OK, I admit it. I’m a functional atheist.

While I say that God is with me all the time – guiding, protecting, and working alongside me, too often I find that I live my life as if everything depends on me. I make decisions and commitments as if I’m the sole arbiter. I don’t take time to consider that God really does have a plan. And in doing so I act like the God I say is here, really isn’t.

Actually, I don’t think I’m alone here. I think many of us suffer from the same misguided thinking. I think the Church, as a whole, has a hard time owning the promise Jesus gives us in Sunday’s Gospel: ‘The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.’

So what IF God really is here? And God knows everything I’m facing? That God has gone ahead of me to provide and protect? And that the decisions I’m making really aren’t as determinate upon my own action as I think they are?

So much of the Christian journey is about letting go, letting be, and letting God. It’s as if God is saying, ‘Relax. I’ve got it covered. Be at peace. There’s nothing that can happen to you that I don’t know about. It’s all going to be OK.’ Lord, help me trade my atheism for your provision and realize that you do have the whole world in your hands.

What do you love to do?

I love the process of testing new ideas –
My staff will tell you that our central pursuit here at St. David's is to throw things against the wall and see what sticks.

I love beautiful things. Cars, photographs, and my wife.

I love to read.
I love to cook.
I love to be with people.

And I answer this question because I want you to.

What do you love to do?
Spend a moment on this.

It’s important because what you love to do is why you’re here.

It is the mark of the Gospel work you’ll contribute to the world.

You and I understand that somehow our existence is not of our own making. God was up to something when God made you and me. And the fullness of God’s plan can only come about through every one of us being who God created us to be. And God created us to love. To be love. To do love.

So what do you love to do?

It’s more than just your passive preference.
It’s your mission.

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Reading
Thin Blue Smoke - Don Worgul
God is Red - Liao Yiwu
Damn Few - Rorke Denver

In Boston on Monday, two bombs scattered the sheep.

Many who hadn’t come to race, found themselves running anyway.
Others became shepherds.

They turned their coats into bandages. They carted the injured off to safety. They returned home with bloodstains. Others opened their homes to the stranded. Donated blood. Bowed their heads in prayer.

Coming to the aid of those who suffer is at the heart of what it means to be human. It is here where we find our deepest fulfillment. Given the choice to own a Ferrari, date a celebrity, or save someone’s life I would not be surprised if most people chose the latter.

And God knows this. In fact, this Sunday churches around the world will celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday, which is when we grab hold of that soul-saving notion that, just as God protects and keeps our souls, we are at our very best when we do the same.

So as we move through the myriad of emotions - fear, insecurity, grief, and loss – we do well to consider that our anecdote lies in the courage to stand up, run to the rescue, care for the afflicted, and give of ourselves to those who need it. May the Good Shepherd grant us strength so to do.

A link to some helpful prayers

Reading:
The Guidebook (NRSV Bible)
God is Red – Liao Yiwu
Entrepreneurial Leadershp Goosen and Stevens

It’s very possible your best days are behind you.

Many of us suspect this but don’t want to admit it. And so it can linger inside as despair and sadness, only to come out as anger or depression - perhaps because we often look at our lives as a series of accomplishments and once we’ve done the best we’ve done, we’ve lost our usefulness. What’s more, the less we’ve ‘done’ lately, the more society relegates us to more distant spheres of irrelevance, which doesn’t help matters.

Sunday’s Gospel says something about this.

We meet the disciples after Jesus has risen and they have returned to their work as fishermen. While we suspect they are bewildered and depressed because their best days are behind them, the text does not tell us this. What it says is that they were willing to join St. Peter and go back to work. Then, it is in the midst of this work that, again they notice Jesus, who provides further proof and encouragement to go off and spread the good news.

If all of life is a gift, then the gift of accomplishment is just that.

The muse that comes to the four members of the boy band, giving them a chart-topping hit at age 17 then disappearing forever, is not a commentary on their creativity as much as it is a sobering insight into the capriciousness of accomplishment. If we built a business, raised incredible children, or put in 30 years at the company, great, the muse did her work and we are no less human, no less beloved, than we were before. We’ve been visited by a blessing that came from outside of us and over which we had little control.

This means we are not that blessing. We cannot take credit for that blessing. We should not feel guilty if that blessing has moved on.

Recognizing that all creativity, originality, insight, and ultimately accomplishment, originate outside of ourselves and visit us in its own time, is an incredible stress reliever. It takes off the pressure and frees us up to, like the disciples, notice Jesus in new places.

Reading

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At Canaan’s Edge – Taylor Branch

God is Red – Liao Yiwu

The Guidebook (NRSV Bible)

For the last four months Joan McKenzie did not have a voice.

As she arrived for Easter services last Sunday, the always cheerful Joan had to, once again, rely on her husband Jim to talk. We had a brief conversation, and Joan said she had lost her voice only once before, briefly, following illness. This time, there was no explanation, and no end in sight. She told me she was going to see a specialist in 4 weeks, the soonest she could get an appointment.

Then, a little while later, during our 10 am Easter service, something magical happened.

Joan's favorite hymn, 'Jesus Christ is Risen Today' was being sung. So Joan thought she would try to mouth the words. As she started to do this, words started coming out of her mouth. She could sing! After the hymn she declared to her husband, 'I have my voice back!'

Joan can't explain what happened, but is convinced it's God's doing. She told me she believes it's a reminder that God is inside us and wants to come out, and that it's a message to be kind and thoughtful through difficult times because they don't last forever.

As I ponder this blessing, not only am I inspired to thank God for the gift of healing for Joan, but even moreso for her gift of courage through the adversity she exhibited.

Joan's example, like that of many saints, is one of faithfulness in what really matters: her relationship with Jesus and the promises He's made to always care for her.

May Joan's special Easter gift inspire us all to remember that today's troubles are only for today, and that the Risen Christ is with us every step of the way.

4-year-old Bridget was in her sandbox playing when she got a headache.

She went inside to her mother who comforted her, gave her some medicine, and then sent her off again to play. But Bridget soon returned with the same complaint. This prompted phone calls, an Internet search, a drive to the doctor’s office, then a rush to the hospital where it was discovered that Bridget was that one in a million child who had developed a massive brain tumor that was aggressively taking over. Her stunned and shocked parents stood by, unable to fully process the unfolding story. An operation would be done the next morning, and the chances were not good. Their priest was brought in to prepare them for the inevitable – the loss of their only child.

The 24 hours before the operation brought a roller coaster of emotion to Bridget’s parents who had to try to remain upbeat and hopeful, but having seen the x-rays, remain realists: that this operation was a very, very long shot. And sure enough, after a four-hour procedure the next morning, the surgeon entered the waiting room staring at the floor. He said he had managed to remove the tumor cleanly, however little Bridget was not able to hang on while she was being patched up. The couple collapsed in tears.

Before leaving the hospital Bridget’s mother asked if she could see her daughter one more time. An orderly accompanied her to the cold, brightly lit basement where Bridget’s body was being stored. As the orderly pulled out the gurney where the tiny body lay, he noticed something.

Bridget was moving.

Emergency staff was rushed in. They were able to revive Bridget. She coughed and cried, but she was kicking. Oh yes, it was a miracle. This 4 year old went on to fully recover. And months later as she played, once again, in her sandbox, her parents looked out at her through the kitchen window filled with unspeakable joy.

This is Easter.

It's not about colored eggs and jellybeans, it’s about the thing most dear to us, having gone away, against all odds, has returned. What more need our lives be than testimonies to the joy of that moment?

Are you wasting your time on the urgent at the expense of the important?

What’s busying you right now – is it something that doesn’t matter or something you’re never going to get good at?

This Sunday, Palm Sunday, you and I encounter Jesus as He takes His final steps to Calvary. And his unwavering focus on the job that’s ahead is incredibly inspiring. Jesus is bound and determined to walk a road He could exit at any time if he wasn’t utterly taken by the importance of the mission.

What’s your mission? How well are you keeping to it?

Stop doing the things that don’t matter. Cut out the things you’re never going to get good at. Look soberly at the call on your life and get busy with that.

If this sounds difficult, challenging, and confrontational, welcome to Holy Week.

In 1950 the average size of a new home was 983 square feet – to house a family with 3.37 people.

Today the average size of a new home is 2,480 square feet – to house a family of 2.6 people.

We, and our stuff, take up three times more space than we used to – thank God we’re so much happier!

Except we’re not. Studies show our happiness has flat lined, and one recent study even linked consumption with aberrant, antisocial behavior.

As Christians we’re not surprised by this. We know what really makes us happy is serving others.

This Sunday we will hear the story of Mary who gave and gave to Jesus - and Judas, whose obsession with money caused him to criticize her. And you and I are challenged to ask ourselves if we’re spending more time pursuing money and things and less time pursuing relationships and connections?

We ask right now: how can we love and serve those immediately around me – and let go of our anxieties surrounding things? What can we do right now to release our worry over possessions, believe that God will take care of us, and concentrate on those around us who are hurting and really need us?

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Suggested Reading

Leaders Make the Future – Bob Johansen

Jesus – Marcus Borg

Daring Greatly – Brene Brown

“Love is not a victory march. It is a cold and broken alleluia.” – Leonard Cohen

On Sunday we laid to rest one of our parish matriarchs, Ida May Corner.

She was there from the beginning and never left us. Few were as devoted to our community as Ida May. That’s why we named our Parish Hall for her and her husband, Al.

Her place in our parish history was not self-appointed. It was earned. Ida May cared for us, worried about us, laughed with us, and loved us. And she did it for six decades.

That’s where the Leonard Cohen lyric comes in.

We can often be tricked into thinking that love is easy or that it is an everlasting feeling. However we know it is neither. Love is born out of a commitment to another that is not swayed by feeling or challenge. This is what Ida May exemplified for us – and this speaks to us today.

Is our love for our work feeling cold and broken?

Is our love for another feeling chilled and disconnected?

Is our love for our children not being adequately reciprocated?

Relax, all of this happens with love. And none of this need dissuade us from loving. For we march on. The victory will come. Love is our necessary option. Love is our given destiny. The place of alleluia will find itself.

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Reading

Generation to Generation – Edwin Friedman

Evolution of the Word – Marcus Borg

The Guidebook – NRSV Bible

It was in the midst of the 18th century famines in France when a particular phrase was, however dubiously, attributed to the clueless royal Marie Antoinette, who upon learning that the peasants had no bread, made her entry into the lexicon of Western Civilization;’ Then let them eat brioche!’

        One of the Church’s relentless missteps is to treat its members the same way. What I mean is that we often choose our leaders, lay and ordained, when we recognize that they have a particularly discernable gift: a relationship with God that allows them to have experiences of God’s presence that others simply don’t have. Our leaders, and hence their institutions, often act like Queen Marie in total oblivion to the condition of most of the rest of the world as they talk about the ways God is always communicating with them, when this is very likely not what most other people experience.

        As many of you may remember, my wife Natalie gave a ‘God Moment’ in February (it’s published elsewhere in the March newsletter). A God Moment is our Episcopal way of recovering the ancient church tradition of ‘testimony.’ And we frequently hear stories from parishioners about the intersection of their daily lives with the Numinous. What resonated with a lot of us is when she said, “I don’t have God moments,” and thus articulated for many people (at least a half dozen told her afterward and probably many more who didn’t’) what we all know about faith: it is a gift.

        For too long those who have been given the precious grace of seeing God’s activity in their lives and in the world have not taken to heart the journeys of those who are differently gifted: Should a fig tree shame a banana tree for not producing figs? This recognition of different gifts is becoming more and more important in today’s faith communities.

        Churches, if they do anything, must take more seriously their roles as places that help us make sense of life. That is, life when we feel God’s presence, and life, especially, when we don’t. We are at our best when we walk in confidence and solidarity with those whose faith journeys are not like our own, and if one can’t make sense of the other, congratulations, add something else to the list.

        The Church is not at our best when we try to correct, discipline, and judge. We are most attractive, and much more like our founder, when we walk in the knowledge of our own fragility and frailty - in the humility that Jesus took to the cross, realizing that our most profound posture is not standing in judgment but kneeling in awe. So for those who have God Moments every day, praise God, you have been given eyes to see the glory of the Lord in wonderful ways. For those who don’t, praise God for the faith that comes not by seeing but by believing, for some would say, that is the greater gift.

Are you confusing 'Busy' with 'Productive?' Jesus Didn't.

I know this really busy guy who recently hired someone to sit next to him at his desk at work.

Her job is to monitor what he is doing throughout the workday, like typing an important email, or watching a surfing squirrel on YouTube.

And he pays this woman to sit next to him and elbow him in the side every time he gets off task. Sure, my friend is busy, but he's realized that being busy is not the same as being productive. And our tendency to confuse the two can literally sabotage our ability to be who we're called to be and do what we really want to do.

This Sunday we will hear an amazing conversation with Jesus, in which his detractors use fear and intimidation to pull Him off track. They try to lure him to an easier, safer path. Sure, He can still do his ministry, but elsewhere.

Of course Jesus will have nothing of it. He will remain firmly on task, and not give way. Jesus is firm enough in his conviction on who He is and what He is called to do, that no one seems to be able to shift His sights off of Jerusalem.

In what ways do we substitute busy-ness for productivity? Are we spending too much time on incidentals and avoiding the hard, but important work? How might the Holy Spirit be working to help us discern?

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Reading

Generation to Generation - Edwin Friedman

Practice Resurrection - Eugene Peterson

Thin Blue Smoke - Doug Worgol

The family photo that sits in our bedroom looks like it came with the frame.

As we relax in a pile of leaves on a sunny fall day, the kids are smiling warmly in attractive clothes as they’re embraced by loving parents who look like they don’t have a care in the world. The professional photographer airbrushed away all undesirable signs of aging and left us with a visual representation of familial perfection and bliss, which is what we paid for.

However, this is far from accurate.

The majority of our time is actually not spent rolling around in piles of leaves, but tending to poopy diapers, spilled milk, stained t-shirts, and endless tantrums - as any parent of toddlers will testify. However, the image we want captured, preserved, and showcased is not what is - but what might be. We want to live into possibility, getting rescued from reality by the prospect of the better.

Don’t we all yearn for this?

Of course, that’s why we frame the photos of 10k finish line crossings and high school graduations. We draw inspiration from these mountain top images and whether we know it or not, they give us the strength we need to make it through the valley of the everyday – through the reality that life right now is not the perfection we so deeply desire.

These images are gifts from God. They are icons of grace that a better world is possible – indeed, it’s on the way. And your call, and mine, is to live into this – to be captured and convinced that goodness will win out over evil, right trumps wrong, and that the God we’ve given our lives to is working out all things to the good.

Relax, stay the course, cling to Jesus, help others, do the next right thing. While heaven’s not here, it’s coming, and you’re going.

---------------------------

Reading

To Canaan’s Edge – Taylor Branch

Church Marketing 101 – Richard Reising

Understanding Boys – Clarence Moser

Chris Yaw

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I Don't Have God Moments

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