Fears

What is painfully absent from my life? Confidence! I seem to be afraid of or anxious about many things. And here I am reminded of Jesus - God, my heavenly mother knows what my needs are today. She is constantly sending love and peace. It is I who cannot (or forget to) receive it. Because I am looking elsewhere so often. This fear-filled approach to life is stunting. That is why I have been focusing on grace and Psalm 27. Taking my unnamed fears and anxieties and putting them in God's loving care frees me to be. Frees me to explore myself, my husband, and the world with confidence.

Unnamed. That is only partially true. One thing I am fearful about is people knowing me ... and rejecting me. Okay, that's two things. I am starting to feel pressure to be perfect (from myself). So I'm glad I was able to give Peter grace re: his laundry mishap yesterday. So perhaps the next step is to name some of those unnamed fears.

In addition to being known and rejections I am afraid that the voices that constantly tell me I am not good enough or smart enough are telling the truth. So I look to others for that affirmation. But I have not really let it sink in - so I focus on the surface issues - research statement, GRE - and rather than allaying my fears, this just feeds them. So I am giving my obedience to my fears rather than God.

Maybe seeing the 'fair beauty' of the Lord means opening myself to her great love for me - and all her children.

Transformation

Rivers of living water in the midst of the desert - the grind wears on us, the living water refreshes. The grind of the sand echoes our daily grind of life. Things to do, places to be, people to contact - the busy-ness of the day grinding our spirits down as the sands of the desert grinds our skin ... the water of Christ, flowing that we might bring forth our blossoms, leaves, fruit. Our true fruit - our true selves in Christ, that which never gets ground down. Only covered up because its fire is so bright and hot that we fear we may be consumed.
The secret? We will be consumed, but not wholly. What is left will grow and reveal to us our true selves, watered by the Living Water. If we have eyes to see. If we have ears to hear.

Becoming

I was reading the gospel of John this morning. It struck me that although it is not apparent in English, in Greek the verb geneo is very prominent. Becoming, being born. We are continually becoming. Every choice we make leads to a way of being. Becoming anew, becoming from heaven. Continually becoming, always a new creation with every breath and every decision. So, the question our lives must answer is, "Who Am I?"

If we value integrity, our choices, thoughts, and actions need to reflect that. If we value courage, we need to act courageously. If we value truth, we must speak the truth on behalf of ourselves and others. If we value peace, we must act peacefully. If we value equality, we must make choices that help to bring that about. If we value justice, we must not only act justly, but work to eliminate the injustices inherent in our society.

Just writing this makes me tired! Yet, if we value love, we must love ourselves and our neighbor. No one benefits if we burn ourselves out.

Becoming requires being mindful of where we put our energy and how often we replenish it.

Becoming, being born, a new creation in Christ.
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Grace and Vulnerability

I am not sure if I've written on my latest epiphany on Grace and God's goodness. It's easy to think that God doesn't care - else why would there be suffering? Yet, I think this misses the point of original sin. We have free will, which includes the will to be greedy. The will to cater to our basest desires rather than our highest. The will to be selfish and take what rightfully belongs to others.

There is enough food, shelter, warmth and clothing to go around but we, not God, we choose to hoard these things. We choose to exploit other nations and people. We choose to put those with dark skin in ghettoes of our making - not theirs. Then we blame them because they protest. Or they attack us. But we, we are to blame. Every time we choose to not look or not listen to the truth. And we are all guilty. I think this is what Thomas Merton meant.

God provides enough; we hoard and hurt others out of fear and lack of trust. We are vulnerable and do not like the feeling so we make ourselves less vulnerable at the expense of others. I am feeling this vulnerability now. We spent a lot of money getting our apartment ready to have others move in. Then they chose not to. So we are strapped and unsure what comes next. We have decided to move to Cleveland, yet we need to make sure we have shelter and jobs. That takes money.

We will be talking about it tomorrow. I will be focusing today on abundance. God's gracious abundance. And grace. For each other and for others. How can we continue to be generous when it feels we do not have enough?

Gunmen

So, I was reading a website the other day and I saw an article about the terrorist brothers who shot and killed twelve people, kidnapped several others, robbed a gas station and caused the city of Paris a few days of panic. They called him a gunman.

Unfortunately, here in America, that has very romantic and very positive associations. Why would we use it for those who kill and terrorize others? Is our vocabulary so wanting that we have no other appropriate and less romantically loaded words? How about murderer, killer, even with alleged in front they are more accurate.

Terrorist, murderer, killer, kidnapper. We are afraid to call things what they are.

Yet.

We also have issues with name-calling in this country. We love to call others terrorist for supporting democratic policies. We call women especially nasty things when they speak out. We terrorize them when they disagree with us. Yes, I am a woman and I am using we. Because we are all guilty when we do not speak out.

What is the answer? How can we negotiate conversations when our partners sling accusations and exaggerations? Does that make it harder to call out people for what they've done? More problematic? What about when someone says or does something blatantly racist? Do we call them out? I've heard some talking heads argue that is 'playing the race card.' It's like some people have turned the meanings of words upside down to suit their own purposes.

But, that does not stop things from being what they are. We need to stop calling terrorists gunmen; thereby romanticizing them. We need to start calling society out on its racism, sexism, hatred and injustice. Lord, lead the way.

Who has the power?

Epiphany

It's Epiphany, the day the wise men finally made it to Jesus - two years after his star appeared. Light in the dark sky. And the sky was dark then. Those of us who live in cities have a hard time imagining how truly dark it was. Especially in the winter, when it was long as well.

My heart can be a dark place - but only parts of it. Many of the tumors and scar tissues have been removed, cleaned or healed. My life has never been easy but mostly not especially hard. I've lived through a lot of darkness. Today I choose not to add to the darkness already out there. Like policemen killing young, black men without facing any consequences; the war on women the Republicans seem to be waging; gang shootings; Syria; Palestine; Iraq; those last three the doing of my own government; torture.

The thing is God/Christ/Yahweh/Allah is there hurting alongside the mourning, alongside the tortured - the raped, alongside the homeless, the hungry, the lost and the forgotten. The least of these. This makes me think of The Night Ministry. Perhaps it is time to put away my wounded pride and go out with them again. They need people to sign up. The gathering of light for those who are truly in a dark place. How will they know God is there unless we go out to them?

All this pricking is getting downright uncomfortable: TNM, Nora's lay chaplains, the Church on the Flats. I wonder if anyone goes down there now? To let them know God is with them and loves them?

Meals and Worship

So, I have been reading a book on worship by a past McCormick professor. The section that speaks to me most today is that on the eucharist. The original intent was truly a feast. It is no longer a feast. I wonder how we could bring that back to our worship? Compared to a feast, our worship is very sterile - non human. Eric seems to think doing things would be a good beginning. I think it would be great to include meals and discussion in his plans.

I remember going to Louisville Seminary's chapel and the communion table was full to overflowing with food. It was truly a feast. Not a communal meal because we did not eat together, but a feast. Rogers Park has a meal after worship. It to is a feast but not a real meal in that the cliques stay together. It is not welcoming to the stranger.

Eric was here helping as I was reading and I just knew we had to do something to celebrate our friendship in Christ. He is very intense but I think that is just what RPPC needs.

So how can I reinterpret worship so that it is a feast? How can Peter and I incorporate this into our marriage? How can we host others and be hosted in the same way. In a weird way going to the kitchen is very much like being at eucharist because everyone is so happy to be there! Every one is grateful and joyful. The joyful feast of God.

I'm going to have to rethink my ideas of Holy Communion. ...
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