“And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what really matters, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.” – Philippians 1:9-11
I am stripped down. I wait my fate. What will it be? Will it be gain? Will it be Christ? I will not choose, except, of course, that I have chosen by the words I’ve spoken, by the things I’ve done.
I am stripped down.
I have been stripped of agency. Another will decide my course. I’ve lived in faith that God has set my way, but set my way through me. A crueler hand now rests upon the tiller of my time. Does it grow short?
I am stripped down.
I struggle to bring influence, to speak good news, for few may hear me now. Is it hubris to believe that they who hold me in this place consider what I’ve said and turn their souls toward Christ?
I am stripped down.
Thank God Epaphroditus has recovered, though for him, like me, to die is gain. For Jesus and for me he’ll carry word to those I love that… well, that I love them from the heart. I am stripped down. What more to say?
Just that I love.
A poem/prayer based on Philippians 1:3-11, the Revised Common Lectionary Second Reading for Year C, Second Sunday of Advent.
It’s a funny thing. When you hear just part of a conversation, it can be misleading. I mean, you might think you know what folks are talking about, but it turns out you might not.
In this case, it was a kolea, a Pacific Golden Plover, who overheard some people talking about heaven. And yes, he got confused.
He heard enough to learn that the people talking about heaven believed it was a really nice place. He heard enough to learn that the people talking about heaven didn’t expect to go there for some time. He heard enough to learn that the people believed that other creatures could also go to heaven.
He didn’t hear anything about it being a new life and a very different kind of place. He didn’t hear anything about dying as a transition from one kind of life to another kind of life. They just didn’t mention that while he was listening.
But at the end of the conversation, as the people were walking away, one of them said something about heaven being beyond the clouds.
People tend to talk that way about heaven because even though we have telescopes and can look a long way into space, “beyond the clouds” is something most of us don’t know much about, and the life God intends for us beyond our lives here is also something we don’t know much about. But the kolea didn’t know that. He said to himself:
“Those people can’t fly beyond the clouds, but I can. I can get to heaven myself.”
And he launched himself into the sky.
A kolea migrating from Hawai’i to Alaska, or from Alaska to Hawai’i, can get very high indeed. He flew up over the low clouds that were raining on Hilo. Then he flew up over the middle clouds that were spotted about around the slopes of Mauna Kea. Then he flew up even above the high wispy clouds above Mauna Kea.
Each time, he looked about for signs of heaven.
Each time, he didn’t see them.
“I must be close to heaven,” he said.
What he found as he circled higher and higher was that it got colder and colder. He’d felt that before, but as he flew higher than he had before it got colder than he’d ever known. He didn’t like that. He also didn’t like that the air got thinner. Not only was it harder to breathe, he had to flap his wings harder to move enough air to keep flying. In fact, there came a point that he just couldn’t go higher. Gasping, he let himself fall, then circle, and glide back down to the ground.
He landed, still winded, on some grass near another kolea, who hopped over to see what was wrong. “I tried to fly up to heaven,” he said sadly, and told her the story. “I must have been close, but I couldn’t get there.”
“That’s too bad,” she said to him. “Here, take a bite or two. There’s some tasty things here. And you’ll find some good water to drink just over this way.” She led him over to the food, and water, and a safe place to rest.
He ate. He drank. He rested. His breathing settled. His wings regained their strength. He looked at his new friend.
“You know, I flew a long way up to get close to heaven,” he said, “but you’ve been kinder to me than I can remember anyone else being. It might just be that I’ve been closer to heaven here than I ever was up there in the sky.”
by Eric Anderson
Watch the Recorded Story
I write these stories in advance, then tell them from memory during worship. The story you just read and the story as I told you will not be the same.
Photo of a kolea (a Pacific Golden Plover) by Eric Anderson.
“But Jesus said to them again, ‘Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.'” – Mark 10:24b-25
A camel, which is a beast with sense, will cast a jaundiced eye upon a needle’s eye if told that they’re to pass on through. At most, a knobby hoof may paw the ground.
Yet I engage in exercise of needle-passing almost every day, and have for one score years, and ten, and six, endeavoring to tell a story so it lifts a heart or redirects a mind.
A task for fools, I say, as those I teach nod sagely in agreement with my words, then go to do the opposite of what I’d said, and what they’d then approved,
Because, you know, though there’s a better way, the one we know is still the one we’ll do. We thank you for the wisdom of your words and hope the world one day works as you say.
If only it were only “they,” the ones to whom I speak! For it is also “Me,” the one I seek to govern by your guidance, Christ, the “I” who also cannot seem to follow you.
I would despair, save that some seeds I never thought would bloom have grown, have blossomed, borne sweet fruit as marginalized people claim their place and power where they once had none.
So take my challenge, camel. I will make my painful way through this so-tiny eye, and once we’re through, what visions might we see, what glory celebrate, in God’s sweet possibility.
A poem/prayer based on Mark 10:17-31, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year B, Proper 23 (28).
We pray for the mothers of the world: for the ones who have borne children, for the ones who have adopted children, for the ones who have, by the sharing of love and care, mothered someone or some ones around them. We thank you for the gift of love which mothers may share. We praise you for the care so many children receive from diligent and compassionate mothers. We ask your Holy Spirit to be present when motherhood stumbles and love fades, when children suffer neglect or abuse, or when a much-loved and much-loving mother is taken from them by the sad realities of the world.
We pray for the mothers who do not know where they will find the resources needed by their children. We pray for the mothers who do not know where they will find the resources needed for themselves. We pray for the mothers who, for whatever reasons, have yearned for and never had children. We pray for the mothers who struggle to live in war zones, or abusive homes, or with illness, or with children who do not return their love. We pray for mothers with gratitude and with urgency, when so many things can go wrong.
May we, as so many mother strive to do, live up to the high standards of your call. May we search diligently for truth and courageously bear witness to it. May we be held in your Holy Spirit when we need strength and renewal. May we be guided by your Holy Spirit when the time to work is at hand.
Jesus said he would gather the people as a mother hen gathers her chicks. Gather us, O God, and all those nations of the world, beneath the comfort of your wings.
There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love. – 1 John 4:18
Fear is not just about punishment, John. Fear is also about being hurt. Fear is about taking a risk. Fear is about the unknown.
I fear punishment, of course. The pain is not just the harsh words, hard tones, spoken to me. I punish myself as well.
I fear as well the hurt that is not punishment, but comes from accident or malice done around me.
I fear to take a risk, of course, because, deserved or not, if risk turns into failure, I will feel the pain.
And I fear the unknown because who knows (I don’t) what dangers lurk for me, what hurts I’ll face and feel?
So John, I know that God is love, rejoice that God loves without fear. I live in love and fear. I fear I am not God.
A poem/prayer based on 1 John 4:7-21, the Revised Common Lectionary Second Reading for Year B, Fifth Sunday of Easter.
But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. – Jeremiah 31:33
Of all the promises you’ve made, O God, through human speech of ancient poets, this I wait for most expectantly. Oh when, I ask, will human hearts be oriented to your will?
From Jeremiah’s day to this, I do not see a sudden change in human righteousness. Not even Jesus’ resurrection prompted us to set aside our greedy lust for power,
Our tolerance for prejudice, enshrining it in law that breaks the Law I yearn to feel a-written on my heart. How bright would be the dawn of such a day!
But God, I fear that knowledge of your law within the heart would do no better than to write it on papyrus, paper, wood, or stone. We learn it, and we know it, and we break it.
So did you, have you, written on our hearts, and did we find a way to curtain it away, as centuries of Christians have ignored the Savior’s last command to love?
I tremble that this promise is fulfilled.
A poem/prayer based on Jeremiah 31:31-34, the Revised Common Lectionary First Reading for Year B, Fifth Sunday in Lent.
“But Elisha said, ‘As the LORD lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.'” – 2 Kings 2:2, 2:4, 2:6
You threw your mantle over me, Elijah, as I plowed the fields. (You failed to mention that you’d taken that direction from the LORD.) You would not pause to let me kiss my parents, no. But cook an ox upon the fire of its yoke, and feed the neighbors? Yes. You’re strange, Elijah. From that mantle day, I’ve clung to it and you. I’ve seen your challenges to kings and queens. I’ve seen God’s fiery judgement fall.
So now you’d leave me, prophet of the trumpet voice, to serve your God and speak to kings as if they had no soldiers to command. Have we been walking on the road toward your death and burial? Should I have asked the gathered prophets for a shovel, casting earth and tears upon your stiffening form, just as you cast the mantle on my back which stiffened, knowing that the furrows of my life would grow new fruit.
I said I’d follow then. I tell you I will follow now, despite the lack of tools to dig or fill your grave. I’ll follow you across the stream divided by your mantle’s touch, not knowing if I can return to Jericho without a muddy swim and wade. I’ll follow you though tears are all that fill my eyes, so that your spirit takes its flight and I see nothing more than mist, despairing of your spirit’s gift.
Fire. Horses. Galloping between us. Whirling, swirling wind. You rise beyond my grasping hand. Father, no! The chariots of Israel steal away my heart!
Your mantle falls. I’ll cling to it until my sobs have eased and I can test to see if God is with me.
A poem/prayer based on 2 Kings 2:1-12, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year B, Transfiguration Sunday.
The image is The Ascension of Elijah, Russian icon of the Novgorod school, late 1400s, by Anonymous artist from Novgorod – http://www.bibliotekar.ru/rusIcon/2.htm, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4157865. Until I looked over Orthodox icons for this post, I hadn’t seen images of Elisha grasping Elijah’s mantle as if to hold him to the earth. It’s a powerful image.
They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes. – Mark 1:22
Astounded I was, for certain – not, however, in a good way.
I know there’s nuance, theory, opinion, but not so this Jesus.
I’m a great one for clarity. Say what you think but modestly, right?
Not so this Jesus. He laid it out clear and said he was right.
Astounded I was, and a little offended by arrogance there.
That’s when the shouting began. Oh, not me. A poor man afflicted
By demons within. I knew him. We knew him. The Teacher did, too.
“I know who you are!” he cried out, then called him “the holy one of God.”
I was moving to gentle him, comfort him, lead him away and to home, when
Jesus delivered his order: “Be silent! Come out of his spirit!” And silence.
The man drew his breath, then exhaled with a sigh, clearing the tension away.
He smiled, gave his thanks, took his seat near the wall. Nobody knew what to say.
And now I must listen again to this arrogant Jesus who seems to know everything,
Because with a word he set this man’s spirit free. None of the rest of us did.
Perhaps Jesus’ ideas are not just opinion. Perhaps he knows more than he says.
A poem/prayer based on Mark 1:21-28, the Revised Common Lectionary Gospel Reading for Year B, Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany.
The image is Christ Healing a Possessed Man in the Synagogue at Capernaum, an 11th century fresco in the bell tower of Lambach Abbey, Lambach, Austria, by an unknown artist – Scan aus: Rudolf Lehr –- Landes-Chronik Oberösterreich, Wien: Verlag Christian Brandstätter 2004 S. 79 ISBN 3-85498-331-X, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6633986.
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