In The Living of These Days

Part of my Lenten practice and discipline so far this year has been two things.  One, I've tried to engage myself in three minutes of silence each day for the pure sake of being silent and present to God.  Two, I've also tried to keep up on reading the 40-Day Journey with Joan Chittister.  For the most part on both of them, I've done alright- not every day and not perfect; but I've done okay. Today, I want to share a reflection with you from Day 17 with Joan Chittister.  For the Bible verse, she uses John 14:27:  "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.  I do not give to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." Joan writes these words that I invite you to reflect upon with me today: "Peace comes when we know that there is something that the Spirit has to teach us in everything we do, in everything we experience.  When we are rejected, we learn that there is a love above all loves in l...

"There's a Wideness in God's Mercy, like the wideness of the sea; there's a kindness in God's justice which is more than liberty.  There is no place where earth's sorrows are more felt than up in heav'n.  There is no place where earth's failings have such kindly judgment giv'n. There's a welcome for the sinner, and a promised grace made good; there is mercy with the Savior; there is healing in his blood.  There is grace enough for thousands of new worlds as great as this; there is room for fresh creations in that upper home of bliss. For the love of God is broader than the measures of our mind; and the heart of the Eternal is most wonderfully kind.  But we make this love too narrow by false limits of our own' and we magnify its strictness with a zeal God will not own." - "There's a Wideness in God's Mercy" (ELW 587 vv. 1-3) This is one of my all time favorite hymns.  It is probably best known for it...

"How precious is your steadfast love, O God!   All people may take refuge in the shadow of your wings.   They feast on the abundance of your house,  and you give them drink from the river of your delights.   For with you is the fountain of life;  in your light we see light." - Psalm 36:7-9 We get this week in these words images of baptism, of drinking, of water being the fountain of life.  We are preparing this Sunday to hear words about life, about water, about light, about dancing, and about partying.  Partying, or celebration, means nothing without having known the opposite.  Rejoicing doesn't mean one iota unless we know sorrow, sadness, darkness. The people of Flint know darkness, sadness, and what it is not to have clean water to drink.  Some people in our own community know what it is not to have heat, or power, or money to buy food, or shelter, or clothing.  Some of us reading this might know disappointment, hurt, he...

" Do not be conformed to this world,  but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect." - Romans 12:2 Paul is encouraging transformation for the Romans.  Transformation, literally to be formed around... to be formed around the renewing of your minds that you might discern the will of God.  God's will is different from the world, God's will desires life not death, light, not darkness.  This week in the life of the church we celebrate Epiphany, which means revealing or manifestation. God reveals God's purposes to the world in baby Jesus.  These purposes are love, redemption, salvation, transformation.  The world doesn't get the final say, God does.  Transformation is more than a head game, it's a life action.  When you've encountered God and God's revelation, you can't ever be the same again.  God does not leave you as you came, you're always ...

I don't know why... and truth be told, sometimes I wish I did. I don't know why bad things happen to good people. I don't know why God takes them young and full of life. I don't know why death hurts so much. I don't know why Devon Smiley was killed this week. I don't know why or how things seem to go on without someone that we knew or loved. This week has been hard for a lot of people in this place that I have come to call home.  I have never appreciated or valued community more than this week.  To see how people have come together in the midst of horrible news, to see how students just want to be with one another in loss, anguish, and grief; to see how far reaching news, and even love, travels is simply astounding. #DevoStrong We need each other in times like these.  We need each other to lift us up, to help us hold our heads up, to check on us, to let us cry or laugh or tell stories.  We need community even though it feels like we want to be a...

Jesus said, “Everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened." - Luke 11:10 I remember watching just recently a video of a now 18-year old woman in my internship congregation speak of what the Church is to her.   In some sense, one would think that she would say “more screens and multimedia in worship” or “Ipads with the liturgy on them for everyone!”   However, she didn’t.   She said those are worship things, or church matters.   The Church, she says, is something different altogether. What she says is very good and compelling, and her basic message is summed up in a hashtag:   #Churchisfamily (or community). I know, I know, some of you are asking what a hashtag is and it is one of those social media words or ideas.   A hashtag is a way to group related messages on social media sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc.   The hashtag begins with the “#” sign and then end...

Apologies if you're offended by some of the wording that follows.  My wife posted this earlier this week on Facebook, and ever since reading it, I've been so grateful for it: This morning I asked God to make me awesome. I was like, "Lord, would you please make me strong enough and smart enough and good enough? Make me capable and steadfast and secure and then make me all the other things I'm not and give me everything else I need to be awesome, so I can finally be kickass at life." And God was all, "Actually? I have a better idea... You do you, frail and broken; you be who you are - and I'll do me, strong and whole; I'll be who I Am. And then we' ll kick life in the ass *together*, because when you're not enough, I Am sufficiently graceful, and when you're too weak, I Am perfectly powerful. I don't even need you to be awesome, I just need you to remember that when you're not, it's ok, because I Am on your team." ...

"Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ has forgiven you." - Ephesians 4:32 Be kind to one another.  Or, be tenderhearted.  Forgive as you have been forgiven first by God in Christ.  Paul says such easy words, or at least easy on the surface.  But, these words are hard.  Kindness is a virtue; being kind to another person takes work, struggle, and even a bit of passion. This week, the Junior Varsity and Varsity teams from South Haven High School have started their football games.  That means that the Band has started practicing and drilling for their halftime show as well.  I've been thinking back to my days in band this week.  My band director had this motto in the front of the band room that he would always open and end the school year with:  Be Kind.  Two simple words, but they were there in front of everyone; not at the side or in the corners of the chalkboard, they were plastered in capital ...

“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 circumstance acting on your own good will) will make of you tomorrow.  Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within 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” [“Patient Trust” by Pierre Teilhard deChardin, SJ) I l...

"We are not called to relate to God without a world. To love God we must also love what God loves. We are called to love this created world as God loves it. . . . We are to help transform this universe in Christ by seeing Christ in the universe and loving Christ at the heart of the universe." - Pierre Teilhard de Chardin de Chardin has become one of my favorite thinkers and mystics in the life of the Church.  He writes a prayer that I have used with my spiritual director about trusting in the slow work of God and helping us to slow down a little bit in a culture that calls for "the need for speed." This morning, this quote is what I am resting with.  To love God we must also love what God loves.  We must also love the creation and everything it as God does.  Everything in it- that even includes people, and sometimes, admittedly, that's a challenge.  God is active in out world- not some displaced far off entity that sets things in motion and then leaves them ...

"For in [Christ] every one of God’s promises is a ‘Yes.’ For this reason it is through him that we say the ‘Amen’, to the glory of God." - 2 Corinthians 1:20            We are reading here the first little bit of what our Bibles break down as 2 Corinthians.  This is Paul's letter to the church/community of faith in Corinth and both 1 Corinthians and 2 Corinthians are likely really just one letter, not two separate books like our Bibles tend to separate them.  Some of the correspondence from the Corinthian congregations are lost, we don't have those manuscripts, but we do have what is left of Paul's reply.  In this first chapter of the continuation of the letter, Paul and Timothy are writing to the community to tell them they are going to be delayed in coming to see them.  They did not plan for this to happen, and they could not have said, "Yes, we are coming" and then "No, we are not."  Thus, in Christ eve...