God in Sandals

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Jesus was God in Sandals…

 

If he was indeed God in sandals, then that means he cared about what God cared about, hated what God hated, and loved what God loved.  The incarnation gave God a face.  It gave God literal tears, literal laughter, literal hands, literal feet, a literal heart, and a literal mind.

          Rachel Held Evans

 

__________________________________

 

If Jesus were to show up today

He might wear sandals

 

Or perhaps he would wear Hokas.

Maybe even Florsheim wingtips, although I doubt it

 

I have no clue

But I think I know where Jesus would hang out

And it wouldn’t be at the political rally “Rededicate 250.”

 

He wouldn’t be admiring the newly added gold leaf

On the walls of the Oval Office

 

And he wouldn’t smile beneficently as

Pete Hegseth abuses the gospel and talks about a “holy war.”

 

It is more likely that he would be sharing a sandwich with a homeless dude

In a doorway

 

Trying to comfort immigrant children in Dilley Detention Center

And walking in a Pride parade with his queer brothers and sisters

 

He probably would be totally uncomfortable standing behind

The resolute desk, or sitting in the pew of a White Nationalist Church

But totally at home in a homeless shelter, or a soup kitchen

 

If Jesus was God in sandals

And if Jesus, as GodInUs, the Spirit

is with us still

 

then maybe we need to take another look

at what it means to follow

 

Because I don’t think Jesus is looking for us to

Line up behind the church or the state

 

I think he is looking for us to become so permeated

With love, with his presence

That we start to think, feel, and act

More like him

 

I think he wants us to hang around and value

And love, and help

Sick people and people with mental health issues

Homeless people and helpless people

Straight people and queer people

 

Hurt people

Recovering people

Searching people

Doubtful people

Even angry and fearful people

 

I think he wants us to love

Even our enemies

To give, even if we get nothing back

To serve, without recognition

To live simply (and give away what we don’t really need)

 

I think he wants humility, not arrogance

Non-violence, not missiles and bombs

Truth not deceit

Generosity not greed

 

I think Jesus doesn’t want a fortified palace (ballroom)

For a dictator

Nor a 250 ft arch

 

I think he wants universal healthcare

And housing

And food security

 

Jesus was a radical

He loved with radicality

He taught radical things

And he forgave while nailed to a tree

 

And he calls us to be “ordinary radicals” (Thanks Shane Claibourne)

 

Following Jesus is not about intellectual belief

(Christianity is crazy illogical anyway)

But about embracing love

 

It is not about closing ourselves up to

Others (and of course, sin)

As it is to opening ourselves up to God, to love

And to all those we would rather ignore

It is not so much about prayer and praise

As it is about getting into the mix of the worlds

Hate and pain

 

And loving like crazy

 

Faith (and hope) is lived

A performative mess

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Recently, a flock of religious types and political types

gathered to “rededicate” a nation to “God.”

 

Sounds good, right?

Lofty

Pious

 

Who could possibly be against

One nation under God?

 

One nation! Whose nation?

God, which God?

The Jewish God, the Christian God?

The Muslim God?

 

What about the Buddhists and Hindus

Those who participate in the Baha'i faith

Do they get to be a part of this one nation?

 

Or is it just Christians, ala Franklin Graham, and

God help us

Paula White or Robert Jefress

 

And if Christian, which version?

Because only Nationalistic, Dominion-oriented Christianity

Will be on that stage

The kind that drop bombs in the name of Jesus (Hegseth)

And exclude rather than welcome the stranger.

 

I, as a Presbyterian, would not be welcome

Not that I would welcome the chance.

 

I know our money says, “In God we Trust”

But we don’t

We trust strongmen (yes, men, and they are not really strong) and bombs

And the Stock market

 

And that is not the motto under which our country was born.

Try  E Pluribus Unum: “Out of many, one.”

 

We were not a country built for religious exclusivism

But were a country designed to bring diverse people together

Under some unifying values (not Christian BTW).

The values of freedom and justice

FOR ALL

And all should mean all

 

But just for fun, let say we are a nation under God

That means we should reflect God’s intention for a nation,

Right?

 

What does that mean?

That we are the biggest and meanest?

That we destroy civilizations?

Bomb Kids?

That we are ‘”hot”?

 

In my faith system, God has had a long

And contentious with those nations

That claim to be “God’s People.”

 

In fact, once Jesus showed up the idea that God

had a favored earthly nation

disappeared

 

Sure, God still had a people

But those people who those gathered in love

To praise, worship, pray AND SERVE

 

Jesus was pretty blunt.  My Kingdom is not of this world!!!!!!

Hear that Pete?  Hear that Doug Wilson?

 

But still, even if there WERE a country that belonged to God

What would it look like?

 

Not like the United States of America

Especially not MAGA States of America

 

Its complicated, but if I were to summarize what God wanted

From the people of Judah and Israel

Who were, at one point, supposedly dedicated to God

I would do it this way

 

SEEK JUSTICE AND DEFEND THE VULNERABLE:

God’s country would care for the poor, the vulnerable, the immigrant

It would protect women (not subjugate them)

 

In God’s country, justice would be blind

The Supreme Court would work to create equality and equity

(and not erase Voter Rights and not side with the Oligarchs)

 

SHOW COMPASSION AND KINDNESS

It would not spend most of its money on a Department of War

It would not spend more on guns and missiles than on healthcare

and education, and roads, and food support, and housing

 

It would not be racist

It would not be retributive, a global bully

Fund USAID

(Not funding USAID will mean 14.5- 25 million preventable deaths, many of them children, over the next 10 years.  Those deaths are blood on the hands of our country, because we could easily prevent them.  A side note.  A year of USAID funding was equal to a little over a month of the war in Iran)

 

HAVE HUMILITY

An awareness that life is a gift.  This land we live in is a gift.

That we are servants, not masters

Caretakers not owners

 

Most of all a nation that says it belongs to God ought to actually

LOVE GOD

More than a demented narcissist

More than earthly power

More than wealth

More than anything

 

Loving God means loving creation, not plundering it

Drill baby drill is not consistent with love God

Because this planet is another incarnation of God

 

Loving God means loving all those God created

AS GOD CREATED THEM

 

BIPOC people

LGBTQI+ people

Yes, trans people

People on the spectrum

People with other mental health challenges

People with disabilities

Female people

Male people

White people

Poor people

 

People of all faiths

Even arrogant, domineering, cruel Christians

Get to be loved

 

Maybe if they find love, they will be nicer

Maybe if we all understood we are loved

We would all be nicer

 

I just know that a political rally

Does not make for a country that actually loves God

 

It is merely one particular brand of Christianity (a toxic one at that)

Asserting its domination over the nation

under the guise of “rededication.”

 

On this day, 72 years ago, the SCOTUS (a much better one than we have now it seems)

Declared the segregation of schools unconstitutional.

And 72 years ago, we also changed our motto, out of fear of communism

To “One nation under God.”

 

Now our better angels have been silenced, and we are affirming racism

As a nation (not Godly)

And we are doubling down on a motto that has been weaponized

Against immigrants, LGBTQI+ people and so many others

(also not Godly)

 

On this day, we would do well to ignore the

Performative mess in Washington, DC

And remember the words of Amos

 

I hate, I despise your religious festivals; your assemblies are a stench to me. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!" -Amos 5:21-25

Enabling the beast

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We all see it

Or rather, we should all see it.

 

That if you enable evil

Even if that enabling is passive, you create a monster.

 

And that monster,

Call it hate, prejudice, greed, racism

A beast,

Often personified in a person, or a movement

 

Becomes uncontrollable

Rending the fabric of morality and decency

Gnawing on the flesh of the vulnerable

Eradicating justice

Gorging itself on precious resources

 

Until the world becomes enmeshed in violence

A place where people are marginalized and minimized

Where cultures are destroyed

Where children lie crushed under the rubble of their school

And Palestinian villages are flattened

And strangers are brutalized, not welcomed

 

And people with empty heads and inflated egos

And no moral compass at all

Plan ballrooms, and dream of arches

And fortified bunkers

 

We reach a point where the cancer

That is killing a culture, a nation

Even a planet

Is beyond cure

 

It will destroy

 

And it will be because

Too many people did not stand up and speak out.

 

This is not new

We have seen many cultures die

Many empires stumble and fall

Crashing to the earth

 

We have seen the world slowly

Practice resurrection

Rebuilding

Restoring

(only to see it happen again)

 

There is a reason Jesus said

Be Yeast.  Be salt.  Be light.

You

Not someone else.  You

 

Be the change you wish to see

Be compassion, welcome, and generosity

Be people who fight for justice

Be love

 

Because if you don’t, who will?

Wise people throughout history have warned us.

 

Albert Einstein famously noted, "The world is not a dangerous place because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing."

 

Dante Alighieri expressed a similar sentiment in Inferno: "The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great moral crisis maintain their neutrality."

 

Edmund Burke concisely warned, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

 

Martin Luther King Jr. stated, "In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer highlighted the enabler's dilemma:

"Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act."

 

The monster is awake.

The rough beast slouches toward Bethlehem

Seeking incarnation

 

We dare not be silent.

We cannot stand by and do nothing

(even if it seems as if nothing can be done)

 

We cannot watch as a person who does not care

For anyone but himself, slouches along

Playing King Midas and seeking to turn everything gold

 

While Elon dances like a dervish

And greedy souls destroy the planet for profit.

 

May it never be said that

“The best lack all conviction, while the worst  

Are full of passionate intensity”  (Yeats)

 

We cannot let MAGA win.

We cannot let Putin, Trump, and the oligarchs

Shape the world

 

The stock market is not a measure of wellness

Nor is the wealth of the oligarchs a sign of success

 

For underneath such shallow victories

Racism, hate, and greed grow

Fear too

 

We must be salt and yeast

We must be light

Jesus told us that even small acts are important

 

Yes, it may look as if it is all for nothing

As if we are powerless

The cross looked like a defeat, a failure

But it was magnificent

 

So we must do what small things that we can

We must protect our LGBTQI+ friends

We must stand side by side with those beautiful trans people

In our midst

We must feed the hungry,

Welcome the stranger

 

We must vote

 

Because even if we do not win

This time

Even if evil is not impeached or deposed

Now

 

We will have planted a seed,

Sprinkled a little yeast

 

We will have followed

Jesus

 

 

Blessed or Bitter

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All that I’m now going through

Will make me better or bitter,

Break down or break through,

Learning patience – it takes so much patience.

It’s a great education,

But why is the tuition so high?

Why, God, Why?

                     Brian McLaren

_______________________________

 

I wish it were easy

I wish the formulas worked

 

Bad things happen to bad people

Blessings are poured out on the good

 

Love wins

If you just have enough faith, all will be well

 

I wish there were five holy hops to happiness

 

But frankly, it’s a mess

A liar is believed

Cruelty is justified

Injustice and racism (they go together) are endemic

Bad things happen to good people

And blessings flow down on the brutal rich

 

Black and White is BS

Gray is the way

It is

 

I am tired of missiles killing children

Liars being believed

Good people blindly following and supporting bad people

War being made in the name of peace

Evil being perpetrated in the name of God

 

It would be so easy to get bitter

Hate filled

Despondent

 

It would be so easy to stop

And sit

Immobile

In the valley of the shadow of death

 

Frozen

Lamenting

Why, why God, have you forsaken us?

Uncomforted

 

Life is a lumpy, ripped, ragged mess

 

It is so tempting to build naïve theologies

Where all is nice and clean

And logical

To mutter reassuring banalities

 

But life intercedes

And we realize it is beyond our understanding

And we are perplexed

Anxious

Questioning

Why?

 

Have you forgotten us completely,

God,

If you are there?

 

I have no easy answers.

The formulas lie shattered and useless

 

And yet, I am still casting my questions

Into the darkness

 

My God, My God

Why?

 

Hoping, trusting, believing?

That Love is there.

 

Why not now

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One minute you are yelling “No, it can’t be this way!” and then you are whispering, “Why?  Why must it be this way?”  That why – the prayer of lament – is the prayer you offer on the longest night of the year…

 

It acknowledges, “I don’t have an answer, but still dares to hope there is an answer, so it asks.

          Brian McLaren

___________________________

 

I don’t have an answer.

Perhaps there is no good answer.

 

We don’t like that answer, and so we get creative.

 

God knows

God only knows

There is a bigger purpose we can’t see

God is working God’s purposes out as year succeeds to year

 

Maybe

Or maybe not

 

I don’t understand cancer

Or Donald Trump and his wrecking crew

I don’t understand why people can cheer a cruel, hate-filled man

And thus cheer hate and cruelty

 

I don’t understand why God would let bad people flourish

And put their picture on money

And let beautiful, innocent people suffer

 

Why God would allow bombs to fall

And missiles to fly

And people to starve

And children to die

 

Why?

 

Maybe we are just out here,

On this decaying planet on our own

Making bad choices

And wandering toward a bad end

 

Maybe it is about free will (seems like a stupid idea)

 

Why?

Is it ridiculous to hope for an answer?

To believe that someday love will win?

 

Maybe someday, Trump will wake up and feel a momentary pang of compassion

Maybe someday a CEO will suggest that a slight increase in the profit margin

It is not worth the destruction of the planet

And that bigoted white supremacists will call a black man his brother

And mean it

And that ICE officer will look in the mirror and see what he or she has become,

And resign

 

Maybe

 

Why do I still dare hope?

Because I see something sacred in most (I wish I could say all)

People I meet

 

That spark of the divine

It is there!

Because I watch people do random acts of kindness

And march on No King's Day

And give to the food bank

And help their neighbor

 

Because I see love and joy

Blossom in the most unlikely places

 

Sometimes I think it is true

That life sucks, and then you die

 

But sometimes I know better

And simply ask why

Why not now!

 

Today would be a good day

For love to win

Shaking a fist at God

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I aspire to faith

I aspire to confidence

 

I do not want to join the throng that says

There is no God

 

But there are times when my aspiration turns into

Resignation

Perhaps despair

 

There are mornings when I wake up soul-hungry

Wanting nothing more than to curl up

Fetal

 

Wanting nothing more than to raise my fists

And scream at God

 

The disappointment and anger

Hot

Boiling over

 

At the lies, the manipulations

The injustice

At the torrent of evil that flows from people

 

People who, if I am honest, I see as evil

Who, if I am honest, I hate

 

(is it wrong to hate evil?)

 

I rage not because I don’t think God is there

I rage because I believe there is a God willing to be raged at

 

A God who seems to have failed

The poor

The immigrant

The children, buried in rubble in Gaza, and Lebanon, and Iran

The victims of greed and hate

 

I guess it is better to raise my voice to the heavens

Then to sit in stolid silence

Frigid and silent

In the face of evil

 

Better to believe there is a God who cares

Who can heal and reconcile

Who can make them better

Who can make me better

Even if at times that God seems silent.

 

I cannot accept the God of MAGA

The God of the Evangelicals

Who have turned the good news into bad news

 

“God loves me and hates you” is not good news

 

I cannot accept the God who guides missiles to kill children

And destroys civilizations

 

Whose fault is it

That God seems so hidden and distant?

Some would say it is all my fault

I haven’t “surrendered.”

I am too proud

I have too little faith

 

Perhaps

I will not let go of God

But neither will I let go of my questions

I will not allow shallow, unsatisfying answers

To be my opiate

 

So here I sit

Refusing to accept what is happening

Seeking a God I often cannot find

Shaking my fist at heaven, not because I do not believe,  but because I do

Gentleness requires courage

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Violent emotions are not sustainable long-term sources of energy for the struggle. True gentleness is not an absence of anger, but a transformation of anger from the impulse to harm into an unconquerable will to protect and endure.

 

Gentleness is not the willingness to ignore abuse, but a powerful balance that prevents us from being involuntarily triggered and drawn off course. Gentleness is anger brought completely in harness to our highest values. When we are truly gentle, our power cannot be triggered by fate, nor manipulated by others.

 

Gentleness requires more courage than does violence and demands constant training as intense as that for any battle. Gentleness is not a hiding place from life, but a fortress of peace lying beyond the reach of any indignity from fate or foe. To be truly gentle does not mean to leave the struggle for a better world. Gentleness is the art of living in the eye of life’s storms. True gentleness simply means to be in full possession of our own hearts.

                     Jim Rigby

___________________________________

 

They simmer and fester

Deep in the soul

 

The anger, dare I say hate?

Those emotions that are both violent and lead to violence.

 

There is energy there

Fire

And the pressure builds

Until we act out, our emotions making our choices

rather than our brains

 

We are in the territory of demons

What else can we call them

These malign thoughts

This foul presence

 

The feelings are not unfounded.

The greed is real

So are the abuses of power, and the lies

The harm is real

People are oppressed, and freedom is stolen

Children are killed

 

People in power do evil things,

And do not care (do you?)

 

How can we not be mad!  How can we not respond with every fiber of our being?

How can we not resist, violently, angrily!

 

And yet we live in the shadow of the cross

Or perhaps, on this day, the firing squad

 

And the words of Jesus echo:

Forgive them

Today you will be with me in paradise

Mother, behold your son

Behold your mother

 

On that day, in the midst of the pain and brutality

The injustice

There was peace

A peace that was beyond understanding

 

There was gentleness

 

Just as violence emerges from hate

So gentleness emerges from peace,

 

And peace

Comes because the Lord is near (Philippians)

 

It is peace that guards our hearts and our minds

Peace that makes us

Healers

And the carriers of hope

 

There are too many days when I am not peace-filled

Too many days when my soil is roiled

Too many days when what oozes from my soul are not

The fruits of the Spirit

But the produce of the Flesh

 

I don’t want to be like that

I don’t want to be tossed around by the winds of hate

I don’t want to be manipulated by the likes of Donald Trump

 

I want to be gentle, kind, forgiving

A healer

 

I know I cannot ignore evil.

I cannot step back into silent places of safety

But I can be controlled by love

I can let Jesus have possession of my heart

 

And I can be a safe place

In the midst of the storm

 

And that, that

Is what I want to be

 

Haters will Hate

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“I should be happy, but instead I feel nothing. I feel a lot of nothing these days. I've cried a few times, but mostly I'm empty, as if whatever makes me feel and hurt and laugh and love has been surgically removed, leaving me hollowed out like a shell.”

          Jennifer Niven,

 

As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When shall I come and behold the face of God?

My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me continually,

“Where is your God?” 

          Palm 42

 

Happy are the pushers, for they get on in the world

Happy are the hard-boiled, for they never let life hurt them

Happy are those who complain, for they get their own way in the end

Happy are the blasé, for they never worry about their sin

Happy are the knowledgeable, for they know their way around

Happy are the troublemakers, for they make people take notice of them

          J.B. Phillips

___________________________________________________

 

I am tired

Physically, it can be a challenge

To drag this almost 75-year-old body out of bed

 

Everything hurts, and what doesn’t hurt doesn’t work.

 

Mentally, I’m tired

The complexities of life, which once were fun to juggle

Now seem to crash down upon me

 

Spiritually, I am exhausted

 

Exhausted

 

In the “Dead Poets Society,” the teacher tells his students

Don’t use “avoid using the word ‘very’ because it’s lazy. A man is not very tired; he is exhausted. Don’t use very sad, use morose.

 

OK then, I am exhausted and morose.

 

It is debilitating

The spiritual BS that flows like a stream of foul water

From Erica Kirk and Franklin Graham

From Paula White and JD Vance

 

And sometimes, I suspect, from me too

Me too

 

Because I am exhausted and perplexed

And I do not always handle it well

Too often, too often, Lord, I become what I abhor and protest

 

Impatient, angry, strident, empty, and confused

 

But I am tired of the Gospel that is not Gospel

The good news that is truly bad

 

I am tired of the Christian nation that violates Christ

I am tired of those who have doubled down on arrogance rather than humility

Power rather than servanthood

Lies rather than the truth

Violence and killing rather than peacemaking and healing

Hate rather than love

 

I would love to feel as if my soul is watered by flowing streams

But instead, I am soaked

By salty tears

 

I do not know how to move out of my perplexity

Out of my sense that everything is going wrong

And there is nothing I can do.

 

But perhaps perplexity is the point.

Yes, there is nothing I can do

But is there something the Sacred can do?

 

Sometimes I doubt it.

I have every reason to doubt.

Trump is president.  Netanyahu rages uncontrolled.

 

My head and heart tell me to quit

To hide

To be silent

 

Why bother?

 

Why?

Because

 

God

 

Because of the sunrise over the mountain

The smile of a child

The random act of kindness

 

God lives

Love lives

Goodness Lives

 

Call it what you will

(if you can’t call it God, call it something else)

 

But there is something

Dancing in the morning sunlight

 

Something lingering in my soul

That changes my Lament (at least from time to time)

To praise

 

I am not naïve

Haters will hate

Innocents will still die

Bad people will still flourish

Good-hearted people will still be led astray

By liars

 

But I do believe

Even in the midst of my unbelief

That hate will never be

 

The end of the story

 

I believe

That someday, the Kingdom will come

And it is my job

Every day, every single day

 

To live as though it were already here.

How long, O Lord?

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Right now it is achingly clear, heartbreakingly, angrily, clear, that we who believe that God is love and is present, is also a God who is hidden sometimes, sometimes when we are most in need.  The Psalmist cried out, "How long, O Lord, How Long!?

 

How long?

 

Too long. 

 

That seems to be the answer right now.

 

Even Jesus had a "moment."  My Lord, my Lord, why have you forsaken me?"  Why?  Why have you forsaken us?  Why have you allowed creepy, cruel, greedy, uncompassionate, destructive people to rise to power and destroy so much that is good?  Why do you let childish cosplayers blow some of your children out of the water, and blow apart schools full of children, and boast about it?  Why do you let spiritual lightweights lecture a Pope who is literally quoting you? 

 

Why do you let masked thugs throw innocents into concentration camps where they wither away?

 

Why do you let people who would plunder the planet destroy forests and rivers, and violate sacred sites?

 

Why do you let the political bullies like Putin and Netanyahu, and Trump flourish?

 

Why?  Why? Why?

 

I realize, Lord, that you are way more loving than I can ever be.

I realize that you are more patient.

I realize that you see more than I see

I realize that I, too, am a mess who does harmful things, who slides into anger and hate, greed and other destructive things.  And I am thankful that you are patient and loving, forgiving, and restorative.

 

But Lord, I struggle with those who harm and divide, who grab and devour, who rape, and have no regret.  Only a desire for more, more, more.

 

This morning, as I watched the sunrise, I rejoiced, but my joy was blurred by tears

 

Lord, I am perplexed and confused.  I am tired.

I am tired of my own stupidity

I am tired of the stupidity of those around me.

I am tired that we keep choosing poorly.

I am frustrated that you keep loving and forgiving and working to repair and restore

And we keep doing the same things we human creatures have always done

And keep getting what we have always gotten.

 

Pain, destruction, death, injustice, inequity

Hunger, poverty, war.

 

Why?

When?

How Long

How?

 

These are my prayers of desperation

There seems to be no answer

But against all hope

I believe

Two hearts notice

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A whole civilization will die tonight

People will die

Lots of people will die

Women and children will die

 

Have died

Slaughtered in their homes, their schools

We can hear the cries of the mothers and fathers

From here

 

People will die

Homes will be destroyed

Cultures erased

 

Call it what it is

Genocide

 

Why?

So, our leaders say, we can make lots of money

So that the oil will flow

So we will feel big and strong

USA, USA (and Israel too)

 

It is not all Tomahawk missiles,

And air strikes

It is Zionist settlers with bulldozers

It is the IDF, responding to violence and arresting the victims

 

It is the incarcerated being beaten and raped

Immigrant families being torn apart

People disappeared, without due process

 

It is blockades dooming people to a slow death by starvation

It is infants dying in hospitals because there is no electricity

 

And it is not just in Iran, or Lebanon, or Cuba

Not just the Gaza or the West Bank

 

It is in Minneapolis

Washington DC

Texas

Florida

Idaho

Where the ideologically extreme right has decided

Trans people don’t deserve to exist

Women should be subjugated

Poor people should be ignored

The planet should be plundered for money

 

We should not be surprised that

 

So much evil flows from Empire

We watch it happen

Every single day

 

The lies, the violence

The hate mongering, the division

 

What do we do?

Cheer? (some do)

Pretend it isn’t happening (denial is real)

Become numb, and accept it all as normal?

The ramblings of a madman, the dishonesty, the cruelty, and the greed?

 

Do we reach the point where we no longer notice?

No longer let tragedy and atrocity both us?

Where we can simply ignore a powerful white male who brags

That he can grab “them” by their…  (well, you know)

 

Or, do we allow our hearts to break?

And do we let our broken hearts become broken-open hearts (Brian McLaren’s words)

 

Do we remember that God is love

That God cares for all who suffer,

Agonizes over all those in need,

 

And remember too

That we, as those who would follow GodWithUs

As those who experience GodInUs

Should also care

 

That we should be people of compassion.

 

We should look upon the world with eyes

That see

We should approach the world with broken-open hearts

 

Our compassion should be a bridge between

The compassion of God and the pain of the world

 

When we hear of children killed

Justice denied

Victims ignored

 

When we see violence, hunger, homelessness,

Illness, loneliness, despair

All the miseries of humankind

 

When we see someone suffering,

We should say

 

“Someone is suffering, and at least two hearts in the universe notice and refuse to turn away – God’s heart, and my own.”

This stops here!

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Any God who would wander into the human condition, any God who has this thirst to pursue us, had better not be too put off by pain, for that's the way we tend to treat our saviors. Any God who tries to love us had better be ready to die for it.

William Willimon

____________________________________________________________

Sometimes it seems

as if hate is going to win

as if all that is right

all that is good

is coming to an end

 

as on that Friday so long ago

when in the heat of the afternoon

jeers echoed

lashes fell

thorns pierced

hammer blows reverberated

and love took its last breath

 

or did it?

 

perhaps love is made of tougher stuff

perhaps

just perhaps

on that day

God looked in the face of hatred

and brutality

into the face of judgement and rejection

into the face of power and wealth

 

and said

“This Stops Here”

 

and that is why we call it

Good

 

Doomscrolling or hopequesting

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You’re not doomscrolling, you’re hopequesting. You need those tiny pieces of joy from seeing friends and strangers share their art, their good news, their wacky, unique selves. We need light to live. And we find it in each other.”

          Aaron Corwin

 

We thank You, our Creator, for all things bright and good:

The seedtime and the harvest, our life, our health, our food.

Accept the gifts we offer for all Your love imparts;

Accept what You most welcome: our humble, thankful hearts!

All good gifts around us are sent from heav’n above;

Then thank the Lord, O thank the Lord for all His love.

          Matthias Claudius

 

__________________________________________

 

It all depends on what you look for.

True

There is a lot out there that is dark and evil

There are liars in high places

And people who worship money rather than God

 

But we still live on a planet that was God’s first act of incarnation

We still get to see what God is like in Jesus

We still get to experience God all the time

God is around us, with us, and in us.

 

We carry the Sacred

It is woven into our being

We are Sacred children

 

 God is waiting to be found everywhere,

In the darkest corners of our lives,

In the thoughts that wake us in the night

In the brilliant final blast of a sunset

In a random act of kindness

In that rare Facebook post that celebrates kindness

 

 

We find what we seek.

If we look for evil, we find it every time

If we look for what is good, it comes sneaking out of the mundane

 

In the simplest, lightest moments

in the little graces along the way.

 

God is there, he's waiting

in quite obvious and visible places,

wanting to be found

 

When we look for evil, we descend into the house of fear

And live amidst fear and hate

In a place of violence

 

When we look for good, we ascend into

That place where love dwells

And we are permeated with love

 

Transformed

Part of the ongoing incarnation

Of Sacred

 

Then, what we see,

What we think,

Will bear the fruit of gratitude

And hope

 

And seeing the world differently

Through the eyes of grace

We begin, at last

To reflect the divine image

In how we live and breathe and have our being

 

So the question remains.

What do we choose to look for

This day?

 

 

A Macabre Intimacy

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As long as we continue to live as if we are what we do, what we have, and what other people think about us, we will remain filled with judgments, opinions, evaluations, and condemnations. We will remain addicted to putting people and things in their "right" place.

― Henri J.M. Nouwen

 

____________________________________________________________

 

We are often woven together

in macabre intimacy

which drives us into a rigid world

of judgment

and condemnation

 

A world of “us” and “them,”

“win” or “lose,”

“right” or “wrong.”

 

O Sacred one,

you showed us how to live

what it means to be truly human,

how to reflect your image

through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

 

Jesus was not defined by what he had (not much)

the labels he carried (Rabbi)

his ethnicity or race

not even his gender

 

Jesus was defined by the way he loved

And by love alone

 

He did not worry about what people thought about him.

He merely lived out his calling to be

Light, Salt,

God with us

 

Jesus was not blind to the ills of the world

or the weaknesses of others

But he saw more

much more

 

When he looked at people,

he saw not only the failure, but the promise

not only the darkness but the light

not only the human container

(which is why adjectives were not important to him)

 

but also the sacred seed

 

He saw children of God

All beloved

It was not his goal to be “right” while they were wrong.

He simply wanted to be present,

and by his loving presence

transform and heal

and create newness

 

O God

Forgive us for our need to be right

Forgive us for those times when we get hung up on he adjectives

Black, white, male, female, conservative, liberal, American, Iranian

 

Help us to see the Sacred in others

So that the Spirit in us can greet the Spirit in them

Namaste

Shalom

Yo

Saol

 

Do not let us use the wrong things to define ourselves or others

Help us to be present

To be open

To honor and respect

To welcome

To be kind

 

And be

a reflection of your love

 

Giving up is not all bad

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For Lent this year, I’m just giving up.

          Source Unknown

______________________________________

 

Lent is a slow walk with Jesus

Down dusty roads

Through small villages

 

Gathering around tables

Puzzling over parables

Challenged by terrifying teachings

And totally crazy parables that we barely understand

 

Watching the inexplicable

As the lame walk and the blind see

 

Where up is down and out is in

And dead

Is not

 

Stumbling toward Jerusalem

And ground-zero

Where violence, reconciliation

Despair, hope, oppression, and freedom

 

Will come together in a malign

Alchemy

And we will find ourselves on barren ground

At the foot of a cross

 

In these lengthening days

We are called to reflect

Confess, repent, and lament

 

To set aside distractions

And prepare our hearts for holy work.

 

But there are wars and rumors of wars

There are missiles flying and

Children dying

Leaders lying

 

We hear psychopaths invoking Armageddon,

And see Immigrants beaten

Abusers shielded from accountability

Innocence destroyed

Justice denied

 

And we are distracted.

Our best intentions crumble as we doomscroll

And sink further and further into the darkness

 

Losing sight of Jesus as his reality fades

Watching the light disappear into the dark

No longer reflective but anxious

Stuck in lament

 

Unable to take one more step

Toward the garden

Muttering under our breath

 

I give up

 

Which may be the point of Lent

Reaching that place where we sit

And wait

Open and vulnerable

Scared perhaps

 

Until, amazingly

We discover that the darkness cannot

Overcome the light

 

When we once again find ourselves walking

with the One who shows up in those places of

greatest failure and greatest need

 

And says, “Do you love me?

That is all I ask, that you love me.

 

Because I love you and will never abandon you

And implores us

Feed my sheep

 

I am here for you, be there

For others

 

Because that is what this is all about

When we get to the end of the journey, what will matter

 

Is that we have allowed ourselves to be loved

And that we have passed that love along

 

Being love

Loving

 

Everything

Depends on this

Everything

 

Here before we know it

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People sometimes ask me when I became a Christian, and that’s a hard question to answer because I am pretty sure that by the time I asked Jesus into my heart, he’d already been living there for a while.

          Rachel Held Evans

 

“If you love me, show it by doing what I’ve told you. I will talk to the Father, and he’ll provide you another Friend so that you will always have someone with you. This Friend is the Spirit of Truth. The godless world can’t take him in because it doesn’t have eyes to see him, doesn’t know what to look for. But you know him already because he has been staying with you, and will even be in you

          John 14:15-17

 

Jesus asks, "Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?".

          Luke 6:46

_____________________________

 

Hey God

Are you out there?

Somewhere?  Anywhere?

Do you sit in heaven (if there is such a place)

And watch with horror as we make a mess of things?

 

And what are you like, anyway?

Are you aloof and on a throne

Ready to judge the quick and the dead?

 

Every Sunday we pray

Come, O Creator God, and be with us

Come to this special place we have made for you

Beautiful with its stained glass and its peaceful elegance

 

Hey Yahweh

Hey Jesus…

 

Perhaps we have missed the point

What is in a name?

Everything.

 

You gave us a name

I am

Or rather, Whatever I am I will be

 

Yes, you are

You incarnated

You expressed yourself and told us who (and what) you are

 

You are

In the mountains we love, the air we breathe

In the rippling roaring springs

In the cry of the eagle

In every living creature

Even us

 

You gave us a name

And you gave us a person

Jesus

 

And in that name, you told us everything

You said, “I save.”

I rescue, redeem, recreate

 

You are the one who comes into the midst of

The world you have made and

The mess we have made

 

You come while leaders lie and steal

When power is abused

And innocents are killed

And the planet is assaulted in the name of greed

 

You gave us one we call Emmanuel

God with us

One who taught us who you are

You are love

 

But wait, there’s more.

You have told us, promised us

That you are also in us

 

You are pneuma hagion

You are holy, sacred wind

 

It has been said that one cannot catch the wind

But this wind is in us

Restless and powerful

Unsettling

 

It roars through our souls

And it too

Is you

 

You live in us, O Creator

You live in us, O savior

You make ourselves at home in our

Vulnerability

 

And you have one desire.

That we let the wind be wind

That we let your moving, rushing, roaring presence

Make us

Another incarnation

 

But Lord, we stifle the Spirit

We quench your holy fire

We check and constrain the wind

 

We say Lord, Lord

And then live for power or money

We say God is love

And then hate

 

We proudly say your name

We claim your presence and favor

But we deny your presence

 

No one would know you are in residence

By the way we talk, think,

And live

 

Don’t give up on us, Lord

Your very name suggests you won’t

But in your name, missiles rain down on children

Killing and maiming

 

In your name lies are spoken

Laws are broken

Injustice is perpetrated

 

In the actions of Presidents,

And Secretaries of War, and Majority leaders

Your presence is denied

Your name violated

 

Me too

Us too

We, too, sometimes fail to do what you say

 

But still, you stay

You are

You are in us to save

You are in us to heal and empower

 

Lord, when we are in the midst of strife and division

When everything seems to be disintegrating

Lord, when we feel so alone

And cry out for your presence

 

Remind us that you are already here.