Holy Peace

 

"Loving God,

Only open

your wings

and I will climb beneath their shadow

and find holy peace.

Amen"

Suzanne M. Lewis

 

 

As the second week of Advent unfolds, we are reminded of the importance of Peace.  For many this seems like one of those things that we may achieve after all that we "need" to do is done.  This time of year it is so easy to look around our lives and find so many things that legitimately need to be done.  We have work commitments, church commitments, family commitments and then when we do stop and look around we see all the need in the world.  Peace, what a great idea, if only I had time. 

 

It has taken me many years to realize that it is actually when we can operate from a place of peace that we are able to get far more done.  Maybe the lists change, maybe the "must dos" change, or the "must haves" are turned on their ear. 

 

The reading today from the "Living in Joyful Hope" speaks to the idea of crawling under the wings of God.  It is when we feel secure and safe that we are most able to invite God into our lives.  The Holy Spirit has a way of turning our world upside down, or perhaps turning in right side up. 

 

As we pray today and reflect on the idea of Peace, I invite us all to slow down.  What does Peace mean to you?  How are you prepared to invite God into your life? 

 



 

"Mary said to the angel, 'How can this be, since I am a virgin?"

Luke 1;34

 

Dear God,

Mary's whole life sounds

a single pure note,

perfectly in tune

with your plan.

Like Mary, I will listen for the music of your joy

with my whole self.

My only wish is to place myself in your hands

so that you can make me vibrate,

like Mary,

one with you.

Amen   

 

                                                                                                                    Suzanne M. Lewis

 

In a reading from "Living in Joyful Hope", Suzanne makes the comment that Mary dares to ask a question of the angel.  She dares to speak up.  How hard it is sometimes for us to use our voices.  For some it is equally important to discern how to use them as instruments of good. not pain or as a weapon.  We live in a world so full of ways to communicate, words and noise surround us.  Sometimes I wonder if anything is really being said. How can we best decide what is important or true. 

 

Recently I was away for a week on silent retreat.  It was a blessing and long overdue.  I have been going on silent retreats for years.  That might seem strange for some of you that know me, and can't imagine me not talking for days at a time.  The truth is that I love the silence, I love the permission to just be and drop all those parts of our personality that allow us to engage in the world around us. 

 

In yesterday's reading, Suzanne tells us that "when we pray, we curl up on God's lap, we share the throne of David and we abide in eternity."  Being away allowed me to remember that feeling.  I was reminded when we step away and turn to God, we also return to our selves, return to the source of being that begins and ends with the divine.  The messages of judgement, fear, and anxiety are all connected to the world around us.  It is in stepping away that we are reminded that God is always with us and that finding our voice, asking God where we can best be used and how is an important part of our journey.  Of course, with that comes the necessity to listen. 

 

"If once we have received a real taste of the sacred, we become hungry for more. Our small awarenss leads us to recognize how scant, how provisional, how circumscribed we are.  And though limited, we thrist to be complete.  To live with this sense of lack is part of our human condition.  To meet this need becomes our quest.  Our hunger, though painful, is a tremendous gift.  It animates and energizes us for all the work the Spirit invites us to do. Our huger impels us to seek the Eternal."

 

 

In this season of advent, we are called to make room, to be still and come to know God.  We are called to look throught the darkness in our lives and the world and see the glimer of light.  We are also called to be that light.  During this time we are also inudated with messages about buying the right gift, baking the right food, making joy and light in ways the world tells us will fill us up, will satisfy that hunger. 

 

I love the holidays, I love the fun, the gifts, and the smell of homemade cookies.  Christmas music of all kinds makes my heart sing.  All that said, my hunger for more is always only fed by the spirit.  I am fooled often and try to quell that hunger with any number of other things.  But in the end, it is when I step back, when I am able to go into the quiet and rest in the loving lap of my God that I know how truly blessed I am.  It is then that I know blessing and joy. 

 

"If we can honestly and bravely face the truth of our finitude, even while refusing to abandon our conviction that there must be a response to our deepest need, we will soon discover an interior door.  This door opens onto a world of wonder. With hearts open, we will be propelled on a journey to seek everywhere , and in every person we meet, after the face of God.  We will find God in the most unlikely, most humble and ordinary places!  And on that day we will have all we need."  

 

Let us give thanks this day for the hunger that reminds us of our yearning, reminds us of the all powerful, all consuming love of God. 

 

Let us place ourselves in the longing arms of God on this day.  Let us use our voice to ask the important questions.  Let us find ways to the the light in the world that best serves God. 



LIving in joyful Hope

 

 

 

As I was wondering what kind of Adult Formation I wanted to do at St. John's I knew we needed to try something a little different.  People's schedules, gas prices and the mere distance that people must travel to get here all contributed my deciding to try something new.  This year we have begun using Facebook as a forum for a discussion on the book, Living in Joyful Hope, by Suzanne M. Lewis.  I have also told people in the congregation that are not on Facebook, that I will post things here and all are encouraged to comment.  The group has taken off in a really exciting way.  If you are reading this and would like to be sent an invitation to the group, please let me know and I would be happy to include you.  It is only a closed group for privacy reasons. But in no way means to exclude.  We are all learning this new field of technology. 

All of that is an introduction to the thoughts that will be posted here during Advent. 

"The light of the Good Shepherd is more solid, more dependable than any object found in the physical world. When we lean against it it bears all our weight. And when we abandon ourselves to it completely, it will lift us up."

During this Advent time, what gets in your way of allowing God to love you into wholeness and light?

 

Reflction from Day 1:

‎"In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary." Luke 1:26-27

I love being reminded of the wonder of God. In light of the many things that have already been shared here, the readings for today are food for the soul. They are also ideas that we are all wrestling with and longing to accept.

" God intervened in our history. God created time but lives in the ageless eternity of wonder. Our God sanctified time and made of it a tabernacle where he might be forever revealed. God, whose omnipresence transcends all points of the compass, took sanctuary in a town, thereby making of town life something both awesome and hold. God will not be co...

nfined by limitless possibility!"

During this season of Advent we spend time reflecting on Mary and the birth of Jesus. We are reminded that Jesus is the way that God was able to come and walk and "be" with us. This reading helps me remember that God also becomes present and lives among each of us. As each of us are born, God becomes a little more manifest in the world. That is not to say that we are not flawed, that we are perfect or "God like". But that even in our fallibility and humanness we are able and called to live out God's grace in the world around us.

"God reached across the chasm that separates us from transcendence so that we who inhabit our own historical moment, our own town, may live richly, full of grace now, here."

"What a responsibility you have given me,
to be your eyes, your lips, your hands!
You invite me to pay attention
to what you do now, with my own hands, with the
hands of stranger, outcasts, the friendless, children.
Your marvels are everywhere!"

Last week I was on retreat. Each time I would say something that would negate myself or what I had said, the spiritual director would say: "That is just a distraction, God does not work through fear." How would our lives feel differently if we were able to look at the negative, fear based messages as a distraction, and imagine being God's instrument at work in the world around us. How can God best use us today?

Thank you all for this chance to spend Advent together. God is soooo  good!

 

Reflection from Day 2:

 

‎"And he came to her and said,, 'Greetings..." Luke 1:28a

One of the many interesting things about reading scripture is the chance to look at the words, to remember that the New Testament was written originally in Greek. I love her uncovering for us that the original meaning of the word 'Greeting' is Chaire, or Rejoice! What a wonderful and different way to say Hi, especially if you are an angel(:

As Tina very aptly reminded us when God comes to us in scripture the words that are used are important. God does not seem to muddle things up with chit chat. When we are approached by God, the words 'Don't be afraid' are always there. As I read the word Rejoice today, it felt very joyful.

After reading the mediation I took Riley and myself for a long walk. I did not listen to any technology and we were in the quiet of the woods. I kept hearing the word , rejoice, in my head. On this damp, dreary, day I was walking through the woods rejoicing. God comes to us in the most unlikely and yet, perfect places.

"On the brief occasions when we do experience joy, we are almost always surprised, or even shocked, into it. For this reason, joy seems to come more easily to children-for them so much of life is new and surprising. But by the time we reach adulthood, even the experience of being surprised can seem to be routine."

When my son was a toddler, he had this way of doing joy that took over his whole body. He would look at something, or open up a box, look up and with wide eyes and a perfectly pitched noise, you knew that you were looking at joy. His father and I used to say that he did joy really well. How do we do joy? Why as adults do we need to become jaded or used to the wonders of the world around us?

On the walk in the woods we took today, we always pass a tree that has many branches. They begin low to the ground and progress up into the sky. When my children were young we would walk another path in the woods and there was a tree very similiar to this one. Each time I walk by it I think of my son and how he always called it the bear tree. I can see in my minds eye my daughter sitting in the branches posing for pictures. I can remember thinking on a day, on that path that I always wanted to remember this feeling, this day. I remember thinking they will be grown soon, they will be off. Today as I passed by that tree, I rejoice, I give thanks for the memory of my children and the bear tree. I rejoice in the memory and the grace that it brings. I also rejoice and give thanks for the wonderful and amzing young people that they are becoming. 

"Perfect Love desires our puny, stumbling love. Joy invites us to partidipate with our own imperfect joy in the divine life. "

" O LOrd,
I know
that you rejoice
in the work of your hands.
When I work with my own hands
please let me fill the world
with the glorious melody
that I become when you touch
the ten strings
of my heart.
Let others join this heavienly music,
until that day when the whole world is filled
with your song.
Amen "

My prayer is that we allow ourselves to remember that God is always with us. That we do not need to be afraid, and that we are greated with Rejoicing!!!!