On Hiatus

In Bermuda? No,wish we were. Still pain free? No- In the hospital instead. Once again, I am being reminded that life can change in an instant. A week ago, I thought I would go to the ER to check out a problem I'd been having while I was actually having it. Here I am, a week later, still here and awaiting surgery. Our bodies are "fearfully and wonderfully made..." and it's a wonder that they work as well as they do.

The people who care for patients are grace-filled gifts of God. I admire their devoted service even in the midst of the hurricane. They were here and they stayed the night. One nurse convinced a friend from NC to come babysit the children while she tended to her responsibilities here. Medicine is a calling and I've seen commitment in every department. I have an opportunity to reflect back to them the goodness that I see.

My stay has been a blessing in that I have felt great love surrounding me at every turn. My wonderful Paul is my constant support as we share another one of life's adventures.

Rejoice always, says the Apostle Paul. When things aren't going well, that's hard, but there's love to be found in every circumstance, even if we have to supply it ourselves. That is something that changes the face of anything.

Pain Free

In getting up from the sofa to come to the computer and begin to write, I realized that the pain in my legs that I usually experience in that process, wasn't there. I had had an easy night, too, flipping over from side to side without having to gingerly push my body with aching leg muscles. I had walked up the stairs and hardly noticed the effort. For the last 15 hours, I have been pain free.

What a gift! Medicine is the tool, but God is the one who gives me the grace to be grateful for the respite. To those of us who have had a broken bone and been unable to use a limb, its eventual healing makes the miracle of motion very obvious. To me, to be able to put one foot in front of the other without noticing the effort makes me aware of how amazing locomotion actually is. Maybe it takes absence to notice presence and be grateful for it.

There is so much about living - the way we move and breathe and exist; about our relationships - the way we communicate and love and feel empathy; about our experiences in society - the way we interact as cultures, genders and age groups, that I have taken for granted. Today, I won't.

Disappointment

Last week I went to Duke University Medical Center for an appointment that had been scheduled four months ago. The purpose was to discuss some ongoing problems that have stumped my local doctors and I was impatient to get there and hear some insight from the great "expert."

There was none to be had. The physician was distracted, rushed and unprepared. In the week since the trip, the promised referrals and paperwork have not appeared, even after several follow-up inquiries on several fronts. There has been no forward progress. I seem to have meandered down some side road, instead.

I've been asking myself how this could have happened because the entire visit had been lifted to God since the start. I, and so many others, have prayed for this doctor since April and asked for wisdom for him and blessing for me. Yet, the outcome, from my perspective at least, is a disappointment.

Even as I write this, however, I know that my questions replicate those asked by pray-ers throughout the millenia. When people have their expectations dashed, we all ask: "Where is God in this?" The hiccup that got in the way of my positive outcome was inefficiency and ineptitude; for others, it may be a far more serious appearance of evil or tragedy. In the end, though, the question is the same: "What happened to the prayers that went up to God about this?"

The underlying question is actually a more basic one: "Why bother praying?"

The answer that strikes me this morning sounds rather prosaic: "Does anyone have a better idea?"

Prayer is a positive, life-giving force that we send forth into the void. It unites those who pray and this changes the world. While I was praying for the Duke physician, love was directed into his life. I don't know how this has affected the man he's been and the decisions he's made since April, but I do know that there is enough stress and negativity in anyone's life that something positive can't hurt.

As for me, the experience of praying for a particular answer might have narrowed my insight into how I might be healed through other means. In expecting the Duke doc to be source, I was making my own diagnosis, when, in fact, the problem may not be in his area of expertise at all. Being disappointed at the outcome is like being annoyed that the lamp doesn't come on when I've actually flipped the switch for the overhead fan. A more fruitful prayer might have been for generalized healing, not a good experience at Duke.

Which brings me to the question that is really the most basic of them all: "What do I really want to be the outcome of my prayer?"

Ultimately, I believe, all of us want to be happy and at peace within ourselves. By praying for specific answers that we think will lead to that, we set ourselves up for failure. God respects free will and a prayer that involves someone else's responses to God's leading is problematic.

Inner peace in the midst of the difficulties we face would seem to be a more effective prayer. God can work with us directly and there are no intermediaries to foul up God's design. So, the better prayer for me is to be at peace with whatever state of health my body is in today while, at the same time, relying on the evidence that Jesus went about healing, not refusing to heal.

As God said to Jeremiah:

For I am mindful of the plans I have for you...plans for your good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

Disappointment, then, becomes my choice, not God's.

I like His vision better.

Back Flip

When I was a little girl, I loved to do what today would be called gymnastics, except back then, there weren't any lessons or trainers or facilities full of equipment. I was reduced to climbing up the molding around the arch that separated our dining room from the living room and doing somersaults down the front lawn. And back bends.

Ah yes, I could bend over backwards and touch the floor behind me. Now that athletic females - including my own granddaughters - are crowding the sports facilites, I've longed to do those back bends, flips and jumps on a trampoline. Yesterday, I got my chance at a setup at the local Mall.

I was there to give the world's greatest grandchildren a chance to have their flying moment, but when I got there, I wasn't 64 anymore. I was 14 and my body could do anything and my muscles and health problems didn't exist. What was I saving myself for?

As they strapped me into the harness, I wasn't nervous, just thtrilled. At last I was going to get a chance to break the gravity of earth and soar effortlessly through the air. I was giddy. I jumped...and jumped again...and soon I was higher than the second story of the building. I felt free and happy and very young.

And the back flip? A bit different from a back bend, but as I brought my knees up to my chest and dropped my head back, it suddenly happened. I was over! I had done it - up, back and over. I mentally crossed off another wish on my Bucket List of Life.

The moral of the story? Do it now. Whatever it is that will give you pleasure and allow you to experience life to its fullest, give it a try. I might have hurt myself as I bounced up and down and rolled my arms in a 360 degree arc, but I've put up with a lot of pain doing things that were a whole lot less fun. The "what if's" are a cautious way to live life, but there's a lot left on the table at the end. I think the "why not's? allow us to feel and experience the potential within.

T.S. Eliot wrote about J. Alfred Prufrock who measured out his life "in coffee spoons." Suppose we chose to fill a tea cup or even a Big Gulp instead? I don't want to reach the end of my days, how few or many that they may be, and say "I wish I had...". I want to be able to look God in the eye and say "thank you - how good it was!"

Sunflowers

There's no mistaking a sunflower. It shoots its way into the air and everyone knows it's there. Its stalk is strong and its seedy face is turned so that all passersby notice its presence. A sunflower strides through life; it doesn't creep.

Other flowers are more sedate. They might be delicate or low to the ground. They have their seeds deep inside and tread softly through the fields of our dreams.

Still others walk a path between the two, not calling attention to themselves, but providing a contrast so that their own beauty becomes evident to all who look.

In the garden of our existence, we, like the flowers, all have our part to play. Sunflowers that are planted under low hanging branches have to twist and bend to find their sun and get mangled in the process. Hothouse flowers brought out into the elements suffer blight and are full of holes. Bushes that live in the shadow of a larger plant remain scrawny and thin.

Jesus said that He came that we may have abundant life and the best way to achieve this is to be fully who we are. God created us with wonderful talents and personality patterns that were there at our birth. Trying to become something else just means that we are a mediocre knockoff of another plant in the garden. The place we've been given to occupy is meant to accommodate who we are - and all of our potential. God is delighted when we fill out the space he's allotted to us.

Be a sunflower; be a rose bush; be a pine tree, but above all, be who God made you to be.

New Life

This blog has reached a milestone: this post is #100. When I started last June, I thought I'd do this for "awhile." Who knew? The Spirit always arrives in unexpected ways.

My unexpected experience at the Wellness Center at the B&B near Charleston continues to change my life. I returned on Tuesday for another Reiki session and some inner healing work with Diane. It's amazing to say that in three hours one's life can change, but mine did. I have a new commitment to life and an understanding of the part that my subconscious has played in my own health.

I have always shied away from the idea that I could be contributing to my body's frailty in some way. That kind of responsibility was too much to accept. Yet the more Diane and I talked, the more I could see that I was using various symptoms over the years to cope with deep psychic pain. This line of thinking links our minds and bodies and explains the one in terms of the other. We are a system of systems and it's unlikely that our minds can isolate patterns of thinking and inner pain from affecting our bodies. Pain seeks a release and if it is ignored, it will find its own outlet.

Diane led me to face the emotions that lay at the base of my distorted view of life and the inner healing session culminated in a choice to accept and love the self that God made me to be. It sounds so simple, but it was powerful.

I played a game as a young child that serves as a wonderful metaphor for what happened with Diane. The game was called "Under the Blanket." My friends put a blanket over me and then they kept asking me to to pass out to them something that I didn't need. I gave up a shoe and then the other shoe, a sock and so on until I was down to my shirt and shorts. I remember thinking that if stripping was the price of their friendship, I wasn't going to play their game. I stood up and took off the blanket and everyone cheered. The blanket, you see, was the thing I didn't need.

Towards the end of my inner healing session, I saw myself tightly enclosed in an L-shaped box. Being in that box is akin to being under the blanket. My emotional pain had demanded portions of myself for its expression over the years and I had given up my uterus, a knee, my thymus gland, and various muscle and joints. The ultimate demand, of course, would be my life.

In the box in my mind, my torso could move a bit, but my legs were stretched out in front of me and I couldn't move them. That made me feel frustrated and annoyed. All of a sudden I pushed out the walls of the box and stood up. I wasn't going to be "boxed in" any longer. The box was the one thing I do not need: my fears and the compensations I've made for not feeling worthy.

I feel so much freer today. I know that my body will be a good barometer for how well I am coping with my own and others' expectations. I also know that my life is much more in my control than I had previously thought. This is God's gift: "I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly."

To the abundant life!

Connections

Often we talk about illness being genetic, but my experience at the Charleston Wellness Center added an additional dimension to that reality. Not only can we inherit a damaged gene or two, but we are also prey to the attitudes, fears and pain that pass from family to family as the generations pass. The wounds of our great grandparents can be as present in our own time as they were in the past because of the stories we share and the attitudes we unthinkingly absorb.

For instance, my father’s ancestors fled the potato famine in Ireland. My mother’s people left a deprived situation in Norway. In both cases, there were many mouths to feed and finding enough food for them all was a daily concern. The feelings involved must have covered the gamut from fear of want to guilt over not providing enough to shame over wanting more when others still had to be fed. To them, food was an enemy to be conquered; food was the answer to the problems of life.

My extended family and I all have digestive problems and the attitudes we have are rooted in these experiences. In our ancestors’ homes, food was always associated with tense dinner times or guilt ridden conversations. Food was the barometer that measured the quality of their relationships: providing it, eating it and giving it up as a sacrifice were signs of love. In these households, food was not nourishment for our bodies, it was legal tender. Every time we, their progeny, eat and drink, these attitudes are present in our emotional genes.

As I’ve thought about my connections to all those who have gone before me, I feel deep compassion and a strong link to each of them. They were doing the best that they could and each person in the chain bears the wounds that came with the trying. I am a product of these individuals, but I have the choice now to continue to internalize their fears or bring healing and forgiveness to them.

I’ve chosen to do the latter, but as I entered into their pain through prayer, the list of people I was remembering grew longer and longer. Each person had touched another person who had touched another who had touched another and I soon realized that I would wind up praying for the world. We are all connected to each other and because we are all in God, we are all one.

I think this is what is meant by Jesus taking on the sins of the world. He saw through all our poor choices to the pain, guilt and terror of everyone who ever lived and who will ever live and loved us all. He reached into our heart's pain and cried out on our behalf: “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” and brought pure, unconditional love and forgiveness to us all.

We can look back on the legacy we’ve inherited and do the same. We can stop passing on the pain by entering into it and facing it and healing it. This is more than an intellectual exercise. In our empathy, we unite with those who have gone before us. Those in our past become present and we make room for God to bring us peace.

God's Surprises

Every once in awhile, God intervenes in our lives in an amazing way. I call these "god-incidences" because I don't believe in the other kind. This one started with a call from hotels.com that interrupted an otherwise delightful dinner at a restaurant called "High Cotton" in Charleston, SC. We were supposed to stay at a hotel in a nearby suburb and they were calling to tell us that the place had overbooked and our reservation was canceled.

They called around, but there was no availability anywhere. "American Idol" was in town! They were doing auditions for the East Coast and people had come in droves to be insulted or chosen. When the .com agent could find nothing, he turned us over to a specialist who handles difficult cases. After making another slew of calls, she found a B&B and we were finally set for the night.

It was when we looked at the hotel's web site that we realized that, indeed, "everything happens for the good...". The B&B was a Wellness center and the proprietors practiced a stress-reducing, inner healing technique called Reiki. With all the health issues that I have, this seemed to be a Divine gift that I would never have gone on my own to find.

When we arrived, our proprietress was as aware of the serendipitous nature of our meeting as I. Our conversation immediately went deep and I found myself sharing my life with this stranger. Our session was wonderfully freeing and I saw a pattern in my illnesses that I hadn't noticed before. Better yet, I was able to see that my attitude and thoughts have contributed to my health and she helped me to see that I had more control over what is happening in my body than I had thought.

There's much more to this that I want to share, but I'll save that for another post. Meanwhile, as today's scripture readings attest, "in everything, give thanks."

Carousel of Life

My life is rather unsettled at the moment. Our new pastor is making changes and he hasn't collaborated with the parishioners nor has he explained his actions. Things just happen and practices that have been a part of the identity of this church for 40 years have simply disappeared. It is a most difficult time.

When life isn't going quite the way we would wish, what's the next step? Well, for me, it's going to God and asking for some direction. It may come through a thought, a comment, a song, a scripture verse or some "chance" encounter or event, but I trust that God will, at some point, provide what's needed. While at chuch earlier tonight, the answer was immediate: the choir began to sing "To everything, there is a season..."

The lyrics have been going through my head ever since, but not the hymnal version. Instead, I'm hearing the one sung by The Byrds back in 1965:

To everything (turn!, turn!, turn!)
There is a season (turn!,turn!, turn!)

It's the instruction to "Turn!" that sticks with me. In my mind, I see myself on a carousel and as it's going round and round, I am leaning over the edge trying to grab at something passing by. "Wait! Wait - go back!" I want to say, but the carousel goes on and on as I look backward at what is retreating from my view. The prompt to "Turn!" reminds me that I must turn around and face the future instead.

The truth is, of course, that life is always moving on and to try to ossify it in one place or another is to go against its nature. In the Acts of the Apostles, St. Paul relates the story of his conversion and quotes Jesus as saying: "Saul...it is useless for you to kick against the goad." The gist of his meaning is pretty clear, but I've never known the exact definition of a goad. Turns out, it's a cattle prod. So the instruction is, once again, very clear: "Move on!"

My church is different. Right now, other people might be saying, "my job is different" or "my new spouse doesn't do what my last one did" or "my illness means that my life can never be the same."  All of us have the same choice: we can decide that only the past is good enough or we can try to appreciate what new strengths the new situation brings.

I know which choice is the loving one. I know which choice is the one that makes the most sense. I even know which choice I want to make. I'm just not there yet. With God's grace, maybe tomorrow. As for tonight, I'll sing myself to sleep: To everything (Turn! Turn! Turn!) There is a season (Turn! Turn! Turn!)...

The Taffy Heart

We all have friends and family members who live in our hearts in a way that is so real that we feel totally connected. It is as if when they move, we quiver or if they reach out an arm, we are there. In that heart-space is a oneness that belies our separateness; in that heart-space, we recognize that we are bound by a love that is at the core of who we are.

Right now, I see this tug of the heart playing out in a very public way because yesterday was moving day for the priests of our diocese. My parish has a new pastor who has been torn from a congregation many hours away and our retiring pastor of 17 years is moving on to his new assignment. Fr. Jim's presence lingers even as we change the picture on the wall of the Commons to welcome Fr. Chuck. Hearts across Virginia are like emotional taffy which is being pulled to bridge the physical distance brought by the change.

We all experience this tug of the heart when we love someone. To the other is where our thoughts stray; the other is where our feelings exist and our desires live. When we love, the unity is palpable. We may think we love separately, each with our own special someones, but in that experience we recognize that same love occurring all around us: Love and the world loves with you. We are all drops of water in the same ocean.

If God is Love, then it is God who is joining us. The omnipresent God is the web of our existence. We can't move without someone else being affected. We are connected, a cosmic body, joined by love and moving towards our common end. We are like a planet caught in its gravitational journey around its mother star. We are part of that gravity, all drawn to the center, to the God who keeps all of us in motion. To separate ourselves from each other or from God is like Saturn trying to break away from its rings. It is impossible; we are joined by a web of love, even if, at times, we don't feel it.

When we are hurt or angry at others, we fool ourselves into thinking that we can drive away the pain by severing our ties, but the gravity is too strong. The more we push away, the more the other is imprinted within us because the struggle is so great. We are trying to fling ourselves into space, but breaking the bonds of love is impossible; the person will always be with us in our memories and in our pain.

God is our core and there is no place where God begins or ends. That makes you me and me you and all of us are one in God. That means the panhandler who wants money for a bottle as well as Mother Teresa and the Dali Lama. In our empathy, we can change the world by spreading love through the underground connection deep within even if it is thwarted in the visible sphere.

The Kingdom comes down to this: Faith that the web of Love is true, Hope that it will make a difference and Love that stretches like taffy to touch all wherever they may be.

Moment of Grace

Yesterday, I read similar passages from two books. They both centered on the necessity of going through hard times because after a failure or suffering, people are able to identify with the frailties of others and accept them with humility and love. In that process, we lose faith in our ability to conquer ourselves and we rely instead on the grace of God to do that for us. It is the first leg of any 12 step journey and it is what St. Paul recognized when he said "when I am weak then I am strong."

No one, of course, wants to go through the Good Fridays of our lives, even if we know that Easter Sunday follows. The pain, however, acts as a looking glass through which we are able to see the pain of others. When we reach out to try to ease it, the world becomes a more loving place.

What is true for people is also true for churches. The Body of Christ metaphor which describes the Christian bond throughout the world is more real than one would, at first, imagine. We often think of churches as institutions, but, in reality, they are really fleshy examples of their members' lives writ large. They reflect the narrative arc of a well written, three-act novel just as people do: connection, conflict and resolution.

On the worldwide stage, the Catholic Church is in Act Two of a very painful drama: pedophile priests. If the pattern holds true, on the other side of this crisis lies a humbled Church that is a more powerful sign of the unconditional love of Christ. This trauma will have destroyed the clericalism that has allowed people to be observers of their own spiritual dance rather than participants. Its members will have have been forced to reach deep and forgive a brother who differs from them only in the nature of his sin. The light of Christ will shine more brightly.

This is a pregnant moment in the lives of Catholic Christians. Once the administrative house is put in order, those in the pews have the choice of once again looking to the clergy to act as their intermediaries or standing beside them as each listens for the Spirit within. The priest as "other" sets everyone up for disappointment; the priest as "brother" acknowledges that he and we are partners in building the Kingdom that is to come.

Act Three has yet to be written - and the pen is in our hands.

The Social Contract

There was a story in the paper this week about organized groups of hackers who break into the computer systems of large organizations to steal or alter information. Many people are at risk because their passwords, identifying characteristics and other supposedly secure data are now in the hands of those who see themselves above the law.

The big question debated in an NPR radio interview was whether or not this is a crime. Hello out there - I thought a crime was "an action injurious to the public." Why is cybercrime being treated more like some sort of digital graffiti spree by bored teenagers than the serious threat to property and safety that it is? Why is the "boys will be boys " (with no excuses intended for girls) approach ever tolerated?

Modern peoples have entered into what John Locke called a "social contract" with each other. It is a decision to voluntarily give up some of our own freedom to do entirely as we wish in order to receive the larger benefit of living in a safe and supportive environment. We pledge not to rape women so that we ourselves might not be raped; we agree not to steal from our neighbors in order that our own property will not be threatened. It is in our self interest to create a safe and just society and so we put limits around our own behavior.

At the moment, the fabric of this agreement seems to be fraying. - more emphasis on the "unum" in our national motto than the "pluribus." The individual is so elevated that our ability to live peaceably together is ever harder to achieve. We talk glibly about our "carbon footprint," but neglect to consider the impact of our social footprint as well. How does the way we live affect the lives of those who are our neighbors in the community and the world?

The social footprint includes everything from how loud is the music we play to the demands we make upon the common water supply. All that we do touches the others involved in our social contract in some way. The problem is that many people are leaving bear tracks where bird imprints would be more appropriate.

The two greatest commandments, Jesus said, are to love God and love your neighbor. In other words, we are to walk through life with love. To love is to look over your shoulder at those following behind, to look down at your feet to see who might be beneath them and to look ahead to sweep away obstacles that might be in the path.

Love does not hack into the computers of others. Love remembers that we never walk alone.

Misconceptions

I met a woman over the weekend who has been away from mainstream Christianity for 30 years. It seems that she had problems with some of the doctrine. One of the issues she struggled with was the resurrection of the body. "I believe that the spirit moves on to something better," she said. "You've just described the resurrection of the body," my husband, Paul, replied.

In her childhood understanding of the faith, she had never grasped that the bodies we dwell in on earth are not the bodies that we live in when we die. The resurrected Jesus passed through walls and appeared and disappeared at will; our bodies will be something different as well. St. Paul says in 1 Corinthians. "the body that is sown...in weakness ...is raised in power."

The vision of the mortal seed giving birth to some kind of glorious immortality passed this lady by when she was a teenager. How sad that she has lived so long with a misunderstanding of what Christianity actually teaches.

I think we all probably live with misconceptions about how to live out the gospel. It's gone through many emphases over the years as people focused on one aspect or another. What is clear at the moment is that what was birthed in a vision of freedom and glory has wound up in a focus on "this vale of tears" and the need for us to "take up our cross" in order to follow Jesus.

What if the cross we take up is the one to which was nailed, as St. Paul says in Colossians 2:14, the law, "obliterating" its charges against us for all time?  Then, the cross Jesus offers is the victorious one, not the one of suffering, because He already bore that one for us.

I think that Jesus envisioned a far more powerful life for us than we believe we can live and therefore, we settle for far less than He wished. Our prayers and our hymns beg and plead for grace, mercy and forgiveness. What more can God do to demonstrate that we already have it? The God who does not live in time saved us from despair in the first century, is saving us today and will save us tomorrow. It is one ongoing "obliterating" experience.

If we don't believe in our own capacity in Christ to bring love to all and to experience God's peace, then we certainly can't achieve it. We've been given the ticket for the cruise, but it's up to us to say thank you and get on the boat.

Golfer Rory McIlroy, after having had a disastrous final round at the Master's, quoted Muhammad Ali: repetitive affirmations are the key to victory. McIlroy must have repeated "I will win the US Open" 100 times a day in the two months between the tournaments because that is exactly what he did. Not only did he win, but he won spectacularly, setting 12 records in the process. Belief in ourselves can be that powerful. Belief in our God and His provision for us can be even more so.

Our victory over sin and death has already been won; most of us, however, get stuck at the foot of the cross instead of in front of the empty tomb. We get caught up in the pre-Jesus picture of the human race instead of the cleansed and freed people who live the "abundant life" He came to give.

Perhaps we should be repeating 100 times a day the opening to the Letter to the Ephesians: "We have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavens." Then we might be able to live as if we meant it.

Diversity

Yesterday there were four cars ahead of me while I was stopped at a light and I noticed that they looked like a chess board. Side by side were two identical SUV's - one black, one white. Beyond them was a pair of nearly identical sedans, but this time, the one on the left was white and one on the right was black.

When I got to my destination, I parked and noticed that the pine tree in front of me was not one color, but two: the inner needles were green and the outer ones were gray. Next to it was a leafy bush whose mature leaves were dark loden and the new growth almost lime. I've been mulling over these contrasts ever since.

Clearly, our world is not monochromatic - not in its foliage, its manufactured products or its people. In everything there is contrast. We are not created to be the same. If we were, Adam would have been satisfied to simply make another buddy and not a woman.

We all spend our lives, though, trying to make others to be just like ourselves. We complain when friends or spouses don't have the same interests or reactions that we do. We judge people for dressing differently or expressing themselves in a way that sets them apart. We shun those whose behavior we don't condone. We willingly give away our freedom to decide for ourselves and follow the herd instead.

There are several scripture verses in which St. Paul chastises the various churches who have thrown away, as he says in Galatians, "the freedom we have in Christ. (Gal 2:4)" In frustration he chastises them for being taken over by rules made by humans: "Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!" (Col 2:21)
He rails against those who judge others by what they eat or drink or how they are trying to "earn favor with God" by observing special "days and months, seasons and years (Gal 4:10)."

He admits that "Such regulations indeed have the appearance of wisdom," but states that they don't help us control ourselves. It is the Christ within us who enables us to live and love and birth His Spirit into the world. Change comes from the inside, not imposed by a plethora of rules made by others on the outside.

Unity and sameness are not synonymous. Some religions, in their quest for oneness, have made sameness the criterion for accomplishing it. If that were a value, I believe nature would look different and so would we all. We are called, instead, to be united in a vision: love God and love our neighbor. The more rules we make as to how to accomplish the vision lead to disagreements and disunity. The more rules, the more controversy.

I would never call myself a libertarian - and I'm grateful for for many of the protections of the twenty first century - but I am beginning to chafe under the rules that keep popping up to direct our behavior. Both our churches and our nation are feeling the need to narrow our choices and monitor our actions. Whether it's fining a kid's lemonade stand for not having a permit or limiting who touches the communion vessels after the service, we seem to be at the mercy of others who are sure they know better than we how we should live.

I prefer the "freedom of the children of the God" (Rom 8:21).

Reach for the Light

Ten random thoughts in the middle of the night:

1. Every encounter we have is a choice to reach for the darkness or reach for the light. We can add to a person's feeling of self worth or diminish it.

2. A person sitting alone in the midst of others who are not is an invitation to bring that person into the circle of light.

3. The prayer at church this morning was for the Holy Spirit to "Come!"  Perhaps if we realized that the Holy Spirit is already here, we would use the power the Spirit has already brought.

4. A church becomes a community only when people choose to open themselves to one another. Knowing one another's name is the first step. Choosing to start a conversation is the second.

5. The best competition is when people try to outdo each other in kindness to each other.

6. People come into our lives for a reason: to honor them, to be honored by them or to discover where the walls are within us that keep us apart.

7. We are rich if we think we are and no matter how rich, if we think we are poor, we are.

8. There are more points of view than our own and they might even have merit.

9. Money runs the country - only if we keep silent in the face of the disruptive consequences of the profit motive.

10. When we choose to suffer pain, fear and disappointment alone, we shut out the presence of God.

Sweet dreams.

Liability vs. Responsibility

There was a drowning in our neighborhood recently and one rather disturbing thing happened: nothing. The friends of the victim did not shout or raise any kind of alarm when he failed to reappear after diving into the water. The 20 year old died only 15 ft from shore.

Perhaps even more distubing, however, is the community discussion about the incident that took place last night. It seems that the roving park attendant employed by the Homeowners Association made a statement on tv that he was sorry that he hadn't been there because he could have saved the young man. Neighbors were upset because saving people is not part of his job description and the association might be liable if he acted in a life guard capacity. In fact, having a flotation device at the pier is not an even an option because it would indicate that the homeowners were accepting some responsibility for what happens in the 60 acre lake. "This is not a swimming pool and we don't employ life guards," the Board President said.

Apparently the neighborhood would rather make the evening news as Alameda, CA did when fire and police looked on while Raymond Zack stood for an hour in the freezing water of San Franciso Bay and committed suicide. They weren't properly trained to save him, they told the press.

Doing nothing in the face of an emergency is still enough of a story that it's worthy of note, but apparently it is becoming policy and before long it won't be of much interest. At the same Homeowners meeting, a police officer stated that they cannot get involved in anything other than a felony in progress while on a break. They must call any other type of report in and await the arrival of their colleagues who are on duty. This reminds me of the rescue personnel in a New York bagel shop who stood by while a pregnant woman died. They were on a break, too, and apparently this means that they were no longer covered by the liability insurance policies that protect active duty responders.

The potential for liability is shaping our cultural values. What was once unthinkable is now becoming the law: inaction in the face of danger to another person is to be expected, not condemned. Apparently "Good Samaritans" are still able to come to another's rescue, but the people paid to do so and covered by insurance while they do, are bound by stringent rules that direct their availability and actions. We create this culture of caution by the instructions that we give to those we employ. Are we listening to ourselves???

This is leading nowhere good. If we can no longer depend on each other to watch our backs, we increase the danger to us all. The insurance companies are stipping us of the expectation of safety that is basic to a society. Out of fear of "liability," we are, instead, ensuring that we will live in fear of harm.

God calls us to "love they neighbor as thyself." This is not difficult if we realize that it is only in standing together that any of us can survive for long. It is the lone tree that is destroyed in a hurricane; those in a cluster are protected from the wind. Isolation from responsibility is, ultimately, self defeating.

Fear, mistrust and the economics of the insurance industry's stock on Wall Street are driving this train. A loveless legalism is the next stop. St. John has a better answer: "perfect love casts out fear." (1 John 4:18).

The Silence

Perhaps you've noticed that it's been almost ten days since I last posted any thoughts. This is a blog about prayer shaped insights, so you might be able to guess what has been happening: there haven't been any! Or so I've thought.

What I had been looking for was a clear Presence in all the events of my life. What I have found, however, is quixotic - a hedge maze that is laid out so beautifully, but which requires trust that, however many bends there are, there is a way out. That's an insight that didn't seem to be of much use to anybody, hence the silence. It is, however, one that is familiar to most and so, tonight, I write.

The big question for Paul and me right now is retirement and what to do with the rest of our lives. There are many closed doors here in Virginia Beach - so clear a pattern that it has the marks of God's hand and not just the dive in the economy. Paul is 65 and the work and network that have sustained him through ten years of consulting have dried up right on time. Except that this is not the time that he had in mind and all is happening earlier than planned. What next? We do not so much want to retire, but redirect our energies.

The trouble with a hazy goal, however, is that when everything is a possibility, nothing much happens. Narrowing the focus is what brings about real change. This involves choice and exclusion and much hesitation about doing either. It is when most of the extraneous noise has been silenced, however, that one can hear the whisper. It is only in loss that what should remain can be revealed.

There have been days when I sit down to write some thoughts to share here and the posts almost write themselves; there are other days when each paragraph is pulled from inside me. I think I have been looking for our future to present itself like one of those inspired moments - it's happened before -  but what we've been experiencing is not a Cesarean section, but the inexorable bearing down of a birth that is taking its own not-so-sweet time.

I take comfort, though, in a song we sing at church:You Are Mine, by David Haas

I will come to you in the silence,
I will lift you from all your fear
You will hear my voice
I claim you as my choice,
Be still and know I am here.

Do not be afraid, I am with you.
I have called you each by name.
Come and follow me
I will bring you home;
I love you and you are mine.

Our mazes are all different. They may be serene or fanciful, convoluted or frustrating, but with this kind of God as our companion, we don't have to worry about getting lost. What makes a maze the most fun to navigate, however, is the guidance and direction that we get from those along the path. So, I discuss and I listen...and I write.

Back to Life

I had a conversation recently with a woman who is a medical marvel. Several years ago, she collapsed and hovered on the edge of death for months, but she had a huge network of friends and colleagues who prayed her through one crisis after another. She believes all those prayers pulled her back from the grave.

Inspiring story, isn't it? Yet I have been wondering whether all those prayers really changed God's mind about the outcome of her illness - and if they did, why would we think that we know better than God about how the events of our lives should turn out?

For instance, I once read a story about someone who had been in a car accident and who had fervent prayer warriors pleading for his recovery. While the medics were working on him, he had an out-of-body experience that was exquisite. He was in heaven and felt complete peace, pure love and perfect joy. He never wanted it to end. Suddenly, he was wrenched from that state and returned to earth and all he could feel was a deep sense of loss. His friends excitedly told him later that he had died and the doctors had been able to get his heart started again. They were filled with thanksgiving that God had answered their prayers. From his perspective, it was a mixed blessing.

In the Lord's Prayer, we pray, "Thy will be done," but we really don't believe that. We give God directions all the time, believing that we know what is best for us and our friends. That's scary. The God who lives outside of time, who can see our lives from their start to their finish with all their connections and consequences, will bend to the wishes of a united group of people who can't even see around the corner. That's quite a responsibility.

So, should we stop praying because we don't know what to pray for? I don't think that's the answer, but maybe we might be less specific in our desires. What we really want from God, I would imagine, is happiness and inner peace for ourselves and others. This may be the best prayer we could utter.

Perhaps what we are called to do is to surround a person with loving thoughts for their well being. If we flood our memories with positive regard for him or her and recruit the angels, the saints and our friends to do the same, the overflow of all that love must have a positive outcome because Love never fails. Our prayer then arises out of a selfless desire for another's good and not out of our own agenda.

Maybe God directs us to pray together because the unity that results from so many voices in loving agreement is so powerful that what is not loving cannot stand in its way for long. We wouldn't tolerate the social conditions that cause so much pain to so many and we wouldn't allow research into diseases to languish for lack of money. Our lives would certainly change for the better.

The world might look very different if we could all agree on how we want it to look.

The Right Place

Perhaps you’ve seen the same Forwarded email that I received recently about always being in the right place. It describes the reasons why a number of people never made it to the World Trade Center on Sept 11, 2001. They are alive today because they had gotten a blister and needed a band aid or been stuck in traffic or missed the bus. Things that seemed irritating at the time, were, in fact, the events that saved their lives. Thus, the thought goes, we are always in the right place, it’s all good and it’s just our perspective about negative events that needs to change. God always makes sure we are in the right place.

All of this is true – to a point. It’s easy to say that God’s providence saved the diverted individuals, but this line of thinking would imply that God deliberately didn’t save others. Were they too in the “right place” even though they got swallowed up in an inferno? Their survivors probably don’t think so. I can’t believe that God willed some families to lose a father or mother or that any one life was more precious to God than another’s.

Partiality doesn’t sound like the loving God who would become human and subject himself to the worst our species had to offer.  I’m sure that research would uncover just as many church goers among the dead as among the living and just as many whose fateful choices led them to the World Trade Center as away from it. What we have or have not done can’t be the measure of why some people still grieve a loss and others are thankful to be alive.

So, the “right place” isn’t necessarily the place which avoids the suffering; maybe the “right place” is simply wherever we are because God’s outstretched hand is there, too. God is able to heal the wounds made by those whose free will causes our pain. It is people who are at the root of our hurt and frustrations and the degenerative nature of our bodies explains our sickness and unavoidable death. All God can do is reveal the responses and attitudes that will lead to our inner peace in the midst of it all.

To say “Alleluia” in the midst of emptiness, darkness and confusion is the ultimate statement of faith. It arises from the belief that love never fails, that the right place is in the arms of God and that the more love we cast into the world, the less chance there is for others to act badly.

The world will change because people decide to change it, not because we wait around for God to do it.

Card Philosophy

Mother's Day is almost here and the card stores are in overdrive making sure that we have just the right sentiments to share with the woman who gave us life. For a number of years, however, I've had trouble finding something that expresses what I want to say. I've noticed that the messages in most cards have switched focus from the receiver to the giver. The happy event is seen in the context of how it affects the sender, not the one being honored.

The most blatant example came in the mail the other day. It's a catalog of Mother's Day gifts and the headline epitomizes the perspective of the 21st century Me Generation. It says:

Mothers Day is not for celebrating moms. Mothers Day is for celebrating all they've given us. For all the moments they've offered up a sweet hug or some tough love. For the days when they had just the right thing to say-even if it meant saying nothing at all.

It goes on, but this is enough to illustrate the point: In Hallmark land, Mother's Day isn't about your mother - it's about the effect she had on you.

The birthday cards on display are much the same. We send good wishes to a friend or family member not because this person is witty or wise or kind or talented. Rather, the messages tell them they make us feel good in their presence; that we smile when we recall the times they went out of their way for us or recount what sweet memories we have of their love for us. The bottom line is that we congratulate them in the context of how wonderful we feel when we are around them. In other words, it's all about us.

This is dangerous territory.

When people think they exist just for the benefit of others, they lose the sense that they matter in and of themselves. It's an approach to life that ultimately leads to questions about the utility of caring for those who can't make a productive contribution anymore or the cost to society of those who are disabled. If people matter only because of what they can do for us, then it's only logical to doubt their worth when they can't continue to meet our needs.

Indeed, this is dangerous territory.

People matter because we are "fearfully and wonderfully made" and because God drew satisfaction from creating us and God takes delight in us. He created each of us uniquely and we are an astonishment of characteristics that take a lifetime to unearth. That I laugh at something and you don't is really an amazing occurrence: what goes on in each of our brains that a story amuses me, but not you? What incredible specimens we are in our individuality! Ultimately, we matter because each of us is a glimpse of the Divine that can never be completely parsed.

We have the opportunity each day to honor the strengths of others and to make them aware of the skill, talent and good we see operating in them. So many people are tongue tied when asked to talk about what they do well; all they can think of is their weaknesses and where they failed to meet the mark. It is up to us to keep the focus on the positive and give people the chance to revel in the feedback we give. We see what we are primed to see.

Others do not exist for our benefit. They exist to fulfill the potential within them and if, in the process of doing that, they make our lives richer, we can only be grateful for the overflow. Meanwhile, we can give thanks for them just as they are and take joy in what they become before our eyes.

The ad that advises, Make Mother's Day all about you ( at least they're honest) is offering one path for our culture to take. Perhaps there's another message that leads to a better place: love is not self centered. Robert Frost's poem, The Road Not Taken, reminds us that:

Two roads diverged in a wood.
And I, I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference.

He Is Not here

He is not here, the angel said to the women who had come to anoint his body. He is risen from the dead.

Quite a surprise on an early Sunday morning. He is not here. The women could see that for themselves. They were the first witnesses to peer into the empty tomb. Later, the men would come, but the greatest revelation of all time was entrusted to women whose testimony, because of their gender, would not be accepted in a Jewish court of law. They were inconvenient witnesses for the gospel writers,who, if they were making up a story to tell generations of followers, most probably would have chosen more credible corroborators. The women remain today, however, as the bearers of a startling truth: He is not here.

Everyone else stayed home that Easter morning, lost in their grief and belief that their dreams had been crushed. It was the women who went to the tomb to perform the one service they still could, even while fretting about the size of the stone they would have to remove in order to reach Jesus. The dream may have died, but somehow, they were going to give it a decent burial.

I wonder how the story would have changed had the women not gone to the tomb and verified the truth of the angel's statement: He is not here. It was hard enough for Jesus to convince the disciples that it was he and not a ghost who was conversing with them. It has been hard enough over the centuries to convince people that the disciples did not concoct the story. The empty tomb, attested to by societal nobodies, remains its own proof: He is not here.

The women remind us that it is when we search, we find; that when we give, we receive.

Amen.

It Is All Good

One of the cards that I sent out last week had this phrase on the cover: Easter is God's Way of Saying that It's All Good.

Good Friday is the perfect day to remember that, in the hands of God, all that we endure can have a loving outcome. Our task is to be open to the change that this might involve within ourselves and to trust that God sees around all the corners in our lives. God knows what is needed in order to prepare for the good that lies ahead.

It is tempting to remain fixated on the sufferings that Jesus experienced. It is hard to resist focusing on the lacks in our own lives and our dashed expectations. The glory of the life of Jesus, however, is Easter, not Good Friday. The "good news" is that  Death steals our bodies, but only for a time. The gospel promise is that there is life after death and that Jesus came that we might have life in the now, as well. The Spirit that we have been given is able to transform all that we undergo and bring good out of it.

The rub, of course, is Holy Saturday, the day of silence. Even Jesus had to wait to see the Easter of his life.

So must we all. This is where each of us can make a difference: Trust in the Good on the other end of the dark times of our lives is a three day experience and it's best done hand in hand. It helps when someone else can remind us Sunday is just around the corner.

See you the day after tomorrow.

Slight Detour

A funny thing happened to me on the way to the ... Now here's where the funny part is supposed to start, except that this isn't a comedy routine and I am not the best jokester. Last Friday, my body wound up in the hospital while my mind was making other plans. About the best laugh that anyone could come up with was that now I know what it's like to sleep in surroundings that cost a $1000 a night and come with an adjustable bed and a staff catering to my every need.

Fortunately, I am home and well and it all seems like some bizarre tale told by a bard seeking to wile away the hours. Life is full of unexpected detours from the script we've written for ourselves. Even when we think we've put it all in God's hands, an experience such as I had causes an abrupt rethinking of priorities, activities and plans. The recurring comment that I have received from my friends is "perhaps it's about time to slow down?" Frankly, my thought is more along the lines of "I guess it's time to speed up!"

None of us know the amount of time we have on this earth, but the one thing we all know is that it is not limitless and that our bodies deteriorate with age. When looked at from this perspective, we all ought to be making every minute count.

Count for what? That's where the priorities come in.

How are we spending today? Are we so caught up in yesterday that it overshadows everything we experience? Are we so afraid of or longing for tomorrow that we are blind to the possibilities of the now? When the past haunts us or the future makes us uneasy, we give time a power it doesn't have to have.

Time is a human invention. We parse it because we can and because it's a neat way of organizing life. Yet, time is complex. In the 21st century, we can see the past and its future at the same time. We take a video of our kids when they are small and watch it with them as they turn 18. We know how it all turns out because today is the future we wondered about when we shot the footage.

Today is also the past that we will think of tomorrow. It can have its influence while we are living it or it can come to life in our memories. We can do something about what occurs as it occurs or clean up the mess afterwards. The future will be the result of the decisions we make or don't make because it is not a package waiting to happen to us. The only one who knows the outcome of the way we choose to live today is the One who doesn't live in time. Trying to figure it out is way above our pay grade.

So, we have the chance to make the future by doing something today. How are we going to spend the time?

Butterfly Tulip

Last Fall, a friend decided to plant some tulip bulbs in a large flower pot on our deck. The flowers that came up in the Spring would be in memory of my mother-in-law who passed away in July. The outcome has been spectacular.

The tulips are a very unusual variety and in the process of opening, one, and only one, displayed the butterfly form you see in the picture. It is a very apt reminder that Eleanor is living a new life after the chrysalis of her death.

For many of us, our lives seem to be spent in a chrysalis, as well. Life is hard and each day is a battle to survive. That's when we need a reminder that flowers are beautiful, that small miracles occur where we least expect them and that decisions made on a sunny day in October can bring a smile on a cloudy day in April.

People who live in hope plant flowers. These bulbs and seeds will lift their spirits - or someone else's - on some unknown day in the future. Today, let's take a look at the trees that are leafing out and the gardens that are springing to life and give thanks for the people of the past who took the time to brighten the lives of the people of today.

Lamp Light

The Chrysler Museum in Norfolk, VA has a magnificent collection of Tiffany lamps. A curator recently gave a talk about them and mentioned that what we see today is not the same as what our ancestors saw when the lamps were first made in 1895. They literally saw things in a different light.

Tiffany and his customers used Edison light bulbs which have a yellowish tinge to them, unlike those now available which give off a whiter light. The stained glass looks different depending on which portion of the spectrum is used to illuminate it. White light makes for truer color, but this is not the vision that Tiffany had when he created the shades. Are we enhancing his work or altering it?

Many believe that we must reproduce the past in order to stay true to it. There are raucous debates in the political sphere about reinterpreting the Constitution and actual violence taking place over new interpretations of religious writings. There are so many perspectives about who God is and what God wants from us that there are about 38,000 denominations of Christianity in the US and 270 religions in the world. Each adherent is positive that truth resides within the wall of this belief or that and that others should recognize it for what it is: the Truth.

Perhaps St. John brings a needed perspective. His first epistle tells us that God is light. We've come a long way in our understanding of exactly how complex this metaphor really is. Scientists have mapped the electromagnetic spectrum and discovered that visible light makes up only a portion of it. No one can point to a particular wavelength and claim that it, and it alone, is Light. What we are able to see is not all there is and some species can see more of it than others.

Just as this chart is divided into sections, we each view God from our own portion of the spectrum. God must prune away the barriers that prevent us from seeing it in its entirety and these obstacles are unique to each of us. God might be using an Edison bulb to reveal the Divine perspective in one person and a General Electric product in another, but more of the God spectrum will be revealed if we share our individual revelations.

Must we make a choice that excludes one or another's vision of God? Just as we change our perception of Tiffany's genius when we use modern lighting products, the more we can learn of God from our scientists, liberals, conservatives and even agnostics, the greater amount of detail we grasp. Old does not equal better and same does not equal best. Diverse lenses help us see more of the Light we cannot see. 

Sleepy Pigs

The night drags on
Darkness looms
Clocks mock
I am awake

To sleep, perchance to dream
Not tonight as
Mind flits and
Thoughts stalk
The silence

I wish I could
Sleep like a pig
And smile as I
Remember
The sunlight

You are here Lord
But fuzzy in the
Swirl of images
And heaviness

Dazzler of the dark
Sharpen the vision
Of my heart
As I wait
For light

Change of Heart

Lent: Ashes. Repentance. Self sacrifice. Ugh - another opportunity to wallow in self recrimination and abasement; another year to play at "giving up" a treat in hopes of impressing God or ourselves with our self control.
                                     OR
Lent: Renewal. Self Awareness. Metanoia or deep down change of heart. Another opportunity to examine our actions and move closer to God's vision of who we should be.

Whichever is our real motivation, these are the 40 days in which what we do is less important than the attitude we have when doing it.

I've got mixed emotions about this season of purple vestments and darkened churches. They don't mesh with my belief in God's delight in us, God's bounty and willingness to share it and God's insistence that in His love, we are all born anew and capable of accomplishing great things. It's taken me a long time to accept that forgiveness is ours when we ask for it and not try to earn it.

However, the statement of St. Paul in 1Cor 13 puts all of this in an important perspective:

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,but do not have love, I gain nothing.

What amazes me in these lines is that we can do these extraordinary things at all. The gifts of God are truly irrevocable, even if we don't use them in the way that God intended. It is the way in which we use them that makes them a Christian witness or not, not the acts themselves. Whatever we do must be rooted in a love for others and not out of an ego-directed motive.

Each of us has the capacity to perform admirably, but where is our heart? Deep down, what do we think of those whom we are serving with our gifts? I had to stop watching some of the reality shows on TV because I was too tempted to feel superior to the people who seemed to be messing up their lives. That isn't loving and I was full of judgment about the people and not just their behavior. I was being a "noisy gong."

As I write this, I am looking at at a "Ty Beanie Babies" that sits on my desk. It's a white bear with the dove of peace embroidered on its chest. It's a reminder to me that this is the call of all of us: to walk through our days bringing reconciliation and healing and the olive branch of forgiveness. For me, it's a better reminder of what Lent is all about than the ashes and purple cloth.

Phone call

The phone rang at 3am this morning. My heart didn't quite stop as it used to when my mother-in-law was alive and a middle of the night phone call meant that she had fallen or worse, but I was instantly wide awake.

"This is Maureen," I answered. The voice at the other end had the far away quality of a guy on a speaker phone and this guy was also pretty far gone himself. "This is James in the bar and I want to ride in your car," he sang out cheerily.

Paul, who had picked up an extension, noted the Caller ID: "Private Out of Area." We hung up. Our drunken caller pushed Redial and we hung up again. We waited expectantly for a third try, but it never came. Apparently the thrill of the surprise was gone and he went on to annoy other sleepyheads with his nonsensical chatter. To his credit, he was a happy drunk...it could have been worse.

I've been wondering, however, why people get a kick out of disturbing the peace of others, whether it's prank phone calls or media blaring in the neighborhood. Maybe it's because they can; maybe it's because they are low in empathy or maybe it's because they are high in a need for power. Regardless of the cause, some people have a larger footprint than others as we navigate the journey of life and we must learn to live together. The question is, how do we do that?

There's a world of difference, of course, between being inconsiderate and breaking the law, between engaging in high jinks and harassing a neighbor. How we respond to any of it, however, depends on our own vision of what constitutes the "other" on this shared planet. Is that "someone else" a person who is ahead or behind us in the marathon of life or someone who is striding alongside us in one long horizontal line that stretches around the globe?

If others are companions on the journey, then those on either side can reach out to the faltering ones and help them through the tough times. If they are merely other entities who happen to support or impede our progress, then their failings have an effect on us and we have a right to get upset and make them pay when they stumble. Our reaction to the failings of others is rooted in either a belief in a vision of our own extrordinary nature or a belief that we share that extrodinary nature with everyone else.

Jesus made it clear which was his choice. He said "judge not, lest you be judged." His prayer to the Father asks that we be forgiven as we forgive others. The gospel accounts show Jesus refusing to join in the pointing fingers of others. In that spirit, our self absorbed 3am caller deserved at least a mental prayer for his safety in getting home from the bar last night and maybe at least a "God bless you" before we hung up. Who knows the effect that might have had?

The psalmist tells us that God is "the lifter of my head." That means when we are bowed low by shame and discouragement, it is God who reaches out and says, "Chin up, my beloved."

Let's pass it on.

Moving On

Paul and I watched Toy Story 3 the other night, expecting a light, upbeat film about Andy and his stalwart toy friends facing obstacles together and conquering in the end. Instead, we wound up teary and philosophical about the reality of change and the nature of love.

Andy, you see, is going off to college and all of his toy team can't make the trip. Who gets packed in the suitcase? Who goes in the attic? Who goes to day care and who gets put in the trash? Parting is definitely NOT sweet sorrow. Not to spoil it for you, but it doesn't end as one would think.

Throughout the story, the toys must face the fact that Andy doesn't want to play with them anymore. The relationship they had has changed. The future is not yet clear and all that is left are the memories and the heartache. What they do have, however, is each other and staying together becomes their overriding concern. When they finally recognize that Andy must move on, they are able to help him do what he cannot do himself.

Perhaps the real message here is the one from Ecclesiastes: "To everything there is a season...". Pain only comes when we hold tightly to the present that the future is trying to wrest from our grasp. If we can let it go, the transition becomes much easier. Nothing is permanent except the love of our God and the love that we choose to give; everything else is out of our control - including the reaction to the love we choose to give - and subject to change.

"Turn! Turn! Turn" was Pete Seegar's plea when he wrote the folk song (later covered by The Birds) based on the Ecclesiastes verses. I take that to mean that we can't stay glued in place, but must continue to turn to face what is coming next or it may hit us in the back of the head.

Andy, Woody, Buzz Lightyear and the rest of the playroom gang had to turn to find the sunrise from the sunset of Andy's childhood. There was new life for everyone because they did. As we all walk with God each day, we'd better be prepared to turn some corners, too.

Windfall

This is a wonderful guest post written by my husband, Paul.

Last Summer was a time of many losses for me. In the midst of all that was going on, a big windstorm broke a large bough on one of the “century plus” oak trees on our property. This broken bough stayed stuck in the tree. High up. Out of reach. A large problem waiting to arrive in the future. So I worried, of course.


Last week, another gusty windstorm delivered a literal windfall. The dead bough dropped to our driveway, fortunately with no damage. But it was large enough to block the driveway and difficult to move. But I could push it out of the way to deal with later.

Monday a neighbor helped me cut it down into short pieces. It was a good time for us to talk. We usually just pass by on our errands rather than talk for a while. Shared labor gave us a time to interact.

The dead branch appeared so large before. 25 feet long. 6 inches in diameter. But after a short time of sawing, what was left wasn’t all that large.

This morning as I looked out at the small pile of logs, I realized that God was reminding me that large, seemingly intractable, future problems can be resolved one piece at a time. As a business management consultant, I have reminded clients: “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” But for my problems, I want the immediate, quick solution.

As I move to retirement, I worry about the large, intractable problem of resources. (Or, “What do I eat? What do I wear?” from Sunday’s Gospel reading.) This week, there have been some small windfalls into our bank account. God is clearly reminding me that together we can address large, intractable problems through a series of small steps and windfalls.

Usually, I prefer the calm sunshine to blustery weather. But now, I look forward to the next windfall.