The path descending

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…. Jesus had only one “operational mode.” Everything he did, he did by self-emptying. He emptied himself and descended into human form. And he emptied himself still further (“even unto death on the cross”) and fell through the bottom to return to the realms of dominion and glory. In whatever life circumstance, Jesus always responded with the same motion of self-emptying—or to put it another way, of the same motion of descent: going lower, taking the lower place, not the higher.…

 

He certainly called us to dying to self, but his idea of dying to self was not through inner renunciation or guarding the purity of his being but through radically squandering everything he had and was

                     Cynthia Bourgeault

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Bread

Mountain

Temple

 

Wealth

Power

Fame

 

sitting there among the rocks

Jesus battled with himself

 

we sometimes think that in that barren wilderness

as he wrestled for 40 days

Adam and Eve redux

 

that Jesus was empty

that this was indeed paradise lost

no garden but wasteland

a place of want

 

but this was the Beloved Son

confirmed, affirmed, and blessed

the heavens had opened wide and Creator love

had spilled from heaven

 

he carried the Sacred

all that power and love

all that capacity for the miraculous

within that human frame

 

he had wealth and power and

that charisma that draws people

and binds them

 

perhaps the question was not whether he would seek those things

but how he would use them

 

for self or for others?

was this going to be a ministry of ascension or descent?

would he build an Empire through the use of his charisma

and by the accumulation of power and wealth?

or would he build a Kingdom by

“squandering everything he had and was” (CB)?

 

he chose the path descending

he emptied himself (Philippians 2)

walking dusty roads

breaking bread with the unsavory

challenging Empire

dying

 

but dying to rise

from dust to dust

from dust to resurrection

descending to rise again

 

what do we do with our wilderness yearnings?

our hunger, our need for respect

our desire for power?

 

what do we do as we seek the reasonable?

a full belly, a friend, a bit of autonomy?

 

where do our desires take us?

into that mad climb to the mountain top

to fame

to affluence

 

where we are controlled and seek to control?

 

or can we hold our gifts lightly

using them for others

having the mindset of Jesus

knowing the last shall be first

those who give shall receive

those who die shall live

those who are humble shall find glory?

 

what are we doing to do

with the whispers in our ears?

Ash Wednesday

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All those days

you felt like dust,

like dirt,

as if you all had to do

was turn your face

toward the wind

and be scattered

to the four corners

 

or swept away

by the smallest breath

as insubstantial

 

did you not know

what the Holy One

can do with dust?     

                     Jan Richardson

__________________________________

 

we live in a world of ashes and dust

a world consumed

and reduced

by hate and fear and violence

 

by an earth in the throes of death

abused by those who should care for it

 

we live in a world where wildfires roar and reduce

beauty to blackened ruin

where missiles and mortar crash into homes

smashing them into concrete dust and ash

where earthquakes level buildings

crush and entombing

 

leaving people coated with dust and ash and grief

 

we cannot enter

these places

these places of ruin

and death

 

without being touched

by ashes

which cling

and mark

leaving us dirty

 

a sign

of our uncleanliness

and our participation

in what has happened here

 

our part in the creation

of a wasteland

that we call earth

 

and yet

this day

these ashes

mark us

 

not as those who do not see

not as those who do not feel the pain

of this destruction

not as those who do not repent

not as those who do not hope

 

but as those

who, while marked

look forward

toward

what will arise

 

Lent begins with ashes

With the burnt remnants of the divine image

 

Lent begins with regrets

And repentance

 

With the gross understanding that we are not what we should be

Not what we could be

 

we look in the mirror and feel like dirt, sometimes

we feel ragged and torn

and empty

 

and tired

oh so tired

 

of lies

of hate,

of anger,

and fear

 

so tired of raucous debates

and pretentious rallies

 

so worn down

by viruses

and natural disasters

 

and twisted and warped people

who abuse political power

and ban books

and worship guns

and horde wealth

 

worn down by our own lack of efficacy

our own limitations

and flaws

and grief

and helplessness

 

we feel insubstantial

as if the next piece of bad news

the next crisis

 

will cause us to finally

become so fragmented

that we are as insubstantial as ashes

 

or dry dust

 

and yet

for all that

we hope

 

we hope against [all] hope

for we are filled with God

connected in the Spirit to Sacred

to Jesus

 

and “in him all things hold together” (Col. 1)

 

even us

 

we may be dust

we may have been shredded

by the vagaries of life

 

but we know what the Sacred can do with dust

 

this Power, this Love

that dwells inside us

 

it does marvelous things in us

and through us

 

as through Jesus, it multiplied loaves and fishes

as it cast out demons

and healed the sick

and gave sight to the blind

and raised the dead to new life

 

so this Power/Love

takes the most fragmented

the most common elements

 

the most fragmented

the most common people

 

and makes them new

 

transforming

water into wine transforming

multiplication of loaves and fish transforming

calming the waters transforming

life out of death transforming

 

this Power/Love even took a cross

and made it a symbol of life

 

it can certainly take us

and make us Sacred Children

 

Ah, yes

There are days when we feel like dust

But we know what God can do

With dust

 

 

 

 

 

 

the impulse to love

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Loving God, who in Jesus Christ

welcomes us as warmly as sons and daughters,

may we so rest in the riches of your unconditional love,

that our instinct to rival others

is transformed by the impulse to love them

as you have loved us.

Amen

                     Trevor Williams in “What Were You Arguing About Along the Way?”

                     Ed. Pat Bennet, Canterbury Press, 2021

________________________________________

 

it was no accident

that Jesus, when he was here on earth

created a community

 

perhaps it was not

from our perspective, much of a community

it was not large

the members were a motley crew

of men and women (yes there were women)

 

it was nomadic

and probably dependent upon the generosity of others

 

it did not have a name

it did not have a building

it certainly did not have a steeple

or a large screen

 

it did not (I suspect) have a praise band

 

but it was a community

because Jesus was all about community

 

Ok, let’s be honest

Jesus was all about Kingdom!

systems, if you want to think about it that way

 

he was about systematic poverty

systematic piety

systematic prejudice

 

he came not just to change individual hearts

but to change the world

 

his mother had it right!

when she insisted that through her child God

…has shown strength with his arm;

…has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.

…has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly;

…has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.”

 

yes, Jesus came to change our hearts, and our minds, individually

but we individuals, transformed by love, are meant to come together

to change the world

 

we exist to confront the ills of the world

greed, racism, the need to dominate and control

and to change those systems that promulgate them

 

systematic racism

systematic greed (toxic capitalism)

systematic domination (authoritarianism and nationalism)

are pervasive and deadly

 

and it is the job of the community

those gathered around Jesus

to confront and change them

 

those ills come out of individualism

out of a need to win

to be the richest, the most powerful

the one with the most toys, the best toys

 

they can only be overcome when we let go of that sense of

self against others

and begin to embrace the way of

self for others

 

and we can only move to that place

individually and then corporately

when we trust enough in God’s love

and God’s abundance

 

so in the end it is all about trust

trust in divine love

and trust in the power of love

 

that is how we participate in

the irresistible revolution (Shane Claiborne)

we trust

in Sacred Love

and live accordingly

What do we do with God?

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… if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the Kingdom of God, I can tell you that you have to see everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too (pause) I guess that is why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest

          Rich Mullins, quoted by Shane Clairborne

______________________________

 

what do we do with this God

we say we worship?

 

What do we do with this God who comes to us

as a baby

walks in the dust of rural roads

eats and laughs with sinners

refuses to fight violence with violence

and eschews the path of domination and wealth?

 

What do we do with the God who

Responds to the hate and evil of the world with love?

Who looks down from a cross, the death machine of Empire,

and speaks forgiveness?

Who sees another in pain beside him and speaks hope?

 

We have so often gotten God wrong!

We worry about whether God “gets” us.

But do we get God?

 

Do we get that God really is love?

Do we understand  (as Richard Rohr puts it) that God is “the prodigal of prodigious prodigies” (Isaiah 29.14)

Always surprising us with grace

Even while we try to layer God with words, creeds, rules, and rituals,

even while we try to recreate Yahweh into a God of domination and affluence.

 

God has one goal

To permeate us with Sacred Love

To fill with Sacred Presence so we have a little of God’s

Generosity, compassion, kindness, forgiveness, and love

 

So that we respond to those around us the way God responds to us

With prodigal love

 

The kind of love that sees the poor, and chooses to live with less

so that one might give more

That sees the oppressed and chooses to live with less power

so that they might have more power

That sees hate and chooses not to respond with hate and violence

 

A love that is willing to sacrifice

Let go

In order to serve and heal

 

What do we do with this God we say we worship?

We let God astound us with Love!

With wonder upon wonder

 

We let God love us more!

Because that is what God wants to do!

Until our hearts burn!

 

And then we live accordingly

Until out of the gloom and darkness comes light

Until the humble rejoice

And the needy have plenty

And the ruthless vanish (Isaiah 29)

seed planted

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It is hard to say goodbye to those we love

I remember too well the early deaths of my parents over 30 years ago

And the weird emptiness that was there

When they were gone

 

My soul was filled with empty warm happy sad feelings

that came like waves in my soul

at strange times

 

when I caught the smell of freshly baked cookies

or walked through the woods on a warm fall day

and smelled the pungent pines

 

My parents were good people

Good parents

Good servants

 

Ah yes, they served

Neither put themself forward

“Hey look at me!”

 

But both spend their lives serving

Their family, their church, their community

 

I’ve been thinking of death lately

As I have presided over too many funerals of people close to me

Aged saints who lived well and died well

 

I love the fact that Jesus (as Brian McLaren points out)

Talked about life and death using the metaphor of the harvest

 

We can see life as the continual toil of the farmer

Who each year plants good seeds and works the fields

So that there will be a harvest

 

Always there is a harvest

An end

Always an end

Where what has been planted, nurtured, cherished, and anticipated

Ends

 

Is cut down

 

Part of the story is about the nature of the harvest

Is it plentiful or not?

Is it sweet or bitter?

 

But an even more important part of the story

(or so it seems to me)

Is this

 

when the harvest happens

and the grain and fruit are gathered

there are seeds that are gathered

that drop to the ground

 

and become a new beginning

 

each ending is also simultaneously a beginning

there is always continuity

seeds become new plants

lives that cave in become (potentially) lives restored

hope crushed becomes a new hope born

 

newness is the key!

In the continuity, there is discontinuity too!

 

As Paul put it what is perishable, dishonorable, and weak

Becomes amazing, powerful, and eternal

 

In our lives

And in our death

We are unmade so that we might be remade

 

This is the hope!

That the old Stephen may die and a new improved Stephen be born

Each day, each hour, each moment

Even as I walk this earth

 

This is the hope

That Joan, Rhee, Dale, and all the saints

In a flash, in the twinkling of an eye

Became new

Taking on the imperishable

Sown in weakness

Raised in glory

 

Don't be so sure

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We see the world in simple dualist terms: we are the good guys who follow the good authority figures and we have the right answers; they are the bad guys who consciously or unconsciously fight on the wrong side of the cosmic struggle between good and evil. We feel a deep sense of identity and belonging in our in-group…. This simple, dualist faith gives us great confidence.

 

This confidence, of course, has a danger, as the old Bob Dylan classic “With God on Our Side” makes clear: “You don’t count the dead when God’s on your side.”  The same sense of identification with an in-group that generates a warm glow of belonging and motivates sacrificial action for us can sour into intolerance, hatred, and even violence toward them. And the same easy, black-and-white answers that comfort and reassure us now may later seem arrogant, naive, ignorant, and harmful, if we don’t move beyond Simplicity in the fullness of time.

          Brian McLaren, quoted by Richard Rohr

_____________________________

 

I love being “right”

I love having a sense of “rightness”

 

There is something profoundly comforting about thinking

one has “gotten it right”

especially when one is surrounded by those

with like minds

who agree

 

ah!  the power of groupthink

that cultish devotion to us

as we gird our loins and brandish our

sacred texts

and prepare for war against “them”

 

it is comforting to settle into that space

where was does not have to think too much

examine too much

feel too much

where mindless devotion flourishes

and zeal drives us into mindless action

 

where complications are discarded

like fast-food wrappers

and we rage against the enemy

against “sin” (as we define it)

 

it is good to be right

it is good to have power

it is good to be in control

 

except

 

the cost is great

the “foot soldiers” in this ideological war

are expendable

 

it does not matter if women are

minimized, marginalized, oppressed, suppressed

it does not matter if they die

 

only one thing matters

well two things really

a zygote

and a sense of righteousness and merit

 

if those on our side suffer, it is noble pain

rewarded in heaven

if those on the other side suffer

it is the just consequence of their actions

for which they must pay

 

it does not matter if LGBTQI+ people are demonized and killed

it does not matter if the poor get poorer

it does not matter if our country pillages the resources of another

it does not matter if there is a mass shooting every day

 

you don’t count the dead when God is on your side

 

it is all very simple

and so we approach life

and economics, politics, and religion

with confidence

our flags fly high (from the back of jacked-up pickup trucks)

 

we are the victors

we are right

 

just believe, just behave, just fall in line

it’s not complicated

 

except it is