Writing to God: Day 6

John 1: 1-5; 14a
The Word Became Flesh

O God who came down and touched the water with your bare hands.  O God who scuffed through the grainy ground, walking from town to town, and got your feet all dusty.  O God who sat around a dinner table with close friends.  Told stories, talked about your day, laughed at a stupid joke.

Come.

Come and be near.
Come and listen.
Come and understand.
Come and embrace.

When the waters rise above our heads.  When the dusty road becomes too long and winding to find our way.  When our dinner tables are empty; or seats that were once occupied are no longer.  Or the stories have all been told; the jokes laughed at one too many times.

And silence now fills the space between bites and sips.

When friends who were once so close are now just out of reach.

Come.
And be near.
And listen.
And understand.

Come and embrace.

O God, we pray.

Amen.

Writing to God: Day 4 & 5

As I figured, I got behind in my posting.  This will not be the last time I'll be behind.  I will also admit, that as I write these prayers, I get nervous about sharing them on here.  They feel too raw and too serious!  But, I made the commitment.  So for whoever is out there, here is Day 4 & Day 5 of Writing to God.

Day 4 (Saturday February 21):  Psalm 46
God, so much of our earth is frozen - and you tell us to be still.  So many of us feel as though the walls of our homes are closing in on us - that's how long we've been inside them, without much chance or courage to venture outward.  And you whisper - be still and know.

How still can one get before the crazy settles in?

A man died in Louisville a few nights ago.  He was found frozen on the steps of the homeless shelter.   The shelter had closed for the night.  The man's name was Kenneth.  God - you knew his name.  God - you knew him well.

How can we be still and know - when our shivering is too strong; too consuming?

How can we be still when our hearts become so closed up and cold - and our concerns and energies are spent on finger-pointing, name-calling, and the fear-based need to be right in our inclinations - that we miss the profound dysfunction of a human being dying in the bitter cold night because there was no room in the inn - in the land of dreams and opportunity?

God - when the world is cold and frozen shut, it is so hard to be still.  And so help us God - at the very least - to know.  To know that you are God.  To know that there is more love than indifference to go around.  And perhaps our knowing can lead to the stillness that you call us to.  The stillness of finding our place, knowing our place, seeking our place as listeners, peacemakers, as people of love.  People who can do our part of warming a cold world.

Help us, then, Lord, to be still.  To be still and know.  To be still and know that you are.  To be still and know that you are God.
Amen.

Day 5 (Monday February 23):  Ecclesiastes 3: 1-20; Ashes to Ashes Confession
Cold reminds us of what it means to be human, to be fully alive, to hurt and to rejoice.  And darn-it if it still isn't a winter mess outside!  I'm going to look back on these prayers and wonder if there was just nothing else to talk about.  For a week now, our days, decisions, actions, and inactions have all depended upon what-is-it-going-to-do-next?  Snow?  Ice?  Freeze?  Rain?  Flood?  Nothing?  Remind us of our humanity and our limitations.

I search, God, for a way to be at peace with my brokenness.  I do not want to be so content that I stop trying to be whole.  But I want to find the peace and security that comes with knowing and accepting that I never will be whole.  Not until death, I suppose.  Is wholeness just out of reach?  I work on my spirit.  I strain my ear in morning darkness to listen for your voice.  Where are you?  What are you saying?  What are you not saying?

O Lord - don't you see the brokenness of your people?  Don't you see the fear and violence and the false security we have placed our lives in?  Your children are killing your children.  And so many of us turn the other way.  What do we do when our brokenness is in too many pieces, with too sharp of edges, that we bleed trying to find our role in living and creating a different way?

There is so much possibility.  And there is so much pain.
How do we even know where to begin?

God, don't leave our side.

Amen.

Writing to God: Day 3

"Humility"  Isaiah 40

O God, may the echoes of laughter follow me today.  Speak to me in playfulness.  Open my senses to the liberation that you bring simply because you are above all and in all and through all.  And I am a grasshopper - bouncing along thinking that the world starts and stops with me.  Assuming that my decisions have the strength to press pause and play in the grand scheme of things.
I hope you laugh out loud - in love, of course.  Teach me to bow down.  Unwrap for me the gift of humility.  Place me in the balance of responsibility and release.  For you are the Holy One.  The earth laughs at our predictions - not to be mean - but to remind us of our inability to fully understand and to stop acting like we do.  Smile at your world today, God.  Smile at us and show us the liberating fullness of your laughter.  Amen.

Writing to God: Day 2

I look out the window today, God.

And see everything that is possible.

The bird about to take flight.

The person in a car driving by, slowly,

As to not slide off the snowy road.

The light of day stretching across the horizon.

I look out the window today

And wonder what it will be like

To pay attention to the trees, the 

Way they stand so elegantly in a frozen earth.

To listen to the way the snow 

Sounds as I take a step out the door.

I look out the window today

And wonder what it would be like

To greet every person with 

A smile and a wave - or even a hug.

Truly happy that they walked into the room. And,

Noticing the smile that embraces them,

They too might feel a little bit lighter.

I look out the window today, God,

And I see all that has been given and made.

Even in a season of cold and barrenness

There is a bird about to take flight,

And a person in a car driving by, slowly.

And the light of a new day stretching across the horizon.

If we would just take the time to look out the window

We would see everything that is possible.

This is the way you love us, God.

Amen.

Writing to God: Day 1

I may be shooting myself in the foot.  But, I'm giving this a shot.  (ha - no pun intended) Jesus said not to be like the hypocrites who pray on the street corners really loudly so people will see them and think they're devout.  So what's the difference with me putting my prayers on the world-wide-web?  I'm struggling to answer that.

But it's the season of Lent.  Today is Ash Wednesday.  The world I live in is snow-covered, cold, and on pause in many ways.  The season of Lent always gets under my skin and makes me want to do something new…something different…something maybe a little more bold and daring than I might do otherwise (maybe).  So here is my version of bold and daring (don't laugh).  I may be shooting myself in the foot…or the mouth….or putting my foot in my mouth…or….well, you get the point.  But I'm going to attempt, really hard, to write a new prayer every day of the 40 days of Lent.  And then (deep inhale) I will share it on my blog.  To guide this process, I am using a book by an amazing writer whom I just discovered about a month ago (thanks to a good pastor friend!;) ) called, "Writing to God:  40 Days of Praying with my Pen" by Rachel G. Hackenberg.

Why share my prayers?  I suppose because I still feel new to this blogging world, and I'm trying to figure out if I like it.  Also, because maybe there are others out there who have similar thoughts, prayers, and struggles as me.  And if I can help you articulate your thoughts, prayers, and struggles - (or just make you feel better about yourself through my insecurities!!) - then perhaps that's all the reason I need.  So, here we go…Day 1.

Ezekiel 37: 1-3
God, the blank page stares at me.  Who knew a white page could be so intimidating?  It seems to smirk and say to me, "Really?  You think you can do this? Do you really think you can etch anything of meaning on me? Really?! Ha."   It's as though this page - this ordinary, typical, not-so-special piece of paper - is my life.  My inner critic, more specifically.  Taunting me and making me feel inadequate.  I'm giving in to the page - my life - my inner critic.  I'm letting myself intimidate me.
God - everything you do screams LIFE.  Living, breathing, abundant LIFE.  So why is it so cold?  Why does it so often feel as though our breath freezes and stops the minute we let go of it?  Like we're stepping out into the snow-covered world, and our boots get stuck in the mounds of thick, white fluff.  This stuck-ness is how life too often feels. We stop before we ever truly begin.  We let it happen.  We let it happen. We let our lives say to us, like the taunting of the blank page, "Really? You really think you're good for something? Really?! Just - stop."  And that's all it takes for us to wiggle our foot out of the snow stuck boot, one after the other.  Leaving them there, empty, in the cold.  Our tracks barely made it out the door.  We go back inside and return to our familiar pillows and blankets of comfort and warmth. Of security.
And still, you beckon us, God. Our scared, timid, self-interested selves that like to think we're so strong and have everything under control. You beckon to us and latch onto us in a way so snug that we cannot wiggle away.  You say: "Move. Breathe. Look. Go. Live."
You say:  "Create life out of nothing.  Fill in the blank space with color and sound.  Make these dry bones move."
O God, show me how to put my feet back in.  Wake me up.  And show me how to move.  Amen.

"Hope, Justice, Dreams" Jeff Bruce

In honor of this day, I am posting my husband & co-pastor Jeff Bruce's sermon that he preached yesterday.  May the words we speak, the prayers we pray, the lessons we teach to our children, and the way we treat others be words, prayers, lessons and actions that bring people together in reconciliation, in understanding, in respect, in love.  We won't always agree with everyone we meet.  But we can always be kind.

The Town and Country Bike Shop began with a rocky start.  Now this bike shop was unique – as it was in the club-house that sat in my parent’s backyard.  It had all kinds of parts.  Bald bicycle tires.  Busted tubes.  Rusty chains.  Worn out hand grips.  And its owners were all in middle school.  My friends and I were so into BMX, or bicycle motocross, that we decided to start our own bike shop.  On a normal summer day, we could be found racing around the neighborhood and jumping curbs and home made dirt ramps, or sitting in a driveway with our bikes flipped upside down, handlebars and seat holding the wheels upright in the air, attempting to make a minor adjustment that would make our bike just a fraction more awesome.

            Our first big project was building our own bike.  Now building a single speed 20” bmx bicycle doesn’t require a lot of mechanical knowledge, but it does require some.  And it required money.  I had purchased an old bike frame and fork and two wheels off my college aged neighbor, but I needed more parts to make the bike work.  So one person bought tires, another bought the handlebar attachment gooseneck.  And then we set off to work.  And they got bored with the work and they went to played and raced their bikes, and piece by piece, with a lot of head scratching and trial and error, I built the bike.  And it was a hit.  We all took it for a spin around the neighborhood.  Everyone loved it.  But the oldest one of our group, the ringleader said:  ok, now we have to sell it.

            I immediately responded with a “NO WAY!  I don’t want to sell it.  I did all the work and most of the parts are mine anyway.”  But the group decided they wanted to sell the bike and split the proceeds evenly, and majority ruled.   But I disagreed, so I took it and locked it in the shed with a padlock, and my friends were so angry.  They wouldn’t even talk to me.  I think they even tried to break the lock off the shed.  Finally, I ended up taking the parts they had supplied off the bike and giving them back.  The partnership dissolved, and Town and Country Bike Shop closed before it could make its first sale.

            Now there were lots of shades of grey in the scenario of my first business experience, and my granddad loved that I learned about business partnerships that early.  And the big question that I ask is:  What is fair?  What makes something fair?  Now I know we can say life is not fair – just get used to it – that is the reality of the world.  But in this situation, what is fair?  Was it fair for me to supply the majority of the parts and all the labor and not get the majority of the funds from the sale, or even the main decision in making the sale?  Or was it fair to my friends that I used their parts and then locked up the newly built bicycle in my shed?  What is fair? 

            Today as we worship together on this Martin Luther King Jr holiday weekend, we are again reminded to look at the ideas of fairness.  What is fair?  What is just?  What is right?  Like I said earlier: the world’s not fair.  We know that.  But could there be the chance that we are unknowingly hindering fairness or unknowingly standing in the way of justice? 

            Anne and I went to see Selma at the movie theater in Bowling Green this past week.  And if you haven’t seen it, I would highly recommend it, but it is a difficult, difficult movie to watch.  There is nothing to make you feel good when you watch this movie – simply because of the horrific atrocities that were committed by our white brothers and sisters against our black brothers and sisters.  And it is even more difficult to realize that this is recent history.  The events that took place in Selma, Alabama: that happened only 50 years ago.  Where are we today?  How far have we come?

The prophet Amos cried out:  “¹ I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.  ²³ Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. ²⁴ But let justice roll down like waters,

   and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”

            I think the most difficult thing for me to grasp as a religious leader is how the Good News of Jesus Christ was and is used to justify keeping people oppressed.  Think of the ways that it has kept people in “their place” throughout history.  Slavery.  The Women’s Suffrage Movement.  Segregation.  Marriage Equality.  Your place is here, this is God’s will, and that’s how it is.  Life’s not fair, get over it. 

            But there’s a great mistake that is made when God’s divine will is invoked as it pertains to oppression.  Our God is a God of liberation, not oppression.  Our God is a God of Justice, not a God of injustice.  And if we used our piety and our religious zeal to allow oppression to remain and injustice to prevail, then we, my friends, need to listen to Amos’s little sermon.  Because he was talking to a people that had forgotten who they were.  They became so focused on the right way to worship and the right way to offer sacrifice, and they thought that’s all that was required to be faithful.  But Amos suggested otherwise.  Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like and ever flowing stream. 

            Amos goes a little further in chapter 8, saying:  ⁴ Hear this, you that trample on the needy, and bring to ruin the poor of the land, ⁵ saying, ‘When will the new moon be over so that we may sell grain; and the sabbath, so that we may offer wheat for sale? We will make the ephah small and the shekel great, and practice deceit with false balances,

⁶ buying the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and selling the sweepings of the wheat.’ The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob: Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.” 

            Amos was active as a prophet during the time of the divided kingdom when Israel and Judah were separate and still maintaining power and independence….which of course, was brief.  If you look at the Bible, most of the story of the Hebrew people is that of an oppressed people.  And yet, in the time of their own freedom from oppression, when Israel and Judah were independent, they oppressed their own.  They trampled on the poor and needy.

            It is so important that we pay attention to this concept of oppression throughout scripture.  The very first commandment calls the Hebrew people to remember:  “I am the God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.”   You were there.  You were oppressed.  This is a part of your story.  This defines you.  I am the God who liberated you.  I brought you out…I rescued you.  Remember?

           In a year where racial tensions have been high once again, and there are cries of injustice from the streets in Ferguson to the streets in New York City, I think it is important to consider context.  Now politics and media perspectives have divided us as a nation on this issue, but I think scripture can help us look in a new way.   The story of the Hebrew people is a story of liberation from oppression.  God sets them free.  God is with them as they carve out their own place.  This is their context:  God liberated us from captivity.  Now, how many years ago was that? 

           What about our context as American people?  Does the idea of liberty come up in our history?   Of course.  It is the theme of the Revolutionary war.  Liberation from the tyranny of oppression.  No taxation without representation.  These continue to create our context as Americans.  We sing the National Anthem.  We celebrate Independence Day.   We become angry when there is just an inkling that our liberty is being taken away.  And how many years ago was that war?  Over 225 years.  And it still has a claim on us today.

            So what about our black brothers and sisters?   Many whose ancestors were brought here during the slave trade?  The Emancipation Proclamation came from Abraham Lincoln in 1863.  Slavery has been over for 150 years.  Brown vs the Board of Education happened in 1954 that was supposed to end segregation in schools, and the Civil Rights act passed in 1964.  And yet, equality was not achieved and there was a call for a voting rights act.  The march from Selma took place in 1965.  Fifty years ago.  People seeking total liberation and equality.

            If the story of the Hebrew people is a people who were liberated by God in the exodus, if the story of the American people is a people who revolted to tyranny, is the Black-American story of oppression not also a story engrained in their identity as a people?  Perhaps that is one reason the words of the prophets were so natural coming from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.    

            The Christian story is rooted in the story of the Hebrew people.  It is a story of liberation, but also a story of new life, and a new way to live.  Love your enemies. Those were Jesus’ words.  And could there be anything more difficult?  Love your enemies, your opponents, the people who think and act differently. 

            Watching the movie Selma, I was reminded once again that Christianity took a lead role in the civil rights movement.  I watched as clergymen who had traveled to be a part of the movement were beaten to death.  White Clergy.  Killed because the supported justice and equality for all people.  Killed because they marched with a black minister and proclaimed the same Gospel of love, justice, and hope.  The church took a lead.  But yet this week I also read King’s letter from a Birmingham Jail – addressed to “my fellow clergymen” – mainliners – Methodist, Presbyterians, Episcopals, Baptist, who had called his current actions unwise and untimely.  He responds: “First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.”[1]

“I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth of time. I received a letter this morning from a white brother in Texas which said: “All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great of a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost 2000 years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth.” [2]

Friends.  Today we are reminded that we play a role in the struggle for justice and equality within this world and especially within this nation.  Our Christian nature of loving God, loving ourselves, and loving our neighbors, even our enemies, is a proactive love.  Our silence in the face of injustice puts us on equal grounds with Pontius Pilate washing his hands. 

The question for us as Christians – for us as a church – that we must continue to ask:  Are we willing to call out the injustice that continues to exist within and beyond the topic of racial inequality in our own country, not to mention the whole world?  Are we willing to stand with the oppressed?  Are we willing to deal with the consequences that come with walking in the path of righteousness?   Where do we stand, friends?  Where will we stand?  Let justice roll down like waters and righteous like and ever flowing stream.   Amen.

           

             

  

                  

---

[1] Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, April 16, 1963, pg 9-10.  Letter available at http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu:5801/transcription/document_images/undecided/630416-019.pdf 

[2] Ibid, 11.

Daybreak

The night of the morning hours pulls me from the warmth of my covers.

It lifts my head from the scoop of my pillow.

I walk in the dark of the morning, holding my phone to shine a brief light,

So that my foot does not meet the side of the bed, but rather slips into the soft welcome of my slippers.

Into the kitchen, I make my way to turn on the most important gadget in the house:

The coffee pot.  The good-morning-rumble it hums makes me happy.

I sit at a table that holds many stories.

If it could speak, what would it say?  What memory would it decide to tell me?

Lifting my pen, I scribble some sleepy words about what the sky looks like

As dawn begins to settle in.  About how I expect my day will unfold.

(Pause.  Is that a baby’s cry?  Or is it the cat reminding me that he exists?  I know all too well that he does; yet he feels the need to say it over and over and over again.)

What should I read?  What should I write?  What should fill the space of my prayers?

There is an energy running through my veins that I cannot ‘pen’ down – no pun intended.

The sky looks gray and cold.  The ground glistens with frost.  I wonder if it will snow.

These quiet minutes are reminders that I exist in a world bigger than the one that exists within my mind.

The ordinary gift of stirring sugar into my coffee, to watch the milk swirl as the steam hovers over my favorite mug,

This gift of catching a few moments of peace in the lightening colors of the morning

This gift is what I miss when I let myself get in the way of myself.

This gift is what brings me inward so that I can live outward.

This gift is what is changing me.  Every day. 

And every day that I welcome it; every day I let it pull up a chair at my table; is a day that is well lived,

Even before it begins.