Christmas Day B (Dec. 25, 2011) John 1:1-14
And the Word became flesh and lived among us ...
                                 John 1:14a New Revised Standard Version 

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

                            John 1:14a Today's New International Version 

So the Word became human and made his home among us. 

                                       John 1:14a  The New Living Translation

The Word became flesh and blood ...
      and moved into the neighborhood.  John 1:14a The Message

Well, the Idea became a man and moved in with us ...

                                             John 1:14a  The Cotton Patch Bible

No matter how you say it (and I distinctly recall a seminary professor saying that the literal translation of the verb all these render 'lived' or 'moved in' or dwelt' with us is actually closer to 'pitched tent' -- which immediately makes me think of God setting up camp with us!), no matter how you rank the above in accuracy or inaccuracy, the general notion is still totally confounding to the unbeliever. 

GOD BECAME LIKE ME? TOOK ON MY LIMITATIONS AND CONSTRAINTS IN LIFE? ARE YOU NUTS?

Which is the #1 of all the outrageous promises (see this week's www.d365.org devotions by Tammy Wiens) that only Christianity experiences with the Divine. I just had that bubbling-over joyous (Marva Dawn would say HILARIOUS!) experience as I lost track of the time and made a mad dash by mini flashlight out of my study, into the sanctuary,successfully negotiating a maze created by the Christmas tree, communion table, music stands and microphones, through the vestibule and into the choir room, to the carillon control -- to set off a wedding peal at midnight to welcome in Christmas Day. And as the raucous, joyful bells began to ring and ring and ring on top of each other, I realized how ridiculous I must have looked: in stockinged feet, sans a certain article of clothing meant to constrain, blouse pulled out, no jewelry, hair askew.... And I could truthfully say I felt like a child sneaking down with my sister to peek at the tree in the middle of the night as I opened the front door out from the vestibule so I could hear the carillon ringing more clearly through the crisp winter air. There was something both clandestine and conspiratorial about it ... yet it was definitely God who beckoned and accompanied me.

So the question I hear this week is: how has God burst in on YOU lately to allow you to experience the Incarnate One's outrageous presence?

hungry are fed ... needs in general are met

  beloved saints on earth are not forgotten

promises are fulfilled, over and over ...

 even when in strange places ...

all of God's children are loved and protected as they are by the Incarnate One, and it has nothing to do with their nuclear family make-up

22 years ago this adventure of mine began with the sun shining on a rooster...

last spring I saw this moon and thought: 'love cradled'; as I prepared the blog I thought: what a fitting image for Incarnation. the realization that followed: it was taken after a wedding reception on March 19; exactly 280 days later (40 weeks) we were lifting candles high to Silent Night -- yes!

                                             

Advent 4B (December 18, 2011: Colossians 1:21-23)

The last of the series 'looking for the REAL Jesus' as published in Reformed Worship, Vol. 101, helps us look beyond the manger and the humble, unimaginable incarnation of God to the end point, the culmination of the reason for the birth in the first place.

           'And you, who were once estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 

           [Jesus Christ] has now reconciled in his fleshly body through death, so as 

           to present you blameless and irreproachable before him....' (v.21-22)

Estrangement, even mental hostility always has its physical overtones. To turn away is to sin. How often in the height of an argument have you heard: 'don't you walk away from me!' or 'whenever things get the least bit tough, you always turn to .... ' Our physical stance is the analogy of our relationship with God. 

So the question I hear this week is: without Jesus Christ and his reconciling work, what does your picture with God look like?

Gavin, demonstrating his yoga prowess

Brenna, in a sea of beach debris

sibling nonchalant attitudes?

AAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Advent 3B (December 11, 2011: Colossians 1:15-20)

Well, I stumbled again last week -- got this part written, but was stumped on the pictures! Now I know what they should be ... will be going back and slipping that in before finishing and posting this one.

This week is the well-known 'Christ Hymn', and the theme, 'Jesus, Our God'. The text claims Christ is 'the image of the invisible God... for in him the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile all things ....' 


Can you even begin to wrap your brain around that? The people who looked into Jesus' eyes were looking into the very eyes of God? That all of us were created through him and for him? That we have been reconciled to God through him only because he made peace for us through the blood -- through his willing and sacrificial crucifixion -- of the cross? That we are a new people, people of God, the church, only because he is the second Adam, the first-born, and our Head.


The question I hear this week: because he is also fully human, have we 'shrunk' Jesus from awesome, holy, powerful God to a biddable companion along the way? Or, because he was born as a tiny, helpless baby, are we perhaps unable to fully see that Jesus, the tiny baby, is our God; the only one able to save us and restore our relationship to God? 

Have you glimpsed the divine image projected onto the canvas of our humanity (especially in the very young) in your life lately?


And how is it that our youngest ones seem to feel that they are in charge of us?


In the midst of this very deep and profound theological concept, I hear the laughter of the universe pouring forth from our most mischievous God. 
      " Look to the little ones ....."

Godly play: peek-a-boo

Nap time?

NAP time???

YES!!!!

I am NOT pleased...

MORE!!!!!

Where are our minions? We want service! Anyone listening?

How many adults does it take to photograph two toddlers?

In the midst of trying and polarizing theological debate in my denomination, I step back in faith from the fray and encourage the people God has given me to minister to and with. I try to encourage them to discern the way Christ is leading them, the direction of their particular life ministry, and to go there.  

Am I concerned about individuals? Of course. Am I concerned about the future of the church? Not at all. There will always be a church, Paul makes that clear here. There cannot be a head without a body... and Christ's body IS the church. Will it necessarily be MY beloved church the way I like it? Does it really matter? Alleluia!

ADVENT 2B (December 4, 2011)

This week the Advent series I chose to follow shared in Reformed Worship 101 uses Col. 1: 9-17 to 'look for the REAL Jesus'. This week we find Jesus, our King. Thanks to Sally A. Brown's blog on Working Preacher for Christ the King, Year A, 2010 for her contribution to my understanding.

This is another way of phrasing what scholars have called 'the cosmic Christ; for a very long time. The Son of God who is not only the visible image of the invisible God, above all, but is the one both through whom and for whom things were created -- including the 'powers and principalities' of the world. Christ existed before all else and is the matrix, the point of origin, of all coherence and sensibility for all created things.

To put it another way: Paul's emphasis here is not on the fall of creation or of a corrupted one, but on the claim that creation makes sense because of the Son. Period. Since the beginning of time. end of discussion.

There is a baptismal connection here as to the reality of our true identity. Is our mental image of the cosmic Christ, of King Jesus, any where near big enough? Can we allow him to do the promised work of reconciliation to bring who and what we and the whole creation are right now to the fulfillment of God's kingdom?

stone on Tara that, when a true king's foot was placed on it, cried out his name

 

queen of the rock? --  the Cloisters, Iona, Scotland

baptismal font at Lindisfarne (Holy Island), England

A New Church Year ... A New Start

ADVENT 1B (November 27, 2011)

OK, so here goes another try. This Advent I'm off-lectionary; it does happen once in a while. I was captured by a series highlighted in Reformed Worship entitled 'looking for the REAL Jesus' which uses passages from Colossians 1. This week we have vs. 1-8 and 28-29 (the 'bookends') and are given the theme or title: 

       Jesus, Our Good News.

So what is there to say, really, about the truth of this statement? That the one we are preparing for as a darling baby is our Good News ONLY because he has bought us our salvation at so dear a price? That the only real hope we have is in a baby, vulnerable and powerless, who allows himself to be crucified for our sakes? That all this is by the grace of our loving and forgiving God without any means of meriting it ourselves? 

Some hear that and call it a downer. What do you hear?

And how do we respond? Has it indeed been bearing fruit in you from the day you heard it and truly comprehended the grace of God?

How will we move through this week, shopping and wrapping and decorating, now that we are reminded of this good news?

May the blessings of Advent time -- a time of preparation -- examen -- be with you.

Entrance to The Heugh, Lindisfarne (Holy Isle), England

                  

Looking from The Heugh down at the outline of St. Cuthbert's cell, Lindisfarne

OLD arches signifying the entrance to St. Andrew's, Scotland

Elegant stairway in Sir Robert Scott's home, Abbotsford, England

'Faery Steps' and path on Iona, Scotland

Road to north pasture and bathing beach on Iona, Scotland

Walking down from the 'Beehive' atop Dun I, Iona, Scotland

Pentecost A (June 12, 2011)

Looking back at the event called Pentecost (Acts 2:1-21) I have been affirmed and uplifted by David Lose' Working Preacher blog. One of my deepest connections to Celtic Spirituality is that it refuses any attempts to 'tame' the Holy Spirit by imaging her as a dove. For the Celtic Christians, the Spirit is and always will be the 'Wild Goose,' untamed, unpredictable, and (once we open our ears to her) demandingly raucous! 

David captures that truth about Holy Spirit is listing two paradoxes of how we have come to (comfortably!) 'settle in' to Pentecost celebrations. 
    The first: Holy Spirit comes NOT to solve our problems, but to CREATE them
    The second: Holy Spirit does NOT PREVENT failure, but INVITES it

Seventeen months ago the congregation I serve was brought up short (as was I) to have our financial situation put in very stark black and (red?) white, with the only solution forseeable to reduce the terms of call for the pastor to 60% time. 

I would not be able to stay on at that rate.

Less anxious minds were gathered and a plan to move forward over three years was proposed and accepted (but only by a margin of about 2 to 1) at a special congregational meeting that February. Yet through the extended additional stewardship campaign that preceded that meeting and the work of Holy Spirit throughout the remaining spring, we stepped out into a risky venture we absolutely KNEW we could not sustain on our own: to open an emergency food ministry run by private donations, available to anyone in need, AND to be a Food Pantry for the county Food Bank, with monthly distributions of government food. 

We helped our first 4 families one year ago next Saturday. And a month later I left on vacation, feeling very unsettled about my future ministry in that place.

When I am at the beach I am renewed in many ways. One of my personal paradoxes is that only at the beach does my internal clock waken me to go watch (and shoot) the sunrise. That Tuesday morning I had a profound experience which I will share this morning with the congregation. 

 

What an odd cloud strata

(moment of awareness)

A window into heaven?

Or a window to us?

Oh! God's eye shining a profoundly felt message:

Do not worry

I am watching over you

I am watching out for you

I do not slumber

Nor do I sleep

I am with you always

Forever

ALWAYS!!!

My Pentecost prayer is that we all continue to face the Spirit's problems, accept her invitation to risk failure or setbacks, and be daily renewed and strengthened to let God be God. Only then can we be the Pentecost people we are called to be. 

PS: We are now serving about 40 families regularly, giving additional food at distributions from our food ministry called 'Feeding the Flock'. We have distributed boxes and bags of gently used clothing, a bicycle (complete with helmet) and other children's toys. We have outgrown our freezer and are buying another. And we have friends and neighbors coming to volunteer and help out, even some strong young men who unload bigger and bigger pallets each month. And we have yet to use a single dollar from our church budget. 

To God be the glory!!! 

Easter 7A / Ascension  (June 5, 2011)

I'm a little 'after the fact' this week, but had been mulling it over in my mind for several days and feel it's still worth posting. In considering the texts from Acts 1 and 1 Peter I am in debt to Fr. Rick Morley's a garden path blog. I was already 'seeing' the cloud in my mind and considering various perspectives that it was a fulcrum (of sorts) for.

And a whole lot of song lyrics were floating about in that consideration. 



flying to Boise, ID 2009 



Sunset at 35,000 feet



Music lyrics by Lady Gaga (Edge of Glory) started off Rick's blog; I had been thinking in terms of Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now. (Is my generation showing?) For some reason the old Ray Coniff Singers cover of I'll Be Seeing You (I was VERY young when my parents were playing that LP!) came to mind as a nostalgic view of Jesus' ascension which spun off to a more realistic imagining the disciples paraphrasing The Clash: Will you stay or will you go?



Western PA


But the cloud isn't the main thing; the main thing is the presence and glory of God in Jesus and promised in the gift of Spirit.






at 45,000 feet over the Atlantic

Where is it that you most easily 'see' God's glory?

Bethany Beach, DE

What does the experience feel like?

Bethany Beach, DE

How do we share that glory and presence with others?

Easter 6 (May 29, 2011)

 ¹⁸For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, ¹⁹in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison, ²⁰who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water.

²¹And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ...   1 Peter 3:18-21 (NRSV)

Obedience has certainly gotten a bad rap these days; it is probably running neck and neck with discipline for the bottom of the barrel in terms of desirable qualities. Status is more likely to be bestowed on those who cheat the establishment (and get away with it) or ones who flagrantly defy authority (even if they get  caught). 

The Greek word translated 'obey' (and the Hebrew Old Testament also rendered 'obey') do not carry the meaning to adhere to orders or commands; in both cases the  root meaning is to listen closely. 

How do you listen to God?

Lindisfarne, England

In what ways do you hear God?

George Wishart Memorial, St. Andrews, Scotland

Bethany Beach, Delaware

Are we listening deeply as a people?

Lindisfarne, England

Pasture beside Kilmartin Church, Kilmartin Glen, Scotland

How can we better practice a radical (foundational, deeply rooted) obedience?

With thanks to the Rev. Donna MacArt Havrisko for permission to include 

photos with her image from the Redstone Presbytery 2006 Celtic Spirituality Pilgrimage.