Reflection on Psalm 46

Here is my latest reflection, considering stillness, written for Mulberry Street UMC's newsletter as part of our summer sermon series on Psalms.

Reflection on Psalm 51

Here is the link to the reflection I wrote on Psalm 51 for our church newsletter as part of our summer sermon series on Psalms.

Seeing God in All Things

Apprehend God in all things, for God is in all things.

                                                                                                --Meister Eckhart

This past Sunday afternoon I had made blueberry jam and two loaves of multigrain sandwich bread. As I reflected on Meister Eckhart’s quote above, I thought about how I saw God in these two activities.

Baking bread is always sacramental for me. As I dissolve the yeast and add flour to it I think about Jesus’ statement about how the Kingdom of God is like yeast that permeates a whole batch of dough. Seeing the dough rise I reflect on the risen Christ. And whenever I smell the bread baking, I am taken back to my experience in the two-year Academy for Spiritual Formation, where the aroma of freshly baked bread filled our worship space when we gathered to celebrate Eucharist each afternoon.

My jam making also gave me opportunity to experience God. The fruit itself is gift, a reminder of how God bountifully provides all we need. As I crushed the berries, I thought about how we most often come to deep devotion to God by being broken. We have to know our own insufficiency to embrace God’s sufficiency. As I saw the blueberry pulp where once there were individual berries, I thought about the contrast between self-focus and giving oneself to the community for the sake of God’s kingdom. Just as jam is not possible without broken berries all mixed together, so the Church is not the body of Christ if we do not give our whole selves to each other.

Is it possible to see God in all things? In unpleasant as well as pleasant instances? When things don’t go the way we would choose as well as when we are in our happiest moments? I believe that our ability to do so depends on the expansiveness of our view. Can we rejoice in the success of another, even if we have experienced failure? Can we see that it is better that we do not demand our rights so that another’s rights can be honored?

I am challenging myself to look more closely at the mundane and the marvelous, and the joyful and sorrowful, at the painful and pleasant—and to see God. Maybe this is something you try for yourself.

Reflection on Psalm 13

Here's the second of my reflections on Mulberry UMC's summer sermon series on Psalms. This is a reflection on Psalm 13.

Morality As An Obstacle to Holiness

I’m reading Life and Holiness by Thomas Merton, so over the next few weeks you will likely find my blog posts exploring some of the ideas from that book.

Merton says that moral goodness is an infantile conception of holiness. He observes that we don’t appreciate the meaning and greatness of our vocation to Christian holiness because we don’t know how to value the divine redemption and infinite mercy of God, so we content ourselves with exterior signs of respectability.

An article I read recently in Weavings magazine referenced three phases of discipleship described by Father Ron Rolheiser. The most basic phase, Essential Discipleship, is defined as the struggle to get our lives together. Moral goodness would seem to fit into this lowest level of discipleship. If being good in the sight of God and others is my goal, I remain in the shallow end of the pool of discipleship.

The second and third phases of discipleship are Generative Discipleship, defined as the struggle to give our lives away and Radical Discipleship, the struggle to give our deaths away. Jesus gives us the ultimate picture of what giving one’s life and one’s death away looks like. Jesus’ path of downward mobility, giving up one’s rights and privilege for the sake of others, is the way of holiness. This is not an easy way, especially when we are the ones who have rights and privilege. Merton notes that the way of Christian holiness means embracing hardship and sacrifice for the love of Christ and in order to improve the condition of people on earth. He says, “We may not merely enjoy the good things of life ourselves, occasionally ‘purifying our intention’ to make sure that we are doing it all ‘for God.’. . . Our love of God and of man cannot be merely symbolic, it has to be completely real.”

Such a love means we cannot close our eyes to the injustice that surrounds us in our own communities and across the globe. We cannot excuse our indifference or inaction by saying someone “deserves” their lot in life, or that exploitation is okay because it’s the cultural norm or that the problem is too big for me to make a difference.

The amazing thing about the path of holiness is that in giving ourselves away we discover freedom that is not possible when we content ourselves with being morally good and respectable. When all we have is available to others, life becomes joyful.

Reflections on Psalms

During the summer, I am writing a series of reflections for our church's weekly newsletter on to accompany a summer sermon series on Psalms. Here's the link to my reflection on Psalm 8. I hope you will join this journey through some familiar and not so familiar Psalms!

Becoming What We Do

Cynicism, criticism and negativity—it seems to me that these are the predominant attitudes I’ve encountered in groups of adults recently. Even when these are not directed toward me, the aura of these can feel like a heavy coat on a hot day. The sad part of these attitudes is that they are contagious—one cynic in a group suddenly becomes a handful. One critical voice can suddenly be a dam breaking forth, causing every other voice in the group to take up the banner of criticalness.

When did it get to be so popular to be a naysayer? Do folks think it is a sign of maturity to point out every possible flaw in people, plans or organizations? This morning I was reading in the book of Numbers, about how the Israelites complained that the only food they had to eat was the manna that God gave them daily. All they had to do was go outside and gather it up off the ground. It was pure gift to them, a miraculous food supply! And yet, they whined and complained to Moses because it wasn’t what they wanted to eat.

It seems to me that gratitude, encouragement and hope are absent when cynicism, criticism and negativity are present. It’s hard to be grateful for the opportunities and people around us when we are making fun of them or criticizing them.

As we increasingly focus on the negative, it gets harder and harder to see the positive. Douglas V. Steere, Quaker author and professor, says we become what we do. So we can’t make a habit of cynicism without becoming cynics. We can’t regularly criticize without become critical people. Consistent negativity makes us into bitter people.

As a frazzled young mother, trying hard to meet the insurmountable expectations I felt I had to meet, I remember three older women in my church who embodied for me what I wanted to be as I aged. They were positive, encouraging and magnanimous. They smiled a lot. They never had the attitude that they had “done their time” but continued to show up, cheering our children on, and interacting with younger folks at church. To me, they were ageless. And did I mention they smiled a lot?

Now that I am the one with the gray hair and grown children, I realize that I have a choice to make. I can choose to be grateful, cheerful and hopeful or I can criticize, nitpick and complain. I can encourage others or I can tear down what others are trying to build. Knowing that my individual choices in every circumstance become who I am, I pray that I will choose what is hopeful and life-giving.