Anne Lamott is speaking tomorrow, March 24th, at the St Louis County Library. She writes both fiction and non-fiction, but I know her through her printed essays and when she wrote a column for salon, the on-line magazine.
She has struggled in her life, especially with alcohol. She found some solace and stability in St. Andrew’s Presbyterian church in the California bay area. She raised a child, mostly on her own, and faced the tough decisions about being sandwiched between a child and a mother slipping into dementia.
She has a knack for the aphorism. “If God hates the same people you do, you can be fairly certain you have created God in your own image.”
she came to the faith as an adult, but she speaks for many of us in her constant battles to live within it. She wants her life to be a a smooth flight path toward heaven. Instead, she often finds it a slow slog, of small steps, and relapse, and then finding her footing again. As she puts it, “slog, scootch, scotch, rest.” One of the tricks in life, she learns is ‘falling better.” She learned to ski but falls a lot, and she enjoys the run in between the “spills and humiliations, just like life.” In the story she recounts taking her friend Sue, who was dying of cancer, for one last ski trip, the week after Easter. They replayed the Hoy Week services a week late, in the hotel room. Her friend was in a Good Friday time, but she lived as if it were Easter. She taught Anne that the trick to skiing was learning to fall better. The fear of falling impeded her love of the skis. For many of us, we will not reach the summits of our desires. On the way there, perhaps the best we can do is to learn to “fall better.”
She is that most special and gifted of writers on the spiritual life, as she is funny, irreverent and funny, moving and funny. She imagines the disciples on the day after the crucifixion all playing Monday morning quarterback, drunk, and deciding that is was all over for them too. She tells of her struggle finding a dress as an adult flower girl in a wedding where she had visions of looking like some forest princess but being told that she could fit only into an extra large mother of the bride outfit, at 5-7 and 140 pounds.
One of her special gifts is finding some grace in small moments in the hardships of life. She speaks of going past the choir at practice and enjoys their muffled piety. Then, someone has to step out for a moment and “a beam of singing falls directly on me.” She troops off to do a service in a nursing home. Her teenaged son has been impossible all weekend, but he dutifully helps his partner follow the songs and she recites the Lord’s Prayer with him. Her lady falls asleep during the service, and then se wakes and yells that she likes a house, and points to the air. Her teenaged son comes to help her and says let her sleep, she like d the house in her dreams.
Lately, a number of folks have complained that they miss hearing ministers preach about hell and damnation as much as they recall from their youth. they are convinced that we have to demonstrate, prove, our worth before God and each other. Anne Lamott knows better. she knows of grace, full and free. “Grace means you’re in a different universe from where you had been stuck, when you had absolutely no way to get there on your own.”
Friday, March 23, 2012
Saturday, March 17, 2012
OT Notes Jer. 31:31-4
1) This is a short little war horse passage, isn’t it?
2) Without falling prey to supercessionism, interpret the new covenant. Without being anti-Judaic, interpret the new covenant.
3) What images come to mind when we read that god took the people by the hand? How could you work that for a congregation and/or an individual?
4) Work with the image of god as a husband to a people. Clearly we get a hint of why adultery was used to amplify the meaning of idolatry to God. Is God saying the people acted a divorce? What makes you uncomfortable with this marital image? What opens up for you with it?
5) What would it mean to have the law/teaching written on the hearts?
6) Notice that God is not accepting a divorce but is seeking reconciliation:they shall be my people. (Note that Hosea is told to call a child “not my people” lo ammi.’)
7) What would spiritual and social life look like if we knew God so well we would have no need of teaching or proclamation? In sports, we sometimes say that certain qualities or attributes can;t be taught.
8) Remember their sin no more is a powerful thing for the the Eternal One, the Omniscient One to say. remember in Hebrew has a sense of bringing the past into present awareness, so I assume that the past is being consigned to the past. Notice how often we say we may be told to forgive, but we can;t forget.
2) Without falling prey to supercessionism, interpret the new covenant. Without being anti-Judaic, interpret the new covenant.
3) What images come to mind when we read that god took the people by the hand? How could you work that for a congregation and/or an individual?
4) Work with the image of god as a husband to a people. Clearly we get a hint of why adultery was used to amplify the meaning of idolatry to God. Is God saying the people acted a divorce? What makes you uncomfortable with this marital image? What opens up for you with it?
5) What would it mean to have the law/teaching written on the hearts?
6) Notice that God is not accepting a divorce but is seeking reconciliation:they shall be my people. (Note that Hosea is told to call a child “not my people” lo ammi.’)
7) What would spiritual and social life look like if we knew God so well we would have no need of teaching or proclamation? In sports, we sometimes say that certain qualities or attributes can;t be taught.
8) Remember their sin no more is a powerful thing for the the Eternal One, the Omniscient One to say. remember in Hebrew has a sense of bringing the past into present awareness, so I assume that the past is being consigned to the past. Notice how often we say we may be told to forgive, but we can;t forget.
devotions Week Of March 18
March 18-Ps. 107 is today’s reading. It starts the last of the five parts of the Psalter. I suspect it is to reflect the five books of the Torah, the first five books of our Bibles. I note vv.298-30, as it notes the storms we face and like Jesus on the sea, they are quieted. “They were glad they had quiet and were brought to the desired safe heaven.” Have you been so quieted/? Do you desire to be so quieted? What would your safe harbor look like? do you have an internal safe haven to which you may repair?
Monday-Buds are on the trees as I write and some daffodils and crocuses have emerged as well. I ran into Janet Riley, and she said the dogwood trees are gorgeous down south. I love that pastels match the approaching Easter season. Recently Biblical scholar and stated clerk Carol Griffith spoke of God as an artist. This is surely one of the times of the year when that image is at its peak. Today, I am taken with the thought that god does some of the best artistic work with living material.
Tuesday-Stellar spring begins with the equinox. This has been a warm march already. I’ve gotten some salad greens planted and am trying peas for the first time. For me lent is a time of planting spiritual seeds that we harvest all through the year. Is there something in your spiritual garden that you need every year? Is there something missing that you would like to have?
Wednesday-Contempt is the opposite of seeing the image of God in someone. It is a hurtful thing to feel contempt, especially from someone you love. It gives the sense that one is unworthy of even time or basic consideration. Sin against others holds them in contempt. I am so grateful that God does not look at us with contempt. Instead we are counted worthy of the life, death, and resurrection, of Jesus.
Thursday-I love March Madness college basketball. I love when a David beats a Goliath. Already some top teams have gone down. I love the emotion of getting wrapped up in a team and how much the players care. That feeling can be an aspiration for us on church feast days. That feeling of togetherness is an aspiration for the fellow feeling of a congregation.
Friday-We live in a ritually impoverished time. The concern for being casual and authentic has robbed us of socially agreed upon way of doing things. We may be at the point where we may need to create our own for ourselves and family for significant moments. Ritual has a way of marking special time. Our children are grown, but they recall what special food we would have at Easter and Christmas.
Saturday-Learning to be gentler on ourselves is a spiritual issue. It seems to me that we have imported the correcting voice of parents, teachers, or bosses and turned them into the voice of conscience. We are all spiritually fragile. I realize that we may be too easy on ourselves at times. We should expect that we will fail at times. Castigating ourselves can become sinful when it attacks our very self-worth and regard. Beating ourselves up gets us where in the end?
Monday-Buds are on the trees as I write and some daffodils and crocuses have emerged as well. I ran into Janet Riley, and she said the dogwood trees are gorgeous down south. I love that pastels match the approaching Easter season. Recently Biblical scholar and stated clerk Carol Griffith spoke of God as an artist. This is surely one of the times of the year when that image is at its peak. Today, I am taken with the thought that god does some of the best artistic work with living material.
Tuesday-Stellar spring begins with the equinox. This has been a warm march already. I’ve gotten some salad greens planted and am trying peas for the first time. For me lent is a time of planting spiritual seeds that we harvest all through the year. Is there something in your spiritual garden that you need every year? Is there something missing that you would like to have?
Wednesday-Contempt is the opposite of seeing the image of God in someone. It is a hurtful thing to feel contempt, especially from someone you love. It gives the sense that one is unworthy of even time or basic consideration. Sin against others holds them in contempt. I am so grateful that God does not look at us with contempt. Instead we are counted worthy of the life, death, and resurrection, of Jesus.
Thursday-I love March Madness college basketball. I love when a David beats a Goliath. Already some top teams have gone down. I love the emotion of getting wrapped up in a team and how much the players care. That feeling can be an aspiration for us on church feast days. That feeling of togetherness is an aspiration for the fellow feeling of a congregation.
Friday-We live in a ritually impoverished time. The concern for being casual and authentic has robbed us of socially agreed upon way of doing things. We may be at the point where we may need to create our own for ourselves and family for significant moments. Ritual has a way of marking special time. Our children are grown, but they recall what special food we would have at Easter and Christmas.
Saturday-Learning to be gentler on ourselves is a spiritual issue. It seems to me that we have imported the correcting voice of parents, teachers, or bosses and turned them into the voice of conscience. We are all spiritually fragile. I realize that we may be too easy on ourselves at times. We should expect that we will fail at times. Castigating ourselves can become sinful when it attacks our very self-worth and regard. Beating ourselves up gets us where in the end?
Sermon Notes 3/18 Num. 21:4-9, Jn. 3:14-21, Eph. 2:1-10
We all recognize the verse John 3:16 from being waved on bumper stickers and on bed sheets at football games. Most of us don’t catch the reference just two verses prior to it.Years ago, I helped a friend of mine with a fledgling Bible school, since I like to teach, and this issue hit me very hard with his classes. The students could rattle off some chapter and verse numbers but they rarely could place those passages into their context. In the Wiseman Bible class on Friday morning, the gentlemen read form their resource packet on the necessity to read Scripture in its historical and literary context, to more fully appreciate the treasure within the bible.
As good Presbyterians, let’s look at the Old Testament behind this verse. The people were afflicted by poisonous snakes, fiery serpents. If they looked up at an image of a bronze snake, then they would live. Recall the image of the snake in healing still graces pharmacy shops all around our country. It comes from Greek myth of a healer deified by Zeus and his staff had a serpent, a symbol of wisdom entwined around it.
My old professor now dean at Princeton seminary James Kay, preached on this passage in Australia. Looking up at the cross, we see that terrible instrument brought spiritual healing to a world. Looking at the cross drains some of the poison away. Put differently Calvary provides an antidote to the venom of all the hate and violence we face. On many crucifixes we see a snake being crushed by the foot of Jesus on the cross. to look at the cross is to drain the poison out of us, the antidote to all of the venom that courses through us day in and day out.
Some of you may have watched the old TV show Star Trek. In one episode a creature infested members of the ship, and they found that light could rid them of the infection. Mr Spock was the first to try out the experiment, but he was left blinded by the light, at least for a time. For john, to see the light of Jesus Christ as the love of god is to know salvation. It may well mean becoming blind to the faults of others and seeing them through the eyes of love. To be blind to the reality of the love of god in Jesus Christ becomes the judgment, the terrible curse of being unable to see or receive love. Hear it again, not to condemn the world, not to use punishment as a divine weapon. In our time, sin is better conceived as an illness, a sickness, than a crime or a bad habit.
In the gospel of John the physical is the gateway to the spiritual realm. the two intersect but have different dimension, of course. The remarkable set of readings we have for today underscores this with our reading from Ephesians with john. The Israelites were dying in the wilderness. The spiritual and emotional poison in our bloodstream renders us on the spiritual critical list. Twice Ephesians calls us dead, no spirit, no life. Only God, out of the great love, the love made incarnate in Jesus Christ. I heard two two complaints this week that ministers do not preach about judgment, punishment as a goad to good behavior and a deterrent against bad behavior. After all of these years, we recoil against the very notion that god gives the us the precious gift of being saved. Maybe that is both accurate and proper, but thoroughly wrong-headed in my view. Following the logic of our passages, punishment and deterrence are tools for a graceless world.
the church has been called a hospital for sinners. Here we get the prescription we so require in order to live into this lfie and the world to come. It’s a simple remedy from Jesus. See me.
As good Presbyterians, let’s look at the Old Testament behind this verse. The people were afflicted by poisonous snakes, fiery serpents. If they looked up at an image of a bronze snake, then they would live. Recall the image of the snake in healing still graces pharmacy shops all around our country. It comes from Greek myth of a healer deified by Zeus and his staff had a serpent, a symbol of wisdom entwined around it.
My old professor now dean at Princeton seminary James Kay, preached on this passage in Australia. Looking up at the cross, we see that terrible instrument brought spiritual healing to a world. Looking at the cross drains some of the poison away. Put differently Calvary provides an antidote to the venom of all the hate and violence we face. On many crucifixes we see a snake being crushed by the foot of Jesus on the cross. to look at the cross is to drain the poison out of us, the antidote to all of the venom that courses through us day in and day out.
Some of you may have watched the old TV show Star Trek. In one episode a creature infested members of the ship, and they found that light could rid them of the infection. Mr Spock was the first to try out the experiment, but he was left blinded by the light, at least for a time. For john, to see the light of Jesus Christ as the love of god is to know salvation. It may well mean becoming blind to the faults of others and seeing them through the eyes of love. To be blind to the reality of the love of god in Jesus Christ becomes the judgment, the terrible curse of being unable to see or receive love. Hear it again, not to condemn the world, not to use punishment as a divine weapon. In our time, sin is better conceived as an illness, a sickness, than a crime or a bad habit.
In the gospel of John the physical is the gateway to the spiritual realm. the two intersect but have different dimension, of course. The remarkable set of readings we have for today underscores this with our reading from Ephesians with john. The Israelites were dying in the wilderness. The spiritual and emotional poison in our bloodstream renders us on the spiritual critical list. Twice Ephesians calls us dead, no spirit, no life. Only God, out of the great love, the love made incarnate in Jesus Christ. I heard two two complaints this week that ministers do not preach about judgment, punishment as a goad to good behavior and a deterrent against bad behavior. After all of these years, we recoil against the very notion that god gives the us the precious gift of being saved. Maybe that is both accurate and proper, but thoroughly wrong-headed in my view. Following the logic of our passages, punishment and deterrence are tools for a graceless world.
the church has been called a hospital for sinners. Here we get the prescription we so require in order to live into this lfie and the world to come. It’s a simple remedy from Jesus. See me.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Column for March 16
St. Patrick’s Day is tomorrow. The European Irish look askance at our desire to make it a day of parades, but mostly alcohol consumption. Combined with March Madness on the TV, we could be swimming in green beer. My father died when I was small, but with a last name like Crowley, I own that slice of my heritage.
So much of the stories of St. Patrick are swathed in legend. Of course, some of my Irish ancestors would say that one shouldn’t let the truth get in the way of a good story. He was from Britain and enslaved in Ireland for a number of years. He escaped, but he had a vision to be called back to Ireland to spread the Christian faith. Ironically, he worked as a shepherd and then was called to shepherd souls as a bishop in Ireland around the 400s.
To be Irish is to know that “the world someday will break your heart.” the old country was harsh for the poor, under the yoke of a foreign hand. Laughter helps comfort the heartbreak. I love the idea that parishes would provide dispensations for the Lenten strictures for St. Patrick’s Day. While the Irish are proud: “if you’re lucky enough to be Irish, then that’s luck enough,” They love to puncture self-importance: “the greatest danger to the country is “the small minds of its small people.”
They know full well, for all of their love of language, (as “there is no tax on talk”) that words are insufficient in a hard world. “The sweetest sound of all is a quiet mouth.” Action is required in life, as deciding and action are separate steps. “You never get a field plowed by turning it over in your mind.”
A marvelous prayer is attributed to Patrick, the so called breastplate prayer. I love it as it touches on Celtic spirituality. The words reflect ancient Ireland and they were not translated into English until the 19th century. First it emphasizes the “strong name of the Trinity,” sometimes called the Three in Irish prayers. (The story of Patrick using the shamrock leaves to speak of the distinct but unified plant was used to speak of the Trinity, after all.) Second, it touches on the natural world:” the virtues of star-lit heaven…the whiteness of the moon, the flashing of the lightning free…and the old eternal rocks. Third, protection is key: “the power of God to hold and lead, god’s eye to watch…God’s shield to ward…the heavenly host be my guard.” Finally, it has a sense of the enveloping nature of God’s love: “Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me…Christ to comfort and restore me…Christ in hearts of all that love me.” for the Irish it is indeed a model prayer as it touches all of life. For the Irish, all actions communicate to heaven’s gates, are offerings to a generous God, so the Irish had prayers for everything from lighting a lamp or putting it out at night, to washing dishes, to grace before meals.
In a hard world, we all need blessings. May the rain blow soft against the snug windows of your house that’s paid for. May your blessings outnumber all the weeds in your garden. May troubles avoid you like a debtor avoids an evening phone call. May good luck pursue you like a linebacker. May your wallet be fat with cash and your heart be light.
“May God indeed hold you in the palm of his hand, but may God never close the fist too tightly.”
“May you be in heaven one half hour before the devil knows you’re dead.”
So much of the stories of St. Patrick are swathed in legend. Of course, some of my Irish ancestors would say that one shouldn’t let the truth get in the way of a good story. He was from Britain and enslaved in Ireland for a number of years. He escaped, but he had a vision to be called back to Ireland to spread the Christian faith. Ironically, he worked as a shepherd and then was called to shepherd souls as a bishop in Ireland around the 400s.
To be Irish is to know that “the world someday will break your heart.” the old country was harsh for the poor, under the yoke of a foreign hand. Laughter helps comfort the heartbreak. I love the idea that parishes would provide dispensations for the Lenten strictures for St. Patrick’s Day. While the Irish are proud: “if you’re lucky enough to be Irish, then that’s luck enough,” They love to puncture self-importance: “the greatest danger to the country is “the small minds of its small people.”
They know full well, for all of their love of language, (as “there is no tax on talk”) that words are insufficient in a hard world. “The sweetest sound of all is a quiet mouth.” Action is required in life, as deciding and action are separate steps. “You never get a field plowed by turning it over in your mind.”
A marvelous prayer is attributed to Patrick, the so called breastplate prayer. I love it as it touches on Celtic spirituality. The words reflect ancient Ireland and they were not translated into English until the 19th century. First it emphasizes the “strong name of the Trinity,” sometimes called the Three in Irish prayers. (The story of Patrick using the shamrock leaves to speak of the distinct but unified plant was used to speak of the Trinity, after all.) Second, it touches on the natural world:” the virtues of star-lit heaven…the whiteness of the moon, the flashing of the lightning free…and the old eternal rocks. Third, protection is key: “the power of God to hold and lead, god’s eye to watch…God’s shield to ward…the heavenly host be my guard.” Finally, it has a sense of the enveloping nature of God’s love: “Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me…Christ to comfort and restore me…Christ in hearts of all that love me.” for the Irish it is indeed a model prayer as it touches all of life. For the Irish, all actions communicate to heaven’s gates, are offerings to a generous God, so the Irish had prayers for everything from lighting a lamp or putting it out at night, to washing dishes, to grace before meals.
In a hard world, we all need blessings. May the rain blow soft against the snug windows of your house that’s paid for. May your blessings outnumber all the weeds in your garden. May troubles avoid you like a debtor avoids an evening phone call. May good luck pursue you like a linebacker. May your wallet be fat with cash and your heart be light.
“May God indeed hold you in the palm of his hand, but may God never close the fist too tightly.”
“May you be in heaven one half hour before the devil knows you’re dead.”
Monday, March 12, 2012
Sermon Notes 3/11 I Cor. 1:18-25
When people are engaged in criticism, a decisive slam seems to be, they have no common sense. Sometimes that means a sense of the practical as opposed to the theoretical.
Sometimes, it means something we assume people agree with reflexively, without much thought, common opinion. II am learning here that some folks have a real antipathy toward Paul’s work, in part due to stereotypes without reading him, or in reading him, they find him difficult. Perhaps, Paul has no religious common sense. With that thought, I jump right into the thicket of his work on cross. Part of me admires the relentless optimism and promise of a lot of contemporary American religion. People need to be lifted up. I oppose its relentless feel good command, however. It does not reflect human experience. It adds to our positive thinking refusal to admit to the hardships of dealing with the tragedies that afflict every human life, no matter how well lived, no matter how good we are. We need a religious way of expressing times and situations that threaten to crush, those hard times when religious pick me ups sound like platitudes or cliches.
The Presbyterian God is rightfully big, capacious, and powerful. That is part of the biblical witness, but we are in a sanctuary that has the Celtic cross dominating our central sight line. The cross is the gospel of admitting suffering in life and into the very life of god. Luther spoke of a theology of the cross.In Christ, God demonstrates power and wisdom in a cross, in an instrument of capital punishment. Who in their right mind would do this? Paul answers, god, proof positive that it is beyond human claims on it.
Paul first wants to emphasize the cross of Christ as a gift no one would think of as an instrument of salvation. He calls it utterly moronic, to our way of thinking. Second, it wants to make sure that we do not see that cross as a personal possession; it is god’s gift to humanity. Let’s go at it this way. men and women sometimes differ on appropriate gifts. Women see them as symbols of someone taking time and effort to find a suitable gift. Men see them as utilitarian, as something needed and useful. So men are right that a blender for a birthday is useful, but they are wrong that a woman will see it as a proper symbol of respect, care, and romance, of true love. so then it becomes a useful weapon for the woman when they brain the husband with it. In other words, Paul says that God demonstrates no common sense. It’s obvious god should clean hose, well maybe except ours. God should eliminate opposition to the Way of God. The Mighty One shoulfd continue to demonstrate mighty acts like the Parting of the Red Sea. (Hall quotes here)
The deep wisdom here is in the nature of love. Love is not coerced. Love empowers, but love is not power over someone in an attempt to control them. Love seeks to bring the best out of people. Love seeks to bring the best out of a bad situation.the cross enters right into the hells we all face of abandoning the way of God or feeling as if God has abandoned us in our plight.
The way of the cross is for us too. We forfeit the grand game of power plays. We walk away from self-promotion, and look out for others.We do not apply the standards of business models to the work of the church. we so blithely say god is everywhere. The cross shows us God at God’s most divine there at the nadir, the deepest darkest valley of life.
Sometimes, it means something we assume people agree with reflexively, without much thought, common opinion. II am learning here that some folks have a real antipathy toward Paul’s work, in part due to stereotypes without reading him, or in reading him, they find him difficult. Perhaps, Paul has no religious common sense. With that thought, I jump right into the thicket of his work on cross. Part of me admires the relentless optimism and promise of a lot of contemporary American religion. People need to be lifted up. I oppose its relentless feel good command, however. It does not reflect human experience. It adds to our positive thinking refusal to admit to the hardships of dealing with the tragedies that afflict every human life, no matter how well lived, no matter how good we are. We need a religious way of expressing times and situations that threaten to crush, those hard times when religious pick me ups sound like platitudes or cliches.
The Presbyterian God is rightfully big, capacious, and powerful. That is part of the biblical witness, but we are in a sanctuary that has the Celtic cross dominating our central sight line. The cross is the gospel of admitting suffering in life and into the very life of god. Luther spoke of a theology of the cross.In Christ, God demonstrates power and wisdom in a cross, in an instrument of capital punishment. Who in their right mind would do this? Paul answers, god, proof positive that it is beyond human claims on it.
Paul first wants to emphasize the cross of Christ as a gift no one would think of as an instrument of salvation. He calls it utterly moronic, to our way of thinking. Second, it wants to make sure that we do not see that cross as a personal possession; it is god’s gift to humanity. Let’s go at it this way. men and women sometimes differ on appropriate gifts. Women see them as symbols of someone taking time and effort to find a suitable gift. Men see them as utilitarian, as something needed and useful. So men are right that a blender for a birthday is useful, but they are wrong that a woman will see it as a proper symbol of respect, care, and romance, of true love. so then it becomes a useful weapon for the woman when they brain the husband with it. In other words, Paul says that God demonstrates no common sense. It’s obvious god should clean hose, well maybe except ours. God should eliminate opposition to the Way of God. The Mighty One shoulfd continue to demonstrate mighty acts like the Parting of the Red Sea. (Hall quotes here)
The deep wisdom here is in the nature of love. Love is not coerced. Love empowers, but love is not power over someone in an attempt to control them. Love seeks to bring the best out of people. Love seeks to bring the best out of a bad situation.the cross enters right into the hells we all face of abandoning the way of God or feeling as if God has abandoned us in our plight.
The way of the cross is for us too. We forfeit the grand game of power plays. We walk away from self-promotion, and look out for others.We do not apply the standards of business models to the work of the church. we so blithely say god is everywhere. The cross shows us God at God’s most divine there at the nadir, the deepest darkest valley of life.
Week of March 11 devotions
Sunday March 11 Ps.19 is great linkage of a religious attitude to science. They do not have to be enemies. Indeed that is the main issue of the Clergy Letter Project of which I am a member. It starts with a hymn to creation and then move to god’s teaching or law. At the end, notice how it admits that our knowledge is always partial and provisional.
Monday-I was re-reading Martin Marty’s Cry of Absence. It was written in the wake of his wife’s death. He uses the psalms extensively to probe his pain, and ours. He writes as what he terms a summery, optimistic spirituality only made him feel worse. For the hard times, he needed a wintry, spirituality that admits to cold and fallow times of the spirit.
Tuesday-We practiced the hymn, O Sacred Head Now Wounded in choir and heard it in the community service last week. Bernard, the great preacher of love, wrote the words a millennium ago. Brian Wren picked up the last verse “what language shall I borrow/to thank you dearest friend.” Search your heart and mind for language to describe for gratitude for the life, person, and work of Jesus Christ.
Wednesday-The book of Proverbs applies wisdom to everyday life. 26 2--1: looks to anger as a problem. “For lack of wood, the fire goes out; and where there is no whisperer, quarreling ceases. As charcoal is to hot embers and wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome person for kindling strife.” Anger burns, and it can burn out of control. Proverbs has it also need an accelerant, as in arson. Here, we are the ones who fan the flames.
Thursday-I am leery of Christians who valorize suffering. To me it often degenerates into blaming the victim of suffering for their plight or tells them that suffering makes us stronger. Suffering can threaten us as well. In hindsight, we may see some wisdom we acquired, but it is so hard to deal with in the moment. We are called, instead, to try to heal suffering when we encounter it. Ins tead of passive acceptance, we resist it.
Friday-The Ides of March just meant a division within the halves of a month. It is known to us as Caesar was killed in 44BC on this date. It was foretold that he should beware the Ides of March. a sense of foreboding is a difficult thing to handle. Are we caving to anxiety, or should be honor feelings that something is a miss and alter our plans? Intuition can be a gift, a curse, or a figment of our imaginations. We can pray for discernment to read our intuitions. We can go boldly in the prudence of care and in the boldness of God’s protection.
Saturday-St Patrick’s Day is a celebration of Irish/Celtic lore. Celtic spirituality has garnered more attention of late. I am attracted to it, as it hold store in praying without ceasing, as it makes every activity a locus for prayer. I also prize its use of nature to offer praises for adoration to the Creator. “Patient lover give us love: till every shower of rain speaks of Thy forgiveness:/till every storm assures us that we company with Thee:
and every move of light and shadow speaks of grave and resurrection: to assure us that we cannot die: Thou creating, redeeming and sustaining God” (George MacLeod)
Monday-I was re-reading Martin Marty’s Cry of Absence. It was written in the wake of his wife’s death. He uses the psalms extensively to probe his pain, and ours. He writes as what he terms a summery, optimistic spirituality only made him feel worse. For the hard times, he needed a wintry, spirituality that admits to cold and fallow times of the spirit.
Tuesday-We practiced the hymn, O Sacred Head Now Wounded in choir and heard it in the community service last week. Bernard, the great preacher of love, wrote the words a millennium ago. Brian Wren picked up the last verse “what language shall I borrow/to thank you dearest friend.” Search your heart and mind for language to describe for gratitude for the life, person, and work of Jesus Christ.
Wednesday-The book of Proverbs applies wisdom to everyday life. 26 2--1: looks to anger as a problem. “For lack of wood, the fire goes out; and where there is no whisperer, quarreling ceases. As charcoal is to hot embers and wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome person for kindling strife.” Anger burns, and it can burn out of control. Proverbs has it also need an accelerant, as in arson. Here, we are the ones who fan the flames.
Thursday-I am leery of Christians who valorize suffering. To me it often degenerates into blaming the victim of suffering for their plight or tells them that suffering makes us stronger. Suffering can threaten us as well. In hindsight, we may see some wisdom we acquired, but it is so hard to deal with in the moment. We are called, instead, to try to heal suffering when we encounter it. Ins tead of passive acceptance, we resist it.
Friday-The Ides of March just meant a division within the halves of a month. It is known to us as Caesar was killed in 44BC on this date. It was foretold that he should beware the Ides of March. a sense of foreboding is a difficult thing to handle. Are we caving to anxiety, or should be honor feelings that something is a miss and alter our plans? Intuition can be a gift, a curse, or a figment of our imaginations. We can pray for discernment to read our intuitions. We can go boldly in the prudence of care and in the boldness of God’s protection.
Saturday-St Patrick’s Day is a celebration of Irish/Celtic lore. Celtic spirituality has garnered more attention of late. I am attracted to it, as it hold store in praying without ceasing, as it makes every activity a locus for prayer. I also prize its use of nature to offer praises for adoration to the Creator. “Patient lover give us love: till every shower of rain speaks of Thy forgiveness:/till every storm assures us that we company with Thee:
and every move of light and shadow speaks of grave and resurrection: to assure us that we cannot die: Thou creating, redeeming and sustaining God” (George MacLeod)
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