our good God, by his marvelous wisdom and goodness, seeing that we had made ourselves completely miserable (even to the point of plunging ourselves into a downward spiral of physical and spiritual death), set out to find us, even though we, trembling all over, were fleeing from God (Belgic Confession, Article 17, my translation).

I love the phrase, "trembling all over... fleeing from God." It makes me think of Adam and Eve hiding from God after sin alienated their hearts from God. Too often, I think, people have been taught or have somehow “learned” from cultural images of “the Deity” that God came looking for Adam and Eve in order to take them back behind the woodshed. But there's nothing in the Gen 3 story that implies an angry or harsh tone of voice when God says, "Where are you?" We—yes, you and I—are the ones who picture God as being red-hot with a desire to exact revenge, when, in fact, everything in the story would indicate otherwise. God's words – even God's judgment – his "because-you-have-done-this" words – those words are spoken with grace and tenderness.

God is not yelling but weeping.

Even after sin God comes looking for Adam and Eve; deeply grieved; even experiencing loss, perhaps? Yes, God is heartbroken. Picture in your mind, perhaps, the woodcarver Geppetto and his love for Pinocchio. Or the great Lion Aslan in “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” giving his life freely to save the life of undeserving Edmund. There is no dark, inscrutable, or foreboding God. No, the face of God is the face of Jesus Christ on the cross saying, "Father, forgive them." God is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love (Psalm 103:8).

So how do we love God "perfectly"? We love God perfectly when we open our hearts to Love… to God’s steadfast, loyal love for you… to God’s undying love for the whole cosmos… to Jesus’ love for you… "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man gives up his life for his friends."

God does not merely want our assent or agreement, not merely our belief in doctrines about God, about Jesus. No, God wants us to be in love with him. Jesus said, “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Dwell in my love.”

Christ doesn’t want us to believe with our heads only -- intellectual assent without a passionate, fiery, white-hot LOVE of God is more distasteful to God than no assent at all: “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth” Revelation 3:15-16).

To love God is to be passionate about the things God is passionate about. To love God is to acknowledge and accept God’s love-to-the-uttermost tenderhearted, compassionate, patient and kind and overflowing love. To love God is to simply respond in kind to what you have been taught since you were old enough to walk and talk: Jesus loves me, this I know!

When we open our hearts to God’s love we find ourselves, by a miracle of the Holy Spirit, becoming more and more perfectly in love with God.

Sunday, February 13, 2011

February 13 sermon excerpts

“Lord Jesus, before you I patiently wait, come now and within me a new heart create. To those who have sought you, you never said ‘no’, now wash me and I shall be whiter than snow” (James Nicholson).

Whiter than snow. Yeah, right. Have you noticed? This time of year, the snow isn’t very white, is it? Warm weather, snow melting… It was almost 40 yesterday and 40-45 is the forecast for today. The snow banks have never looked so ugly, so grimy and dingy... and yet vulnerable, precarious... their days are numbered. You almost have to feel sorry for those once stately banks and piles of snow....

Those dirty banks of snow along the street are NOT what the psalmist and Isaiah are talking about (Ps 51; Isa. 1:10-20), of course, but the grungy old snow can remind us of what we mean when we pray, "Lord, wash me and I shall be whiter than snow."

How did the snow get to be so ugly?

It looked beautiful after the last snow fall, didn’t it? But yet, accumulating through the winter, the evidence of salt and sand spread on the streets and then shoved to the sides after the next snowfall, the evidence of other sources of grime. And the melting reveals what was there all the time. And so it is with us.

How good is it that God doesn’t just spread a new layer of snow over us?! God, by grace, washes us so that we’re just as clean as a foot of freshly fallen snow in the middle of your backyard or in the depths of the woods.

This brilliant newness is what our hearts deeply long for.

Our deepest desire is
for Christ-in-us,
for Christ’s washing,
for Christ’s snow-white purity.
What we seek, only God can give.
What we ask for, we are unable to find for ourselves.
What we desire is faith, but faith is pure gift.
What we pray for is for the grace
to be faithful receivers of God’s gifts --
which means being faithful givers of love and mercy --
and faithful servants of the Prince of Shalom.




Part 4 in a six-part series based on the Collect for Purity.
Inspired by six prayers by Walter Brueggemann in Prayers for a Privileged People.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Super Bowl Sunday

A prayer by Walter Brueggemann, from Prayers for a Privileged People


The world of fast money,
and loud talk,
and much hype is upon us.
We praise huge men whose names will linger only briefly.

We will eat and drink,
and gamble and laugh,
and cheer and hiss,
and marvel and then yawn.

We show up, most of us, for such a circus,
and such an indulgence.
Loud clashing bodies,
violence within rules,
and money and merchandise and music.

And you--today like every day--
you govern and watch and summon;
you glad when there is joy in the earth,
But you notice our liturgies of disregard and
our litanies of selves made too big,
our fascination with machismo power,
and lust for bodies and for big bucks.

And around you gather today, as every day,
elsewhere uninvited, but noticed acutely by you,
those disabled and gone feeble,
those alone and failed,
those uninvited and shamed.
And you whose gift is more than "super,"
overflowing, abundant, adequate, all sufficient.
The day of preoccupation with creature comforts writ large.
We pause to be mindful of our creatureliness,
our commonality with all that is small and vulnerable exposed,
your creatures called to obedience and praise.

Give us some distance from the noise,
some reserve about the loud success of the day,
that we may remember that our life consists
not in things we consume
but in neighbors we embrace.

Be our good neighbor that we may practice
your neighborly generosity all through our needy neighborhood.




Walter Brueggemann, Prayers for a Privileged People (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2008), 183pp.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

A friend who cares...

"Still, when we ask ourselves which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not-knowing, not-curing, not-healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is the friend who cares."


Henri Nouwen, from Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Bread for the Journey

The first book I purchased for my new Kindle is a book I've read over and over... and over and over. And every time I discover something new. Or discover something old which I truly needed to hear anew.

I first read Henri Nouwen's Bread for the Journey not alone but "in communion" with a "breakfast club" of old and new friends in Pella, Iowa. This was at least 2-3 years before seminary. I highly recommend the approach. We each would read the short daily readings -- or, sometimes, read all seven daily readings the night before our weekly Tuesday-morning-gathering at a local restaurant. We'd highlight or underline or put question marks in the margins; and then we'd talk about what had "hit home" or what we didn't quite understand. Of course sometimes we'd just talk about the frustrations and hurts and challenges in our lives without regard to the book. But more often than not Henri Nouwen's wise and compassionate words would find a home in the various and varying situations and circumstances of our lives. Together we grew more and more open to "the voice calling us God's beloved sons and daughters." I miss that group.



Anyway, I could probably cut and paste this selection from somewhere on the web... but it's worth retyping... and so that's what I've done... to let the words become a part of me in yet another way...

And I hope the words become part of you as well...

January 10
Growing Beyond Self-Rejection


One of the greatest dangers in the spiritual life is self-rejection. When we say, "If people really knew me, they wouldn't love me," we choose the road toward darkness. Often we are made to believe that self-deprecation is a virtue, called humility. But humility is in reality the opposite of self-deprecation. It is the grateful recognition that we are precious in God's eyes and that all we are is pure gift. To grow beyond self-rejection we must have the courage to listen to the voice calling us God's beloved sons and daughters, and the determination to live our lives according to this truth.

Henri J.M. Nouwen
Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith