Easter Brings Spring

It felt like Easter Day brought Spring to the mountains. Holy Week was cold and cloudy...it was 25 degrees one morning...and then on Sunday we had a beautiful sunrise and a gorgeous day of sunshine and warmth. The daffodils that had been afraid to bloom have suddenly shown their happy faces. The Hostas are finally peeking up through the soil and I am finally able to put my Dalia tubers in the ground.

I participated in some of the Holy Week services at Christ Church. Preaching on Maundy Thursday and at the Easter Sunrise service gave me plenty to think about. The sunrise service was so much fun. Beginning in the Memorial Garden at 6 am we had a fire to light the Paschal Candle with Christ's new light. We processed the light into the church, brought up the lights there to reveal the lilies and white hangings...no more penitential purple or blood red passion. At the end of the service we processed the "light of Christ" back out into the world as the sun rose over the mountains. We startled the horses and cows around us by proclaiming loudly: "Alleluia, Christ is risen. The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia." 

As sometimes happens, I was convicted by my own preaching on Maundy Thursday. This service, which commemorates the Last Supper and institution of the Eucharist, is so full of symbolism that it is easy to forget what it is about. The Eucharist and the washing of feet as a symbol of Christ calling us to be servants to one another often take the forefront. But the primary focus is the mandate that Jesus gives on this night. Maundy comes from the Latin word for mandate. Jesus gives us a new mandate, a new commandment on this night before he is put to death: 

^“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. 

Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another." 

Everything Jesus does on this night is consistent with what he has taught for 3 years. He responds with love in all the awfulness of  this night's betrayal and misery. One of the most powerful realizations of this night for me was the way that my heart neglects the mandatory commandment of love. I can't say that I hate anyone but my harsh judgments of others feel less than loving. As I said in my sermon, "Love is such a beautiful word..." But doing this love - the love which Jesus showed and taught - well, that's a battle that rages within me and I suspect most of us day by day. 

Jesus didn't just give the "new mandate" he acted it out in front of us. He gave up his right to be the honored guest and assumed the role of servant. The disciples who were at table with him acknowledged their neediness and let Jesus feed them and then they went forth to feed others because they had seen their neediness and been fed. I'm not talking about feeding in the evangelical sense; of course the disciples "fed" others by teaching them Jesus' teachings. But the disciples also did not judge those who came to them hungry and homeless. They organized house churches where widows and orphans; homeless and outcasts could be fed. 

Maundy Thursday left me with a conviction about my own heart and my own actions but it also left me wondering if the Christian Church has forgotten this "mandatory love". It seems to me that we spend a lot of time arguing about "the rightness of what we believe" and little time being a servant to others. We want "our way" to be honored and when it's not we label "those others" as "unbelievers". We have spent so much time over the past 2 decades arguing about sex and marriage that "homeless and hungry" in this country is epidemic. Where is the greatest energy of the Church spent? Why do we separate ourselves from one another over the "little issues" when we can work together to do love? My heart tells me that until we really "do love" with one another the Church will continue to decline and divide into little sects of "like minded" people who do little.  

But to end on a more upbeat note...here is a picture of little Aida Quinn. She and her mom, Jill, and her "Oma" Pat came to see us on Saturday. Jill and Aida are here visiting from Alaska and isn't she a beauty? She will be 2 years old in October.  As I helped her down the step in front of the house, I heard a tiny voice say, "Dank Ou".  Yep, she has impeccable manners!  

Aida

Blessed Holy Week

The glass piece above hangs in a window in my living room. It was made by two friends who just celebrated their one year anniversary. When the afternoon sun comes in through this window I think about that service of blessing for these two men. As the colors spill across the floor and furniture of the living room I still feel the warmth of the Spirit which was so present in their commitment to each other. It was a holy moment; full to the brim with all the joy, peace and love that God's Spirit brings. 

Our Holy Week here in the mountains has been weather filled so far! The colors of the glass are longing for some sun to revive them. Last night the wind roared around us as I walked Bella in my heavy winter coat. The trees were frantic in their fight against the wind reminding me that sometimes "holy" is harsh and wild. The silent colors in the stained glass remind me that something dark is coming. This is a "holy" week - the drama of my faith awaits me. The Triduum, (the Great Three Days) begins tomorrow and we will feast, then sorrow and wait until we can once more celebrate the Resurrection. 

Br. Geoffrey Tristram, SSJE was the writer for the daily meditation from The Society of St. John the Evangelist on Monday. He quoted the spiritual writer Ida Goerres saying that 

"...coming to Holy Week is like approaching a great waterfall with an empty cup in your hand that you long to fill up with water. If you put the cup right into the middle it will likely be dashed away. It is better to aim for one small part of the waterfall, perhaps on the edge, one particular trickle of water, and full up your cup there."

It's true. It is like entering the stained glass piece that hangs in my window. Sometimes I am captivated by one color, or the design or the bevels on the clear glass. The light from the piece is never the same because the sun is always at a slightly different angle on our journey around it. My spiritual journey is hardly the same from year to year as I allow the passion story to penetrate my soul. So I am touched in ways that are new each time. Where will my cup of water come from this year? And yours also....what will fill your cup?

Being Healed...

Altar at Christ Church

Wednesday evening - Healing Service

On Wednesday evening 21 folks got together at Christ Church in Sparta for a service of healing prayers and Holy Eucharist. It was my joy to get to plan this service with some very gifted musicians. The stimulation for the service was listening to a CD done by Mark and Julee Weems, Healing at the Roots: Songs of Renewal, produced by Little Windows. One of their arrangements is a John Michael Talbot song called, Healer of My Soul. 

There is no doubt in my mind that God is a healing God. From the moment in Genesis when God stitches clothes for Adam and Eve to wear after they have been exiled from the garden, it seems clear to me that God is mending us...joining the fragmented ends of our lives, our soul and spirit. There are so many things that chip away at us, leaving splinters. Illness is just one of those "realities of life" that knocks up against us. Perhaps that is why many of the words used for healing in scripture carry a depth of meaning. God is revealed to the Israelites saying, "I am the Lord God who heals you" (Exodus 15:26) The writer uses the word RAPHAH (phonetic spelling of Hebrew) which not only means heal but to make whole, to stitch back together. 

There are many questions surrounding God's healing and I think the reason for that is that we don't understand God or God's love. I don't pretend to know God's mind except for that which God has revealed in the lives of those great saints who have left us testimony, in scripture and in their writings. It seems clear to me that God's love is beyond anything we can understand. Isaiah says that we are "inscribed on the palm of God's hand". (Isaiah 49:17) "Can a mother forget the child she has bore in her womb or suckled at her breast? It is doubtful, concludes Isaiah but even if this should happen, God will "continually" remember you. We are remembered and we are loved and because of these things we can open ourselves to God's healing.

I know James Taylor is not considered a saint (except, perhaps in North Carolina) but there is some wisdom for us in his song, Secret of Life (Live):

The secret of love is opening up your heart.

It's okay to feel afraid, but don't let it stand in your way.

It is hard to lean into love even when we can see the person we love. There are so many hurts in love. Loving God and leaning into that love so that we can open ourselves up to healing and mending is a process we grow into. Trusting God to do in our lives that mending which is most important at the moment is not easy. I can tell you this from experience... I want parts of my body that are wearing out to be restored, but it seems that the greater need for me last week was in the realm of mending and integrating my life in this new "phase" of retirement. I accept that as I continue to pray the words of Healer of My Soul:

Healer of my soul. heal me at even'

Heal me at morning, heal me at noon

Healer of my Soul.

If a tree falls in the forest....

I am so glad that I no longer have to worry about this pine tree in the woods behind my house. The windstorm that came through Alleghany County last weekend took care of this nasty ole tree. but really did it have to throw it on my garage??

I really can't complain (why do we always say that when we are about to complain?) the top of this pine struck a glancing blow to the back of the garage and took down one section of our fence, but missed the house. The light is different without the tree and it was the first thing I noticed when I drove in after being away for the weekend.

As to that age old question about whether the tree falling in the forest makes a noise...well you will have to ask my cat Pumpkin about that...if you can get her out from under the bed!