Clinging to God!

Joy – the passion or emotion excited by the acquisition or expectation of good.  A state of bliss.  Mirth, merriment, festivity!  Joy!

One of the major characteristics of the Christian, or so we are told

“Shout for joy to God all the earth, serve the Lord with gladness says the Psalmist (100:1,2).

“Be joyful always” insists Paul (I Thessalonians 5:16)w

“The fruit of the Spirit is love , joy, peace”  Galatians 5)

Christians are meant to be joyful.  But where is the joy?  All too often Christians are known not for their joy but for their grimness.  The story is told of the couple who went to the airport to pick up a visiting minister.  They had never met the person, but immediately picked out a likely suspect.  “Sir are you the visiting minister?”  “No” he replied, “It’s my ulcer that makes me look like this!”

How do we catch the joy?  We are bombarded with secular wisdom on the subject of joy.  There are video tapes, TV specials . . . Heck, you can buy the book!  Finding Joy: 101 Ways to Free Your Spirit and Dance with Life.  Charlotte Kasl, Ph.D, author.  Everyone has an opinion. Most of us have tried most of the advice.  Still the question remains.  How do we catch joy?  Today in John we hear the opinion of the expert on Joy – Jesus.  Hear his words.

Abide in me.

When it comes to the subject of joy one word seems to be essential.  That word is ABIDE.  If we would experience Jesus’ joy we must abide in Jesus.  We must place ourselves, continually, purposefully, in Jesus presence. We must rest in God’s love.  The image Jesus gives us here is powerful.  “I am the vine, you are the branches....Abide in me”  This image suggests that we need to be connected

Now we already know we can be connected to the wrong things... what we might call counterfeit vines.  A Lexus SUV.  Our jobs.  Our roles.  Success.  Wealth.  Jesus here reminds of what, or rather who is the right vine, the right thing to be connected to.  The vine is Jesus.  The vine is God.  You want joy?  Be connected to God.  Abide in Christ.  Rest in God’s love.

Now that is a simple thing to say… but not necessarily a simple thing to do.  God is not really all that easy to connect with.  Let’s face it . . . God is mysterious, awesome, BIG!  I mean really Big!  But it is more than that.  In the Bible, especially in the Old Testament we find the concept of “kabod” or transcendence.  God as the transcendent one.

Chiam Potok is a wonderful Jewish author.  In one of his books he offers a lyrical description of Kabod.

A quality of holiness, a quality of power

A quality of fearfulness, a quality of sublimity

A quality of trembling, a quality of shaking

A quality of terror, a quality of consternation

God of Israel

Who comes crowned to the Throne of His Glory

And of no creature are the eyes able to behold it. . .

Kabod.  Totally, Holy other.  It is hard to feel connected to something transcendent, infinite.  Someone once told me their major issue with faith was their concept of God.  They saw God as some sort of vague being, some great “other”… and kept picturing tapioca pudding.  The big guy in the white robe with the lightning bolt isn’t much better.

God, the infinite one is hard to connect to.  But there is another side to the God...  the immanent.  Immanence is not the opposite of transcendence, it is the correlative.  Immanence and transcendence are two sides of the same coin....

If transcendence is the infinite God, Immanence is the intimate God
This is the God who is present, and whom we “experience”,

I would say this is the Spirit within.  The teacher, helper, advocate, comforter that Jesus talks about.

And here is where we gain a clue about what it means to abide. . . We can’t grab hold of the infinite God.  By definition this God is too big for us… but we can connect to the intimate God, and in that way tap into the kabod, the transcendence of God

Like a branch taps into the living giving vine of the vineyard…’

So, how do we connect,  grab hold of God in such a way that the life giving presence is there and we can be fed loved, forgiven, nourished?

The word Jesus used to describe what we need to do is, again, abide . 

Abide - to wait for
to endure without yielding
to bear patiently
to accept without objection
to remain stable or fixed in a state
to continue in a place

Synonyms: Stay, continue, bear

To abide has to do with the concept of 'being' instead of 'doing'. Doing in relation to the Christian walk is: reading your Bible, going to church, praying, witnessing, doing good works, fleeing sin, etc. These are all good things to do as a Christian. These are things we should be doing.

However there is something we must remember.  This kind of lifestyle, of nurturing spirituality, being loving, patient, and giving…. This lifestyle is the result of abiding.  These acts are not “abiding.”  They are a consequence of abiding.  The natural fruit of a branch connected to the vine.  And we must remember we simply cannot live this way if we aren’t connected. If we try to live this way without abiding, without being connected…Then we shrivel up and burn out.  We are branches lying on the ground trying to bear fruit with no life giving power flowing into us.  Doesn’t work.  We end up dry and brittle, and there is no fruit.

At least no good fruit.  Just frustration.  Fear.  Rigidity.  Judgmentalism.  To abide in Christ is to be in the 'being' mode. We still are doing the things that God has called us to do. . . we are, as Jesus will say later in John 15… obeying. . . but we do what we do in the context of the connection we have with the intimate God.  It is this connection that is critical.  The relationship we have with Christ is more important than the things we do or don't do.

Abiding is experiencing God.  Abiding is feeling the presence of God more than intellectually exploring and examining, and coming to understanding God. . . .

Maybe a better word is the word cling.

We need to cling to God,

as when lonely and afraid, and  hurting

We cling to another

Clinging and finding in the holding
the touch
the experience of the other being there
the healing flow of love
warmth
energy

Of course clinging doesn’t work if it is one sided

And that is the good thing about clinging to God

The nice thing is we don’t just cling to God

God clings to us… and as we desperately seek to love him

He seeks to love us back.  Jesus said, abide in me, AS I abide in you

We let God love us

And we love God back   Passionately, desperately….

And the more we need God, the more God is there.

The more we are stretched, challenged,

The more lonely and frightened we are

The more God is there, and the more important that connection is.

The more we love God, the more we experience the love of God back

The image that comes to my mind is that of a child, clinging to its mother in the middle of a thunderstorm… and then feeling the presence, feeling mom hugging back. . .

When we abide, we cling to God, and God clings back and through that connection flows the presence of God.  And in that presence… in that presence is power, potency, and yes, relief, and peace.

How do we cling?  Remember, it’s about presence, being connected.  How do we connect with other people?  We focus on them.   Think about them.  Talk to them. But mostly, its focus.  I was thinking about the concept of mindfulness.  Where you try to be, 100% present in the moment.  That is how I think about it.  Instead of being mindful, let’s say, of my breath, focusing, on breath in, breath out, in out….

I try to focus on God.  Can’t say I’m great at it, but I try.  I just keep turning my mind to God.  I have times when I stop (that is kind of what Sabbath is about), and I focus on God.  But mostly it is a matter of trying to do that all the time.  So, I just think about God, imagine God, listen for God’s voice no matter what I am doing. 

I walk through the woods… and think about God.  I thank God for the breeze, the trees, the snow, whatever is there is God’s creation.  I see God, I try visualize the God in each person I encounter.  Even the clerk in the store.  I practice as Brother Lawrence would put it, the Presence of God. That is how I think about it, and kind of how I try to do it.  We all have to find our own way to abide.  Meditating.  A half an hour alone by a fire with a cup of tea.  We all find our own way.  But we need to do this!

And what does life looks like when we abide in Jesus?  When we are connected to the true vine… when we cling to God.  It looks like – according to Jesus, joy. 

But this is the point.  What do we want to be?  Dried up?  Withered?  Powerless?  Or people who bear fruit and have joy?   The word to remember is ABIDE.

Ash Wednesday

Although I do not hope to turn again
Although I do not hope
Although I do not hope to turn 

Wavering between the profit and the loss
In this brief transit where the dreams cross
The dreamcrossed twilight between birth and dying    TS Eliot
  

Today is Ash Wednesday

The beginning of Lent, a time of preparation leading toward Easter

It mirrors the time Jesus spent in the Wilderness before his public ministry.

Traditionally ashes are placed on peoples foreheads, as a sign of repentance,

marking the person as one who mourns his or her shortcomings, and wishes  to turn toward God

I grew up with a lot of Roman Catholic friends

They took Lent very seriously, we Presbyterians, not so much

I remember them "giving up" something for Lent

Chocolate.  Coke!  Cigarettes.  Alcohol.

 This "sacrifice" was, I guess, a sign of repentance and seriousness

I never quite got that.

I like to think about "doing"

What am I going to do for Lent... 

I mean think about relationships.

Do you prepare for marriage,

Do you seek to deepen a relationship, by depriving yourself of something?

Perhaps, 

But it seems more likely that I deepen my relationship by working on the relationship

by talking, listening, focusing, spending time....

by doing something that brings in to focus the one I love...

So I am going to do something for Lent

I am going to seek to deepen my relationship with God

by writing something, a card, an email, a note

to one person each day

Telling them why they are special to me, and to my God!
Because God is very present in the people around me!

What are you going to do!

(You are welcome to share in the "comments" section below :)

Finding our Way

Dazed and confused.

In this world, which right now seems complex and chaotic, even disintegrating… many of us feel this way

Last week I used a poem from TS Eliot

I would like to read it again, because I think it describes this condition in a remarkable way.   Eliot wrote

The endless cycle of idea and action,  Endless invention, endless experiment

Bring knowledge of words, and ignorance of The Word

All our knowledge brings us near to our ignorance, All our ignorance brings us nearer to death,

But nearness to death no nearer to God

Where is the life we have lost in the living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

Besieged by information and knowledge

Besieged by choices

We know about that!  Did you know that Starbucks offers consumers up to 87,000 drink combinations? Comcast, the nation's largest cable provider, offers up to 1,000 channels. Sirius offers 140 different satellite radio stations for your listening pleasure. 

Do you like your orange juice organic or regular, with or without calcium, or with minimal or maximal pulp?  And there are 400 types of bottled water.  How different can 400 types of bottle water be?  How about your toothpaste? Is it the herbal variety with added fluoride, the cavity-busting option with baking soda or the original formula with flavor crystals?  Think about it.  Even here in Wallowa County, and entire aisle at Safeway, nothing but potato chip choices.

And then we get to the really tough choices

About leaders. Choices for careers.  Relationship choices. Financial choices. Ethical choices. 

There so many voices ,coming at us from every side

Not just buy this.. but believe this.  Do this.  This is the way to success.  This is the way to happiness.  This is the way to God. These are American core values.  No, those are.

 

This creates mental, spiritual, and emotional chaos…

Muller, in his book “a life of being, having, and doing enough” says that we “lose our inner sense of what is the most nourishing or right action for us to take in this moment.  We gradually weaken the capacity of our inner thermostat to provide us with reliable, trustworthy information.”  In short we lose knowledge and wisdom in the midst of information overload.  We lose our vision of what life is meant to be all about.

Muller goes on to ask this question.  “When we envision our most beautifully perfect day, what do we dream about doing?  Who is with us, and what are the feelings or experiences we yearn for, how would we fill our day?”  Think about that for a moment.

He then notes, “most of us might describe essentially similar qualities in our one, sufficient day. We would speak of love, or of being loved, of being seen and known, appreciated for just who we are.”  And then he adds, “Perhaps we crave a sense of intrinsic value, knowing that we matter, that our lives, our work, our presence and companionship are important to others, to the world, perhaps even to God. “

But the point is this.  When we are confused, and overwhelmed, when we are drained, we tend to grab for whatever seems convenient in order to give ourselves ease, or fulfillment.  We do not choose wisely.  But we grab for substitutes.  Things that look “close enough”  For what Muller calls “quicker, easier version of love, satisfaction, sufficiency, or peace.

The problem is that the counterfeits don’t work.

Pride does not make us feel authentically important, but is a way of covering up our sense of deficit

Greed never leaves us feeling we have enough, we just want more

Lust cannot give us any feeling of being truly loved or cherished in our bodies and hearts. And often often ends up creating massive problems in our lives.

In short, these things are the wrong tools for the job.

Yet in America, perhaps in all the world, we have turned these unwise options into standard operating procedure.  Perhaps even into cultural values.  Think about it.  Is this not true?  We (America) are number one (pride).  You can have it all (Greed).  Sex sells (Lust)  I just want to be famous on TV (Envy). All you can eat! (Gluttony).  The world owes me (Sloth).  If any bad guys stand in my way, well bring it on (anger).

We constantly make choices based on this kind of thinking.  And when we are making these choices, and thus embracing values that don’t work, we are fast on the road to being people who are depleted.  Not just depleted.  Lost.

So what is the solution?  How do we move from being un-wise to wise?

In the Hebrew tradition there is a day called the Day of Atonement.  Or Teshuva.  This day invites self-examination, and a recommitment, in the context of God’s forgiveness, to a new, fresh, life.  Some scholars say that the word Teshuva can also mean “a return to clear seeing”.  I like that

So how do we return to “clear seeing”?  How do we sort through it all?  How do we choose what is right?  What will work, for us, for those we love?

We access the Spirit of truth.  Jesus in John 14 talks about the Spirit, the Helper, who will be in us and lead us into "all truth."  What we need to do is pay attention to the Spirit, which is “in here”, which dwells in us, and then we seek to make what Wayne Muller calls the “next right choice” 

Muller insists that each day we are confronted with choices, over and over again, each day.  These choices shape our moments, our days, our years.  The goal is to make the right choice.  The best choice!  But how do we do that?  When is that possible?  Only, he notes, when those choices are inspired by our deepest heart’s wisdom and authentic knowing.  I would suggest, that our hearts deepest wisdom comes when we are paying attention to the Spirit within.  When we allow God, through this Spirit, to inspire and guide us. 

This is the opposite of being driven by the externals.  All of those external cultural and organizational requirements and values, all those external demands, fears and coercions.  This is the opposite of just being reactive, and letting all those other things drive us.

Muller talks about this way of being, living moment by moment, listening to the spirit within, making one choice at a time, walking through life one step at a time this way.  “Our choices become small quiet intimate things that flow from us as water from a mountain spring, simple, endless, each thimble of water tumbling into the next, creating a small stream that somehow with neither map nor a plan, through surprising twists, while curving around unforeseen obstacles, somehow inevitably finds it way down the mountain to the sea”

In other words, moment by moment we follow the bread crumbs, and we get where God wants us to go.  But notice. The path is not straight.  There are twists and turns, and unforeseen obstacles.  Sometimes, we look way out there and decide where we think we should go, and create our own path, generally not a good idea.  Sometimes we make a choice that is not the best, and we start off on a wrong direction.  Thankfully God is creative and innovative.  And as we keep looking for the bread crumbs, with the help of that Spirit of truth, God will nudge us where we need to go. 

Sometimes we may get a little off the path, and just need a gentle nudge.  Sometimes we may get way off the path, and God may, as the innovator, may have to nudge us less gently…. Or God may even change destinations for us.  I think that’s possible.  Plan A becomes plan B (I think I am on Z5)

Sometimes, it is really confusing, because we have gotten ourselves in a place where it seems that there are only bad choices.  That there is no way forward.  But God can lead us to the least “bad”, least damaging choice, and soon we will be on our way again.

And again, and this is what is cool

Not just that God is placing the breadcrumbs

God is in us, directing our eyes, our thoughts, our being, to the breadcrumbs.  God is helping us pick that right next choice.

And this is all in the context of God’s amazing love.  His scandalous love.  God never gives up on us

Ever.  Its better than that, he never thinks of it that way.. God just loves us…period.  And works to help us find ourselves, and our path.  God is always there, or rather here, in side us.  Loving, prompting guiding.

I often say, when talking about the Bible… that the Spirit in us interfaces with the Spirit in the Word, and it comes alive.  If moves from being God’s word, to being  God’s word to us !!!

If we are willing to listen carefully to the voice of God, to the powerful influence of God’s Spirit in us, as it informs our heart, then we will interact with life in a new way. God will use life itself to speak to us.  And then we will find truth, wisdom.  We will find our path

And no matter how torturous that path may be at times, no matter how often we will seem to have hit a dead end.  No matter how often we hit spots where there seem to be not good choices,  God will love us.  And guide us.  And we will find our way to the sea

To that place of peace.

That is what this passage promises.  Peace

A sense of being who and what, and where we are supposed to be….

What an amazing gift, this peace

Because it means, that ultimately, as Jesus says over and over and over again

We do not have to be afraid!

We are not hopeless

We are not helpless

We are not trapped

We are not doomed to make the same mistakes over and over again

We are not defined by our failure….

Instead we can follow the breadcrumbs

We can let the Spirit of Truth show us the breadcrumbs of God

And, as Paul puts it…

Forget what is past, and press on, press on

What makes a good life?

What makes a good life

We celebrated the life of my brother-in-law today

Born and raised in Wallowa County, and an really nice guy, he was well loved

and the church was packed, more than packed.....

He was touted as a man who, though smaller in stature, was a great man

and he was...

which is what this blog is about today.  What makes for a great life?  What makes a great person.

It was a cool service.  I was calm and cool too, until the slides.

And then the tears came.

And I thought about Dan.....and what made him special

for he was special

a person who humbles me.

Dan was caring.  He really did care about other people, and he focused on them

He was giving.  He would do most anything for anybody

He loved his wife, my sister.  Was there relationship perfect?  No!  Was it good?  Yes!

They gave to each other.  They adapted.  It was a good thing

He loved his kids.  Dave and Rob were blessed to have a superb dad

who played with them, care for them, teased them, was there for them

He loved his grand kids

He loved God

He lived in the moment, and was free to play!  My did he play!

He smiled, a lot

He was a presence 

Words are inadequate.  But this was a special guy

I will miss him.

And this is what I will take away from his life.

It is what is inside that counts.

Dan didn't care much about outward success

When buffeted by life, he smiled

He seemed to understand that the power comes from within

that the Christ in him was the most important thing, and if he had that inner connection with God, nothing else counted.

External success, no big deal

External pain and failure.   Not a big deal

But that inner connection.

Finding the Christ within.... everything

And so when ALS ravaged his body, he smiled

When the rains didn't nurture the crops, he smiled

Thank you Dan, for teaching me, that the secret is indeed this, Christ in us!

Rest in peace

Thoughts about love

Well it is Valentines Day.  Its a day when we cannot help but think about love, because we almost have no choice.  TV ads push the day, and prompt us to "show our love" through everything from diamonds, to chocolate (ok that might make some sense) to life insurance policies.

But I sometimes wonder if we even know what love is all about?  Frankly it can all be pretty confusing.  And then there are those for whom love has seemed very elusive.  Women for whom Valentines day has been a day when men who have dominated and minimized them give, mostly in a quid pro quo, "and now that I have been nice to you, this is what I expect from you," kind of way.  Women, and men, who have no one on this day whom they can call "My Valentine."  Nothing like being in a sea of overdone sentimentality to feel your aloneness. 

Love is a tricky thing. Even those of us who have people in our lives who love us, and whom we love, know that this is true.  As I have mentioned before in this blog, the Greeks couldn't wrap the concept of love up in just one word.  They needed four.  Storge, natural affection that comes when we are connected in, lets say, a family.  Phileo, the state of really connecting with another due to common values and beliefs.  Eros, the love of Valentines day, erotic love.  And agape, the kind of love demonstrated and lavishly given by God.  

The thing we have to remember that all of these are love.  The love we have for sons and daughters.  The love we have for people in our church.  That romantic love we have for those unique and special people in our lives that sends us out to buy chocolate.  And of course that value giving love modeled by God.  All of them.  It is this full range of love that brings meaning into our lives.  We need them all.  Valentines day focuses on the one that is the most transient, and probably shortest lived of all.  This is "the feeling we feel when we feel like we are going to get a a feeling we never felt before."  Perhaps is it mostly hormones.  But when this part of love can be combined with friendship, and a real commitment to give to the other (not just take), and with that kind of natural affection that comes when people have been connected a long time.  Well, then love takes on a whole new shape.

I hope, that I can be, in the lives of the people I love, a person who is present with  the full width and depth of love.  That my model for love can be that of the Father in the story of the prodigal son.  That when I see a friend coming, a child coming, a love coming down the road to greet me.  No matter where they have been, no matter what they have done, that I can run and greet them and say, "Ah, this is one I love!  One I value and treasure.  You are amazing and wonderful!  Thank you for being in my life.  Here, have some chocolate!"

Thank you God for loving me that way

Thank you to all of you who are in my life

Happy Valentines Day

Running on empty

I have been thinking about emptiness.  That emptiness that comes when we have driven ourselves too hard, too long.  When we have worked, and played, and hurried – when we have given, and related, and studied, and struggled, and parented to the point that we have run out of resources . . . and are fast becoming “crispy critters”

About the raw emptiness that comes when we ignore the danger signals -  frustration, despair, and tiredness - and just keep on. . . keep striving and struggling until we stagger, and stumble, and sometimes, tragically, even fall – flat on our faces, and come to a complete stop.

TS Eliot once described this condition in a remarkable way.  He wrote

The endless cycle of idea and action,

Endless invention, endless experiment

Bring knowledge of words, and ignorance of The Word

All our knowledge brings us near to our ignorance,

All our ignorance brings us nearer to death,

But nearness to death no nearer to God

Where is the life we have lost in the living?

Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?

Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

Where is the life we have lost in living?  The wisdom we have lost as we are besieged not only by tasks, but by input.  Good question.  What has happened when we end up without passion, or vision, or strength - dried up and withered – when we have a void at the center of our souls.

The modern American experience! 

It is a condition we as humans cannot tolerate.  “Nature abhors a vacuum” we are told.  So does the human soul.  And so in our emptiness we seek to be filled.  We reach out, often desperately, looking for ways to be filled, to satisfy the emptiness within. 

We reach out to other people, to husbands, wives, children and friends.  But it doesn’t work. We don’t get filled, we get frustrated, because all too often they are empty too.  And what we have is two empty people trying to suck the last bit of life and vitality out of one another.  I read an author a while put it beautifully.  “You can’t love out of need, you need to love out of fullness.”  Same thing is true of so many of the other things we reach out to.  Jobs, success, “things”, causes.  We think our job will help, a promotion will help.  But if the key thing is, missing, again, those things won’t work.  We can have a wonderful car, a great house, a new carpet so deep we have to tie a bell on the baby, the perfect job, and we can still be empty.

What ultimately happens is that sometimes we find ourselves in a terrifying downward spiral.  For in our emptiness, in our wild searchings, we begin to lose control.  Then tragically we get controlled.  Those things we have reached out to in our quest for fullness begin to dominate us.  As depleted as we are we find ourselves at the mercy of the world around us. The people, the situations, the roles, the possessions we thought would rescue us begin to run our lives.  And often, all too often, that is not good. 

I like the way Paul puts in Romans 12:2.  The world begins to “squeeze us into its mold.”  Being empty we have no strength to resist.  And we begin to live out our empty condition.  And one day we wake up and look at ourselves in the mirror and say “who is this person?”  Eeeeew!

So, what is the solution?  What is the one thing that can create that sense of inner fullness that makes our lives different?  How can we reach out in love and have that work, really work?  How can we fulfill our chosen role in the world, and have that be truly meaningful?  How can we live so that our possessions are tools we use, rather than burdens that control us?

The solution is God.  More specifically the solution is God in us.  The solution is the Spirit.

Let us go back to the words of Jesus to the disciples.  He knows the disciples are troubled, scared, and empty.  He knows that left on their own they will make a mess of things.  Jesus has already told the lead disciple, Peter, that he was going to fail and deny him, not once, not twice, but three times.  That was just a palate pleaser of what could and would go wrong if the disciples went out there and tried to move forward on their own.

So he says to them:  (John 14:23-24)  "If anyone loves me, that person will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. . . . (John 14:26-27)  and the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”

This means the key to fullness is not out there, anywhere.  It is in here, inside us.  Because of how we may at times feel, we as God’s people are never truly empty.  For we have an incredible resource within.  That is what Jesus was trying to tell his disciples.  “I will not leave you orphans, alone, empty.  On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you

“I am in you.”  Think about that.  Christ in the person of the Spirit dwells in us.  He is present in the form of that one he calls the “parakletos.”   My bible translates that word as “counselor”.  In the most literal sense it means “the one called alongside…the one who will journey with you.”    The Spirit bring us a sense of God’s presence

He is present in the  “pneuma” , which is another word for the Spirit.  His breath, his life power, for that is what pneuma means, now resides in us.  The Spirit is the power of God, in us.

And what does this Spirit do?  Well, according to this discourse, it teaches.  “It will teach you all things and remind you of what I have said.”  Remember, we are all too often dazed and confused.  The Spirit gives us much needed guidance, direction, focus.

And all this gives us  peace.  Makes it so we are not always unsettled, dissatisfied.  Empty

And this sense of “peace” gives us a sense of safety so we do not have to be afraid.  Jesus concluded his comments with these words – do not be afraid. Let’s face it, fear really messes things up.  It makes us defensive, greedy, angry, closed, irrational, obsessive… I can’t think of enough adjectives to describe the impact of fear.

So, as the inner presence of God that guides us, and gives us peace and security, the Spirit – bottom line - enables us to live life. . . and it gives us the freedom t0 find our true selves

Sam Keen in his book “To A Dancing God” writes about the impact of allowing the Spirit to dance in our hearts. . . “I have discovered”, he says, “a new dimension of freedom and potency .  I have had to switch from seeming myself as a quasi-determined victim to seeing myself as a responsible agent. With this change has come a sense that the future is open.”

When we are filled we are free to go with God

We are free to be loving people, people who can make a difference

When we are filled the future is full of potential… so much is possible. . . 

More than we can ask or imagine

As people who are filled, we have love to give

As people who are filled, we have joy to express

As people who are filled we have healing to offer

As people who are filled we have peace to impart

Fullness and emptiness cannot exist together

And fullness changes everything!  It changes our lives.

The future is open

I like to close with some words from Paul, in Ephesians chapter 3.  He offers a prayer for the Ephesians.  It is the Perfect prayer for us

I pray that out of his glorious riches God may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge — that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

A roadmap for life

Many many many many years ago I was part of a singing group at Whitman College called "the New Freedom Singers"  Back in those days the contemporary Christian music "thing" was just emerging, and in our group, as well as at the Seeker meetings on campus we would sing some of the "new stuff."

This past week, as I have dealt with some difficult things, including the death of my wonderful Brother-In-Law Dan, one particular song has kept drifting through my head.  We sang this song a lot in those days.  And I hadn't thought of it for a long time.  

But it has wandered uninvited, but not unwelcome, into my mind a lot this past week.  The words go like this.

 I am the Light of the World
You people come and follow me.
If you follow and love, You'll learn the mystery
Of what you were meant to do and be.

1. When the song of the angels is stilled.
When the star in the sky is gone.
When the kings and the shepherds have found their way home.
The work of Christmas is begun!

2. To find the lost and lonely one,
To heal that broken soul with love,
To feed the hungry children with warmth and good food,
To feel the earth below the sky above!

3. To free the prisoner from his chains,
To make the powerful care,
To rebuild the nations with strength and goodwill,
To call a man your brother everywhere.

4. To bring hope to every task you do,
To dance at a baby's new birth,
To make music in an old man's heart,
And sing to the colors of the earth!

Maybe, if I were running a political campaign, this was be my theme song.

But I do know that there is great hope in the idea, that as I connect with God, as I find the God in me

I will understand ever more clearly who I am meant to be (that is always a puzzle to me), and what I am meant to do (I am also clueless there).  And I do know that I appreciate the clear map presented here.  i am to try, as best I can, to find, and heal, and feed, and free.  I am called to bring hope, to make music, and sing!

Multiplying Jesus! Ah, the audacity!

John 14 is an intriguing passage, a challenging passage because there is more stuff in here than I know what to do with.  But I have to tell you, the verse that really gets to me, actually the verse that bugs me, because I can’t get my head around it, is verse 12. “ Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”

Now let’s put this verse in the context of the moment in which Jesus spoke it.  This Passover dinner has been a ridiculously powerful time.  The big news?  Jesus has told the disciples that he is going to die.  I am sure, after the amazing display of Christ power they had just experienced, the raising of Lazarus, this is not what the disciples expected.   Here they were, ready for some strategic planning.  Ready to hear how Jesus is going to “take out” the Romans, or transform the religious system of Israel.  But instead Jesus says to them, in terms of my earthly life, this is the end.  I am going to be put to death.

They are understandably upset.  And Jesus tells them, “Don’t be upset. Yes, I am going away, but if I go away, I am going to come back,  I will come back to be IN YOU.  I want to point out the phrase “IN YOU”.  Notice he did not say WITH you.   Jesus is with us always.  We know that from the scriptures.  God in Jesus is always with us, in love, forgiveness, and acceptance.   This in fact is where that “footsteps on the beach” thing comes from.  People often imagine Jesus walking with them through life.  But the idea of Jesus being with us is meager and anemic next to the reality of what Jesus says.  “I will be IN you”.

This is something much bigger, more powerful.  When we accept God’s acceptance.  When we realize that God is not only for us and with us, but in us, and turn inside, when we take the journey inward to the find the Christ in us, something gets  loose at our core, something wild, and powerful and amazing….

That something is the Spirit… with a capital S.  Not the human spirit, but the Spirit, the reality of the risen Christ.  That is an amazing gift!

Once a University student, engaged in a study, went around asking little children what they thought about Jesus.  One little boy had a cool answer.  “If I asked Jesus if he loved me,” he said, “probably wouldn’t answer me.  He would Jesus send me another kid to play with, he does things like that.”  When Jesus left he sent another…  Let’s not get all wrapped up worrying about the Trinity, or the whether we define the Spirit as Christ in us.  We just know that this is how Jesus put it.  “I am going away, but I will send another, the Spirit.”

And then he explains the impact this way, and this is what really gets my brain spinning.  I am going away, but I will send another.  And when this other comes and is in you, then you will be amazing, and wonderful people, because……The work I do, the Spirit will do

AND GREATER WORK THAN THE WORK I DO, WILL YOU DO…

Wow!

That is something I have trouble grasping.  I mean do I really believe that ?  That with the Spirit in us we will out do Christ when it comes to his work?

I guess the first thing we have to think about is that is “the work”.  I think a lot of times when we think of Christ and his ministry, all we think about the miracles.  But clearly, if this promise is true, that is not what Jesus is talking about!  Do you know anyone who has out Jesus’d Jesus when it comes to miracles?  I can’t think of one.

So what does it mean, “You shall do greater work”

I believe that the miracles were not the most important thing when it came to Christ’s ministry.  Think about the miracles.  None of them had any lasting impact really, except the last great miracle, Christ’s own resurrection.  He raised Lazarus again.  That was cool.  But ultimately what did that resurrection accomplish?  Gave Lazarus a few more years of taxes, and then, ultimately, he died.  Think about the multiplication of the loaves and fishes.  Amazing!!!  Cool.  Took a few fish and few loaves of bread and fed thousands.  But what happened the next day.  They were all hungry again.

What do miracles do?  Really?  What they did in Jesus time and do now is this… they express God’s love.  That is it.  In and through the miracles, God’s love is expressed.  And that is the work of Christ.  Love.  Jesus miracles were not as much about demonstrating power, as they were demonstrating love.

If you don’t believe me, think about the cross.  There Jesus was, on the cross.  The religious folks, the Pharisees stood below.  “Do a miracle!  Get yourself off that cross and we will believe in you!!!”  Jesus didn’t do it!  Just as he didn’t do miracles at the beginning of his ministry in order to establish himself as the Messiah.  Instead he died.  Instead he stayed on that cross, and took all the sin of the world on himself.  Instead he stayed on the cross to illustrate his extravagant love

Greater work… what Jesus was saying is that as people of the Spirit

We can out do Jesus in the work of love….

Now that kind of makes sense if you think about it.  As a physical being Christ could only love one person at a time.  During his ministry Jesus was only one person, only had one body….But now Christ is present in us.  In all of his people.  And together we are the Body of Christ now.  The same Spirit that was in Jesus, that same Spirit is now in us.  And now we, you and I, all of us together, are the Body of Christ.

And as the Body of Christ we have so much ability.  This is one way to think about it.  Christ was just one.  Let’s say there are 30 or 40 of us In my little church.  If the Spirit in in all of us… is 30 greater than 1?  If the Spirit, the power of God is flowing through 30 of us, do we have a chance to do amazing works of love in this world?  Yes.  That is what Jesus was saying.  I am going to be back.  I am going to be in you.  And through you I am going to love people…

You are going to multiply me, in terms of the ministry of love.

This world needs Christ’s love, and it is our job, not to do miracles, necessarily, but to do what we can.  Which may be nothing more than seeing others, seeing their pain, their wounds, and caring, having compassion, reaching out a helping hand.

I mention seeing because that is always the first step… its also something very hard to do.  Tony Campolo tells of a time he was in Haiti.  He was sitting down for a meal in a nice restaurant with some church friends.  They were seated by a window, and just as they got their food Tony looked over and saw three very dirty, tattered, and obviously starving, Haitian boys, faces pressed against the window, looking at their food.  The waiter saw the situation right away.  He came over, pulled down the blinds, and said… ‘don’t them the bother you, enjoy your meal”

We have to see, and we have to let what we see bother us.  We can’t pull down the shade.  How many of you can tell me 1 John 3: 16?  16 Most Christians know John 3:16… but not this one.  It goes this way “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”

Does that inform our lives?  It should.  That is how the body of Christ does ministry.  It loves.  It does what it can.  We are not just talking money here.  That can be part of it, but it is way more….We are talking seeing, and responding.  We are talking loving in practical ways.  A load of wood.  A casserole.  Spending time.  Listening to someone in pain.

This is not just good works.  Because we are not doing it on our own.  Remember.  It takes the Spirit. It is as if Jesus, in the Spirit is loving through us.... BUT

If we are full of the Spirit

If we are connected with the god within

If we find ourselves in the context of the love God’s presence brings… find our true selves,

Then we can be the body of Christ now

We can love for Christ.  We can do the work of Christ. 

And that loving has a lasting impact.  Why?  Because when we love people for God.  When we share God’s love, ultimately we are (this is the way I think about it), loving people into a relationship with God.  And thus loving them into the kingdom, and thus giving them a place nestled in God’s love,  forever.

"I can guarantee this truth: Those who believe in me will do the things that I am doing. They will do even greater things”

Friends, we need to learn to trust, going back to the beginning of the chapter, the God who lives within.  We have to go inside, and find that God, and in the context of our God’s love find ourselves, and then we go out… and we do the work of Christ.  We love people to God.

 I am back to “Wow!”  How about you? 

There it is!

Where did it go?
I know I just had it!
It was right here, in my hand!

But now it is gone
that cup
streaming
caffeinated joy
just screaming to be consumed

Now it's my glasses
I cannot leave without them
I have looked everywhere
All the old places
where I put them

So much of life is spent
looking
most moments I am looking for something
love, joy, hope
meaning?

Why am I here?
I know I understood that just a second ago
but now?
its gone

Ah there it is
sitting among the books still steaming
right next to my glasses

Ah there it is
in the first rays of the sun
kissing the mountain
with gold
molten joy!
___________________________________________________


Ps 136
1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
      His love endures forever.
2 Give thanks to the God of gods.
      His love endures forever.
3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
      His love endures forever.
4 to him who alone does great wonders,
      His love endures forever.
5 who by his understanding made the heavens,
      His love endures forever.
6 who spread out the earth upon the waters,
      His love endures forever.
7 who made the great lights —
      His love endures forever.
8 the sun to govern the day,
      His love endures forever.
9 the moon and stars to govern the night;
      His love endures forever.

Feeling alone

I lay there in the dark

searching

roaming through the far reaches of my self

for some sense

that I am not alone!

There are times when the solitude

is simply too much

I feel like a house empty

a presence is lacking

love is lacking

I miss that intangible 

link that tangibly exists

with another

through words, and touch

and that heart full sense of other

that fills the souls and blossoms forth

in joy, and hope, and expectation

but sometimes there is nothing but a hurtful emptiness

and I am like something torn

something unbalanced

like an organism gone wrong

alone

and so I search

knowing that to find love I must first find myself

I must meet myself

with compassion

and mourn that howling emptiness

and then embrace

myself and in the warmth

of that embrace

find hope

 _______________________________________________________________

 John 14:26-27
 But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. 27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.