Assumptions

Today Catholics celebrate the Feast of the Assumption of Mary.  I celebrated too.  I went to Mass, arriving early to pray a rosary.

I grew up Catholic, but we were not the rosary-praying-and-attending-Mass-on-the-Feast-of-the-Assumption sort of Catholics.  My first rosary memory dates from when I was a pre-schooler; I wore my rosary as a necklace.  Later, I remember going to my grandmother -- not a particularly devout Catholic herself -- and asking her what one was supposed to do with this string of beads anyway.  In time, I learned.

I had been taught to memorize the Lord's Prayer and the Hail Mary at my mother's knee, book-ended by the Sign of the Cross.  Sacred words, these are the backbone of the rosary.  Add a Glory Be and you're almost there.  Apostle's Creed at the beginning, while holding the crucifix in your hand.  Big bead, Our Father.  Little beads, three, then tens, decades, Hail Mary's followed by one Glory Be.  End with Hail Holy Queen, and you're done.

There are other details:  Now the Glory Be can be followed by "O my Jesus, forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, and lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy."  As you begin to pray, name your intention, the cause for which you desire for Mary and her Son to intercede.  And reflect on the sacred mysteries.

There used to be three sets of five mysteries.  Altogether this made for 150 Hail Mary's (less the three at the beginning of the recitation, by which we ask God to increase our faith, hope, and charity).  I have read that this 150 -- reflecting the number of the psalms -- was the layman's way of entering into the daily life of prayer of the Church, doing what they, the illiterate masses, could, as the monastics and learned clergy prayed the whole Psalter in the daily Divine Office.  Pope John Paul II added another five mysteries, the Luminous now joining the Joyful, the Sorrowful, and the Glorious.

I memorized each set of five by memorizing the first, last, and third.  Then I could usually fill in the second and the fourth.  If the first Joyful Mystery is the Annunciation of the Angel Gabriel to Mary and the last is the Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple and the third is the Nativity of Jesus in Bethlehem, the second must be the Visitation to Elizabeth and the fourth the Presentation of the Infant Jesus at the Temple.  It worked for me.

The Assumption of Mary into Heaven is the fourth Glorious Mystery.  If it were not, I would never have spent much time thinking about it.  While I have never established a regular habit of praying the rosary, I have turned to this devotion from time to time, sometimes daily for weeks at a time.  Whenever I get to the Glorious Mysteries (Sundays and Wednesdays and any day during the Easter season), I have an Our Father and ten Hail Mary's to think about the Assumption.

Roman Catholic teaching says that Mary was assumed body and soul into heaven.  Catholics are free to believe that Mary died first or that, like Elijah on his fiery chariot, she didn't.  We were told this morning by the priest that this feast is a reminder of what God is planning for our future, just like Mary says in the Magnificat, that magnificent prayer from Luke 1 (vv 46ff), "...he has remembered his promise of mercy" (v. 54b).

I have always imagined the Assumption like this:  Our life as Christians is the life of "now and not yet," the experience of living in this world and simultaneously living in and helping to bring to the present reality the fullness of the Kingdom of God.  The more I live in God's Kingdom now, the less difference I will experience between my life today and my life in eternity.  If Mary lived perfectly the Kingdom life on this side of death, what could death mean to her?  She was "in heaven," body and soul, already.

At least that's how I think about it, when I think about it.

And I do think about Mary.  Growing up, I wanted to be a more traditional Catholic.  I secretly longed to absorb myself in the candles and incense, the statuary, kneelers and bells at the moment of consecration.  That's why I wanted to know what the rosary was all about.  I could see that being a real Catholic, as I imagined such to be, meant being devoted to Mary.   

There are many people -- Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican even -- who take this sort of devotion to Mary for granted.  For them it is assumed.  For me, it hasn't been so easy.  One way or another, my head keeps getting in the way.  

But my heart?  My heart wants a mother, and there is the Church, holding out to me Mary, the perfect, spotless, immaculately conceived Mother.  I want her to be in heaven, body and soul, crowned as Queen, interceding with her Son for me and for all of us.  I want her to be the Mother of God and the Mother of the Church and my Mother.  I want to adore her, and I want her to love me as she loves her Son.  I want to surrender to this exalted picture of Mary even though -- or maybe because -- she sounds too good to be true.

As I sat in the pew and knelt on my kneeler this morning, I wanted to silence my skeptical, rational mind as rose up to have its logical say.  I wanted the Protestant voice that now lives alongside the Catholic voice in my head to stop telling me that there is nothing in the Bible about the Assumption of Mary.  I wanted to be free to assume that all that the Church says and has ever said about the Blessed Virgin Mary is right and true.

Martha, Martha

As the continued their journey he entered a village where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him.  She had a sister named Mary [who] sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.  Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said, "Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?  Tell her to help me."  The Lord said to her in reply, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.  There is need of only one thing.  Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her." - Luke 10:  38-42

Poor Martha.  Someone needs to set the table, don't they?  Someone needs to fix the food and wash the dishes and make up the beds.

I get tired of the bad rap Martha gets.  How many times have I heard faithful Christian sisters say, in dismay or despair, "I'm such a Martha.  I need to be more of a Mary."

I imagine Martha as a woman like me, always wanting to help, always trying so hard.  Maybe too hard.  I hear in her resentment my own resentment.  "Why am I the only one who cares about..."  A tidy house?  Getting dinner on the table?  Taking care of things and people?  Why is it always me?  Surely I've cried out with Martha, "Lord, do you not care that my sister/husband/children/friends have left me by myself to do the serving?  Tell them to help me!"

I see so much selfishness around me. ("That Mary, just sitting there!  How selfish!") I can't bear it.  I am not going to be the selfish one, that's for sure.

And yet, Luke says that Martha is "burdened."  And Jesus says, elsewhere (Matthew 11:30), "My yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

"There is need of only one thing," says Jesus.  I don't really understand what that "one thing" is.  I know, I know, sitting at the feet of Jesus.  But that doesn't seem quite right.  We know we really can't all sit at the feet of Jesus all the time, in the way that Mary does.  Dinner does need to get to the table.  What can this "one thing" be?

And while we're pondering, take a look at that next line, the one that used to make me really mad: "Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her."  Ouch!  For years and years, those words sounded to me like a sharp slap in Martha's face.  And mine.  And all of those self-identified "Marthas" out there.

Then, about a year ago, after reading this text a thousand times, I heard Jesus say something I had never heard before.  Maybe he meant this:  "Mary has chosen the better part, and it will not be taken from her.  Martha, you could choose it too, and it will not be taken from you."

Could that possibly be true?  I can sit at the feet of Jesus?  But who will set the table?  Who will cook the meal and wipe the dishes and sweep the floors?  If I don't, won't that make me selfish?

And Jesus says to me, "You don't have to be anxious and worried about that."

Really?  The better part can be mine too?  I can give up the anxious worry and have that sort of freedom?  But what will happen?  Who will set the table?

I guess I'll have to sit at Jesus' feet if I want to find out.

Habemus Papam, Holy Thursday Edition

I had no idea.  Since Pope Francis was named I have been reveling in the daily news about him.  He takes the bus!  He cooks his own meals!  Not an article has been published, it seems, that does not identify humility as Pope Francis' chief attribute.  

So I was caught off-guard when I stumbled upon this blog, which I imagine to be only one portal into a conversation that has been going on out of my earshot among "traditionalist" Catholics.  

This particular post concerns the Pope's celebration of Holy Thursday mass at a youth prison and washing the feet of two women and two Muslims among the symbolic twelve.  The comments are stunning to me in their panicked judgments that all hell is breaking loose at the Vatican.  This incident seems to be insult to injury for a community of Catholics who have felt that the previous two Popes were on their team, supporting their point of view and finally rectifying the trouble called by the "Hippie council" (which is the way in which at least one comment referred to Vatican II).

So let me get this straight:  When the Pope is doing what the traditionalists want, he is the spiritual leader of the church, the seat of moral authority.  When he's not, well, he's not.  Pope John XXIII presided over a the Second Vatican Council, but we disagree with its findings so we can disparage it and him.  Pope Francis doesn't want to live in the fancy papal apartments, so he's denigrating the authority of his office.

Jesus, help us.

Remember Jesus?  The Son of Man, who had "no place to lay his head" (Luke 9:58)?  Remember Peter, the ostensible prototype for the papacy, who was a "sinful" fisherman when Jesus called him (Luke 5:1-11)?  Neither of them ever lived in a palace.  Jesus was more often seen hanging around with the likes of youths in prison and women than with the religious elite, who, when they were around, were usually complaining about how Jesus was breaking with tradition in dangerous ways.  Sound familiar?

As Christians, we do not worship a tradition.  We worship the God who is revealed in the man Jesus of Nazareth.  This is a God who identified with the poor and the sinner (2 Corinthians 5:21).  This is the God who preferred a servant's towel and a brutal death to being separated from the men and women he created and loved (cf. John 13 and Philippians 2).  This is the God who died for sinners, not the righteous (Roman 5:8).

He keeps showing up in his distressing disguise, and when we recognize him -- in the feet of a girl who has committed a crime or the hands of the priest who washes them -- he might cause us upset or alarm.  He was a thorn in the sides of the religious authorities of his day and the religious authorities of ours as well.  

In the coming days we will remember him not only thus, on his knees with a towel wrapped around his waist, but stripped and bleeding in the public square, dragging a log through the streets of Jerusalem, and suffocating, a crown of thorns pressed to his head, hanging by nails on a Roman cross.  Nothing was too shameful for him.  He was willing to take the full brunt of the consequences of law and tradition, bearing the curse for us  (Deuteronomy 21:23; Galatians 3:13).

Let us not paint a different picture, one that is cleaner, more palatable for us, one wrapped in clean white linen and the trappings of worldly authority.  That's not what he has given us.  Instead, tonight, we will have to come to terms with dirty feet, a body, as bread, broken, blood poured out.  It might make us uneasy.  I think he wants it to.

Lenten Journey: Ambassadors for Christ

So whoever is in Christ is a new creation:  the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come.  And all this is from God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ and given us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting their trespasses against them and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.  So we are ambassadors for Christ, as if God were appealing through us.  We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.  For our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

- 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 

For Reflection...

We are beloved of the Father for our own sake and not for our sake alone.

It is the Father's prodigal love that first creates us and then recreates us. We are reconciled within a world immersed in bitter conflict.  The world is, as we were, laboring under the old regime, persisting in enmity not only with God, but with itself.  Give me my inheritance, it says, against its own best good.

We have been there, in the far distant country, but we have come to our senses (Luke 15:17) and made our return.  When we arrived home, we found God's reconciling mercy running down the road to meet us, embracing us before we could utter the words of repentance, fitting us with the finest robes and rings.
We've been to the party, eaten of the fatted calf.  We greet the dawn of our own new creation.

It is from here, from home, that we must set out again.  We have a new job to do.  We have been entrusted with the message of reconciliation.  Our business card reads:  Ambassador for Christ.

God is appealing through us.  What do people see?  Do they see the remnants of the pig sty under the festal garments?  Do we embody the Christ who has stepped into our transgression so we could step into his righteousness?  How are we calling others, inviting them to come to their senses and head for home?  How do we witness to the reality of the welcome of prodigal love?

For Entering In...

- Take a moment to recall your own belovedness before our prodigal God.  Whatever you bring to this moment, God knows it all, and God loves the You who brings it.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Consider some ways that you have acted against your own best good.  How might God be acting in your life, now or in the past, to reconcile you not only to God, but to your own best self?

• Take time again today to abide in gratitude.  This is not an exercise in guilt:  I ought to be grateful.  Rather, sit in the quiet with the reality of who you are and what you have in your life -- possessions, relationships, gifts, the natural world.  Notice what feels like blessing to your heart, and give thanks for that.

• How are you living the message of reconciliation?  Where have you experienced being reconciled?  What can you offer to others who need to be reconciled?

• The prodigal love of the father is the gospel message we are called to preach as ambassadors for Christ.  How have you experienced that prodigal love?  How can you witness to that experience?

• There is a legend that says Saint Francis of Assisi instructed his charges, "Preach the gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words."  How can you -- or do you -- preach the gospel in light of this instruction?

- As you remember your own belovedness in the eyes of God, make a point today to allow someone else to see that prodigal love of God reflected through your eyes back at him or her.

Lenten Journey: The Father

"He said to him, 'My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours.  But now we must celebrate and rejoice, because your brother was dead and has come to life again; he was lost and has been found.'"

- Luke 15:31-32 

For Reflection...

Here is the father's last word, his bottom line:  I love you, and I love you.  That is all there is.  No rebuke to the younger.  No rebuff to the elder.  Both are given everything.  Both are called to celebrate and rejoice.  Both, both, are called to life, to be found.

This, finally, is what God is doing in me.  God rejects nothing.  God redeems and reconciles all.  There is nothing in me that is so dead that God cannot resurrect it, nothing so lost that God cannot restore it.

I am the elder brother, and God will take my resentment and turn it to acceptance, my self-righteousness and make of it humility, and my stubbornness God will soften into receptivity.

I am the younger brother, and God will take my thoughtlessness and turn it to compassion, my selfishness and make of it a willingness to serve, and my self-will God will soften into trust.

The father holds out faith that the younger son will return, hope that the elder will come to the feast, and love  for them both, not after they fulfill his will for them, but before and ever and always (Romans 5:8).

It is not a story of a prodigal son, but of a prodigal father.  He is a father whose generosity, whose gift of freedom, whose love is prodigal, "a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, ...poured into your lap" (Luke 6:38).

For Entering In...

- If you are reading this, our prodigal Father has called you and desires for you to know he has given you everything.  Become aware that you stand now and always in the presence of that God.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Take three minutes to watch this video, then answer this question:  Do you believe that God loves you?

• What in you have you despaired of ever seeing transformed?  Give it to God, today.  This isn't about trying to fix yourself or even having any idea of how your life could be different.  Simply open your heart to the possibility that nothing is impossible with God (Luke 1:37). 

• What would it look like for you to come in to the celebration today?  What do you need to step through or around in order to feast on the fatted calf?  The door is open.  The Father is waiting.  The party is for you.  What is one thing you can do to say, yes, to your invitation to the feast?

• List all of the things that you feel have been poured into your life from the fount of love.  Write a prayer of thanksgiving and rejoicing.

• If you haven't already, watch this video.  Really.  If you watched it once, watch it again.  God loves you.

- Carry with you into the rest of your day the sure knowledge that a celebration more wonderful than the most resplendent feast you can imagine is being prepared for you.  That is how much you are loved.  Bask in the glow of your belovedness.

Lenten Journey: The Inheritance

Then he said, "A man had two sons, and the younger son said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of your estate that should come to me.' So the father divided the property between them.

- Luke 15:11-12

For Reflection...

What was the father thinking?  It was as if he were dead, only he wasn't.  If he had been, if the inheritance had come to his sons in the standard way, he wouldn't have been present to witness the consequences.  Instead, in an act of fearless generosity, or reckless abandon, he gives them everything and stands by to watch the drama unfold.

What does he see?  He sees his older son continue unwaveringly on the well-worn path.  He doesn't spend his inheritance.  Maybe he buries it (Matthew 25:18).  All is safe and sound.  No reward, no risk.  The father sees him day by day, sees the groove he walks become a rut.

The father also sees his younger son.  He sees him pack his things.  He sees him walk down the road to God-knows-where.  Will he ever lay eyes on him again?  Where is he going?  Away.  To a far distant country.

The father can't be surprised.  He knows his sons, knew this might happen.  One son, stolid but tethered, the other, untethered but wanton.  The father might even have dreaded seeing it, but he has allowed it.

This is a portion of the inheritance -- the freedom to stand still and the freedom to walk away and keep on walking.

The inheritance comes with no strings attached.  Both sons are free to do with the inheritance what they will.  And they do.

Meanwhile, the father watches.  We know he is watching.  Maybe he looks out at the road as he looks  across the fields, seeing one son at his labors, waiting to see the other coming back across the horizon.

For Entering In...

- Wherever you are right now, God is present too.  Look around you.  Are your surroundings familiar or new to you?  What do you notice?  Can you recognize that God is here, now?

- Reflect on these questions:

• How do you understand the father's decision to say, yes, to giving the inheritance to his sons?  Do you see it as generous?  Foolish?  Or something else?  

• What do you think of as your "inheritance"?  From your parents or other family?  From God?  How are you spending it?  Or have you buried it to keep it safe?

• Have you ever given something of yourself away freely only to see it abused?  Maybe money?  Your friendship?  Your heart?  What happened?  How did -- or does -- that feel?

• Have you created a rut for yourself?  What is that like?  Or do you keep moving, never finding a comfortable groove?

• How do you understand freedom?  Are you free to live as you choose?  What does that mean?  What are the potential consequences when you choose to exercise your freedom?  The good?  The not-so-good?

- Remember your prayer word?  Return to it, if you have forgotten to do so these past few days.  Breathe into that word.  Where does it reside in your body?  Notice how it feels.

Lenten Journey: The Younger Son

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

For Reflection...

It's taken me a while to get around to the younger son.  I've so identified with the elder.  I have begun to imagine the relationship between the brothers, but it's a further step to put my feet in the sandals of the younger son.  Still...

If I'm honest, there are times I'd like to run away from home.  Give me my inheritance.  I'm tired of the rules.  I'm tired of the responsibilities.  I want to eat, drink, and be merry.

Why is it so much easier to own the older son part of me, the part that is crabbed and resentful and not so much fun?  Why is it so much harder to say, And underneath, I'm someone who wants to hang out and have a good time.

Because I see the younger son only as selfish.  By asking for his inheritance, he basically tells his father he wishes the old man were dead.  By leaving, he saddles the older son with all the work of running the farm.  And yet...

I envy him.  There's a part of me that knows I'd like to do what he does; I just don't have the nerve.  It's easier to judge the younger son than to admit that I have the same desires, even if I don't act on them.

Of course, my running-away-from-home fantasy doesn't include the part about running out of money.  Or the part about slopping the pigs.  Or the part about nearly starving to death.  Or the part where I have to come crawling home.  No, in my fantasy it's all the fun and none of the hangover.

But it's not really the pig sty I'm afraid of.  I'm not afraid of where I'll end up, but of the dust-up I'll leave behind.  I'm not so afraid of where I might go as of what judgments I might stir up in my wake.

Because I'm not so sure that everything about the younger son is so very bad. Sure, running away and leaving it all behind is a questionable strategy, but isn't there something between the younger son's grab for his share and the older son's inability to join in the party?  Is there a place we can find where we can both, older son and younger, help out around the farm and still enjoy sharing the fatted calf?

For Entering In...

- Wherever you are right now, God is present too.  Look around you.  Are your surroundings familiar or new to you?  What do you notice?  Can you recognize that God is here, now?

- Reflect on these questions:

• I suspect the older son feels selfless next to the younger son's selfishness.  How do those opposing dynamics play out in you?  What do you do that you think of as selfless?  Dig deep and wonder, what are your true motives?

• Is there something you do for yourself that you judge as selfish?  Is it really?  Does it hurt others?  Does it hurt you?  If so, pray about what it is you really need.  How can get that need met without hurting anyone?  If it doesn't hurt anyone, pray about whether it is, in fact, selfish.

• Is there an area of your life where you are being called to pitch in a little more, to take the burden off of someone else?  Is there a way in which you are being called to set aside your own burden and celebrate?

• Spend some time in the quiet holding in tension what you are discovering about your inner older and younger sons.  Don't try to reconcile them.  Notice what God has to say in the dynamic between them.

- Breathe deeply and notice the air as it fills your body.  Every breath is a gift, a dimension of the Father's bounty that belongs to us (Luke 15:22-23, 31).  Carry that awareness back into your day.

Lenten Journey: Brothers

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

For Reflection...

"A man had two sons..."  Can you imagine if these two were real-life brothers, growing up in the same home?  The elder would be charged with keeping a watchful eye on the younger.  He'd know what he was up to -- no good -- and not up to -- any work that needed to be done.  He'd feel superior, self-righteous.

Meanwhile, the younger son...  Maybe he'd start by looking up to his brother, trying to emulate him.  But it's just not him.  He's got his own gifts.  He might not be the hardest worker, but he knows how to have a good time.  He's funny, charismatic, the life of the party.  He relishes his own verve and wit, but all he gets in return are his brother's stern looks and judgments.  Maybe his parents chime in too:  Why can't you be more like your brother?  The older son is confirmed in his righteousness, the younger in the belief that he can't get what he wants at home.

On the outside, I am all older son -- responsible, serious, practical homebody.  I've never identified with the younger son -- or, perhaps it's more honest to say that I've never allowed myself to.  My older son keeps my younger son firmly in check with no end of stern looks and judgments.  The older son in me knows full well that if my younger son is left to his own devices, things will end badly.  There will go the inheritance, squandered on a life of dissipation.

At the same time, my older son, while wanting to lock my younger son up at home, secretly and sometimes vehemently envies all the younger sons who leave home for distant countries.  Younger sons know what they want -- and they ask for it:  "Father, give me the share of your estate that should come to me."  And the father does.  Older sons don't know what they really want -- maybe a party of their own with enough young goat for everyone? -- but they're not so sure, and they don't ask.

The younger son in the story moves out, and the older son is proved right, isn't he?  The inheritance swallowed up by prostitutes.  The younger son's road ends in the worst possible place -- a pig sty.

Or does it?  In fact, the younger son's road ends in a U-turn.  The end of the road is the beginning, only with fresh robes and rings and the fatted calf and a party to end all parties.

The parable ends without any meeting of the brothers.  I wonder what such a confrontation might yield.  What would the older brother see in the younger?  The younger in the elder?

For Entering In...

- Where has God been in your day so far?  Can you become quiet and notice the beating of your own heart and know that God is there, breathing along with you?

- Reflect on these questions:

• Is there a "younger son" in you that you deny?  Time to dig deeper:  What would you do if there were no consequences?  To what far distant country would you travel?  What would you do there?

• What are your judgments about what you want?  What keeps you from asking?  What are you afraid would happen if you allowed your younger son free reign with his portion of the inheritance?

• The father in the parable gives the younger son what he wants, even while, we presume, knowing how the son is likely to spend it.  What do you think about this sort of radical freedom?  What are the potential risks?  The potential rewards?

• How might you live your life differently if you believed that the end of the road was never a pig sty, and always the chance to make a U-turn toward home?

- Breathe deeply and notice the air as it fills your body.  Every breath is a gift, a dimension of the Father's bounty that belongs to us (Luke 15:22-23, 31).  Carry that awareness back into your day.

Lenten Journey: The Older Son

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

For Reflection...

"A man had two sons..."  That's how the parable begins.  The next part, the part we know the best, is about the younger son who takes his share of the estate, skips town, parties 'til he's broke, then comes crying home.

The older son doesn't come in until near the end.  That figures, says the older son in me.

It is the older son with whom I most often identify.  He's the one who stays at home.  He's the one working away in the fields.  He does the right thing.  He helps his father.  He doesn't cause any trouble.  He doesn't ask for anything, not so much as a goat.

I'll bet he's a good Jew.  Always says his prayers.  Follows God's Law to the letter.  Except for the part where we're called to "taste and see that the Lord is good" (Psalm 34:9).  I know, because the Father practically begs this older son to come in to the party, and the son won't come.  "Taste and see that the Lord is good," the Father seems to say, but his older son cannot.

Neither can I sometimes.  Like the older son, I get tired, sick and tired.  The party started while I was still out in the field (v. 25).  As a matter of fact, my Father's other son (no brother of mine) has been partying all his life while I've been shoveling the manure.  I'm in no mood to celebrate and rejoice (v. 32).

But the party will go on, with or without the older son, with our without me.  The parable ends with the question implied:  Will he go in, or won't he?


For Entering In...

- Take a deep breath.  Close your eyes and feel the surface you're sitting on, notice your body in space.  Think about where you believe your soul resides and breathe into that space, knowing God dwells there too.

- Reflect on these questions:

• In what ways have you, like the older son, tried to do the right thing with your inheritance?  When have you chosen to remain at home in spite of the lure of the distant country?  What are the fields you've labored in?

• The older son is resentful because he believes that his sacrifice has gone unrecognized (v. 29), not unlike the lament of Cain in Genesis (4:5ff).  Consider sacrifices you feel you've made.  Is there something you've expect in return?  Accolades?  Thanks?  Acknowledgement?  Be honest.  How does has it felt to you if those expectations have not been met?

• Can you think of a time when you've seen someone get something you don't believe they deserve?  Maybe an advancement at work?  Money or other material wealth?  Some other sort of success?  Or, like the younger son in the parable, excessive pardon for wrongs committed?  How has that made you feel?

• Jesus repeatedly uses images of celebration to describe what it's like to enter the Kingdom of God (see Matthew 22 and Luke 14).  Do you ever feel reluctant to enter into the party?  If so, what is that like for you?  What is keeping you out?

- Breathe deeply again and notice the air as it fills your body.  Every breath is a gift, a dimension of the Father's bounty that belongs to us (Luke 15:31).  Carry that awareness back into your day.

Lenten Journey: Fourth Sunday - Coming Home

Scripture Readings of the Day

Joshua  5:9a, 10-12

Psalm 34

2 Corinthians 5:17-21

Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

For Reflection...

In the book of Joshua, the Israelites finally come home to the Promised Land.  In the gospel, the younger son comes home to his prodigal father.  And in 2 Corinthians we -- and all the world with us -- come home to God through Christ.

We spend so much of our lives feeling like exiles wandering in a distant country.  We are desert dwellers, refugees from Egypt, surviving on manna and quail.  We have gone our own way, squandered our inheritance, and are reduced to slopping the pigs.

We live with the persistent sense that wherever we are, we are not at home.  And the moments when we feel as though we have finally arrived, in their passing, only serve to reinforce that we're not there yet.

Still, we continue to wander.  We can't build our cities in the desert.  We don't finally eat from the slop bucket, hungry though we are.  Our restless longing is for a place we know we know.  There is something inside of us that won't let us rest until we've made our return.

For Entering In...

- Have you come to feel comfortable in a space where you can spend time in the quiet?  What do you need to have that space, that time, to become present to yourself and to God?

- Reflect on these questions:

• Think about your experience of home.  What comes to mind?  A particular place?  A structure?  Furnishings?  People?  Close your eyes and know what it feels like in your body when you are at "home."

• What has been your experience of leaving home?  Maybe when you went to college.  Maybe when you got married.  Maybe when you went on a trip without your parents for the first time.  Maybe when you moved to a new city or state or country.  Maybe something else.  What is that feeling?  What does it feel like in your body when you reflect on leaving home?

• Have you ever been lost?  Have you ever been homesick?  Have you ever wanted to go home and somehow couldn't?  What happened?  Can you remember how that felt?

• Do you relate to the idea that we live with a sense of "restless longing"?  What do you long for?  Spend a few minutes with yourself taking inventory -- what are all the things that are standing between you and feeling at home in your life?  Notice each thing that comes up.  Don't think of these experiences as problems to be solved.  Just acknowledge them and let them be.

- As you wind down this time apart, consider the degree to which your interludes of focused prayer lead you to feel at home -- or in exile.

Lenten Journey: God's Judgment

Some people told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices.  Jesus said tho them in reply, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans?  By no means!  But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!  Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them -- do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem?  By no means!  But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will perish as they did!"

- Luke 13:1-5 

God our Savior...desires everyone to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

- 1 Timothy 2:3-4 

For Reflection...

We hear it in fiery evangelical messages, the warning of God's imminent judgment.  It is Biblical, from the Old Testament prophets through John the Baptist.  Repent! they say.  Follow God's law.  Turn away from idols.  Or, as I heard on Ash Wednesday, Turn away from sin and be faithful to the gospel.

Or else.

God has established his will, so the argument goes; humans have disobeyed.  God has established his law; humans have gone our own way.  There must be consequences.

Isn't that how it works?  I am not a god, but I am a parent, and there are similarities, if this argument holds.  I bring these children into the world and expect them to adhere to my will and follow the laws I set down or face the consequences.  It's true, and it works -- up to a point.

One of my challenges as a parent has always been that, when my children haven't followed my rules, set down in black and white, I see all the grey.  Is it that they won't, or is it that they can't?  As a friend recently said to me, "It sounds like you're more mercy than judgment."  Exactly.

If that is true of me in any sense, it must be more true of the God whose character is kind and merciful.  If I know of my children, of myself, that sometimes we cannot do the good we might will to do (cf. Romans 7), than God knows that all the more.

So what does Jesus -- Jesus! -- mean when he says that if we don't repent, we will perish in bloody conflict, buried under the rubble of fallen towers?  Is he saying that God will smite us into hell?  I don't think so.

In 1 Timothy, we're told that God "desires everyone to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth."  Everyone.  That is God's will -- that we be saved and not come to destruction.  It is not God's will that threatens my salvation; it is my will.  What I know as a parent is that the rules I make for my children are for their good.  I am trying to keep them safe physically, emotionally, spiritually.  Don't run in the street.  Don't hold a grudge.  Don't forget to say your prayers.  I'm trying to guide them in building lives that will lead them to the knowledge of truth.

Jesus knows the same thing about the God's will for us.  Following the will of God is the way for us to be safe.  It doesn't guarantee a carefree life.  This we know.  Tyrants will still attack.  Towers will still fall.  But our real life, the life that matters, the life that carries on into eternity, will endure.

For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments in silence becoming present to yourself and to God. What does it feel like to be alert and aware in God's present?

- Reflect on these questions:

• What have you believed about God's judgment?  What were you taught as a child, if anything?  What have you heard or thought about it as an adult?

• Have you been in a position to set limits and enforce consequences on someone you love?  As a parent?  Teacher?  Pet owner?  What has your experience been?  How have you held the space between judgment and mercy?

• Psalm 111:10 says, "The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom."  Spend a few minutes silently reflecting on this verse.  What do you understand it to mean?  What does God have to say to you in prayer about "the fear of God"?

• Have you had a specific experience where you had a strong sense of God's will for you?  How did you know?  What did you do?  Did you say yes or no?  What were the consequences?

- Again today, remember the word that you have fastened to your heart.  Continue to use your word, day and night, to recall you to the truth that God is with you always. 

Lenten Journey: Not God's Will

Some people told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices.  Jesus said tho them in reply, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans?  By no means!  But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!  Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them -- do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem?  By no means!  But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will perish as they did!"

- Luke 13:1-5 

For Reflection...

There is pain in this world that raises a single question to which there seems to be no satisfactory answer:  Why?  Why did Pilate kill those people at the altar of God?  Why did that tower fall on those bystanders?  Why did my mother get cancer?  Why did that boy commit suicide?  Why the tsunami?  Why do so many children starve to death in sub-Saharan Africa or Bangladesh?

I want to know why.  I hear these stories, and I feel desperately out of control.  I want to help or to fix.  More than anything I want some sense of assurance that this terrible thing will not, cannot, happen to me.  If I know why, if there is some reason or pattern, I can avoid this terrible fate.  If I can only blame someone or something.  If not, I know it could as well be me.

Perhaps the least satisfactory of all unsatisfactory answers is the one the people who come to Jesus seem to propose:  It was God's will.  We've all heard it.  Something tragic happens, and someone, somewhere, suggests that "everything happens for a reason."  Others go so far as to detail the reason, from "God's perspective":  The hurricane was God's judgment on Haiti, because Haitians practice voodoo.  AIDS is God's punishment for homosexuals.

Lies!

I want to say this as emphatically as I can.  Jesus did too.  I expect his, "By no means!" was more raw and pointed in Aramaic.  You say this is God's will?  The senseless deaths of innocent people?  The vicious exercise of power by a petty tyrant?  No!

The particular lie of "God's will" is insidious.  Pious and kind people use it all the time.  We believe, in the standard form of the argument, that God is all powerful and all good, so we get caught up in the trap of believing that that must mean that God ordains everything that happens -- and that, despite all the evidence before us, everything that happens must be good.

No!

Jesus weeps at the tomb of Lazarus (John 11:35), and he weeps at the altar and the tower of Siloam.  He weeps with me in my mother's hospital room and at the graveside of the boy who died by his own hand.  He weeps in Haiti and Africa and Bangladesh and the bedsides of people with AIDS.

This is the first and crucial thing to grasp about God's will.  God allows evil in the world.  That is undeniable. But God does not will it.


For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments in silence becoming present to yourself and to God.  Take an extra few moments to ground yourself in the knowledge that you are safe and loved.  This is some hard ground we're going over today.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Remember a time when you've heard something that struck you as tragic?  What was your response? How did you feel?  What did you think?

• Have you had a time when you wondered, Where was God?  Can you give yourself permission to question God's power or goodness?  God can handle our doubts.

• We sometimes think of prayer as being permissible only within a narrow range:  We can offer worship or thanks or confess or ask for intercession.  Can you imagine turning to God in your doubt?  In anger?  In raw grief?

• What are the tragedies, personal or global, that weigh on your heart?  Spend the remainder of your prayer time today bringing those to God.  Use words, if you want, or just sit with the Lord in the midst of your sorrow.

- Continue this week to fasten your word to your heart.  Turn to that word during the day or in the night, and know that you are in the presence of God.

- As you finish this quiet time, return to the awareness of God's unshakable love for you.

Lenten Journey: Third Sunday - God's Will

Scripture Readings of the Day

Exodus 3:1-8a, 13-15

Psalm 103

1 Corinthians 10:1-6, 10-12

Luke 13:1-9

For Reflection...

During this third week in Lent, we will arrive at the half-way point of the forty day journey from Ash Wednesday to the Passion of the Lord and Holy Week.  It's time to notice where we have come to along the Lenten road.

We began with the three great themes of Lent, fasting, almsgiving, and prayer.  Lent is a dessert season, and its practices of self-denial are all meant to call us into deeper relationship with the God who, in Jesus, we can meet face to face.

Once we have encountered this God, what then?  Encounter is not synonymous with going to church or following the rules.  It is a living relationship.  God takes the initiative in our very creation.  We respond by doing what we're doing now, turning our faces toward God.

But if our relationship is to grow, we must wonder what is next for us.  God wants us to do more than show up.  We are invited to participate in the work of redemption, that is, in the transformation of the world-broken-by-sin into the Kingdom of God.

If we have come to believe that we have met the real God, we might well wonder what our Creator desires of us. What is God's will?  How do we recognize it?  How do we begin to respond?


For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments in silence becoming present to yourself and to the God who dwells within you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Have you chosen something from which to fast this Lent?  If so, how has that been for you?  Rather than thinking about yourself as having been "good" or "bad," notice whether and when it has been easy or difficult.  What have you been aware of as you fast?  What have you learned?  If you have not been fasting, consider what you might be called to abstain from and why you may be resisting.

• Have you given alms, that is, acted in mercy for someone in need?  Have you been vulnerable enough to receive help in your own need?  Remember that when we act in charity, whether as one who gives or one who humbly receives, we see the face of Christ in another -- and she sees the face of Christ in us.

• How is your prayer life?  Have you adopted or renewed a daily practice of time set apart to be present to God?  Do you still feel concerned about what or where or when or how you pray?  What if every time you became conscious of the presence of God, that was your prayer?  Could you use that as a place from which to grow?

• Have you yet chosen a word to "fasten to your heart."  Continue to carry your word with you, letting it speak in your heart.

• Think back to where you felt you were in relationship to God on Ash Wednesday.  Notice where you are now.  Has anything changed?  Write about what comes up for you.

- As you finish this quiet time, rejoice in the presence of the God who made you just as you are and who longs to have you draw near.

Lenten Journey: Religious Experience

They fell silent and did not at that time tell anyone what they had seen.

- Luke 9:36 

For Reflection...

So-called religious experiences can be slippery things.  Something happens.  I see something or hear something in prayer that strikes me as exceptional.  I am aware of a message or an idea or a deeper meaning that feels like it's come out of nowhere, something I've never thought before.  Or I see an image in my imagination that is so vivid and original and yet so descriptive of my current situation that I can't help but wonder where it came from.

Who can I tell?  With whom can I verify such experiences as both real and of God?

We've all heard of people who say they hear voices or see things that aren't there.  We call them schizophrenic.  We've probably also encountered people who, in one form or another, claim to speak for God.  We think of them as deluded or fanatical.

What does it mean to have a direct experience of God?  How do we know?  What do we do with it?

I don't know, but I can imagine, that Peter, James, and John, discussed their experience among themselves and with Jesus.  A first step in grounding a direct experience of God has to be conferring with mature people of faith.  If I think that God has a word to say to me, I need to bring that word to at least one trusted friend , a pastor, or a spiritual director, someone who I know to be of at least as mature in her walk with Christ as I am.  What does she think?  Does this word strike her as consistent with what she knows of God and of me and my walk of faith?

Another test is to hold the word I have received in the light of scripture and the Christian tradition.  Orthodox Christian belief holds that there is no new revelation in the present age, so anything that I might hear from the Lord has to be consistent with the revealed word.  God's revelation has come to us through the Bible and also through the experiences of other believers through the ages.  Is what I hear in keeping with that revelation?

Finally, God's word for me is for me.  If God is speaking directly to my heart, God's word is an intimate message within our relationship.  God's communication is not like the president to his press secretary, a movie star to his publicist, or a CEO to her public relations manager.  God is instead like a lover whispering to his beloved in the dark.

As we draw close and closer to God, we will hear God speak.  Now we must begin to learn how to listen.


For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments in silence becoming present to yourself and to the God who dwells within you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• What is your opinion of so-called religious experience?  Have you encountered any such experiences, positive or negative, personal or something you've heard from others?

• Are you willing to be open to hearing God speak directly to your heart?  Have you heard God speak to you?  Plan again today to spend time in the silence, listening.

• Do you have mature believers you can turn to in order to confer about your experience of God?  A pastor you trust?  A friend whose walk with Christ you admire?  A professional spiritual director?*

• How well acquainted are you with the Bible or with the stories of people of faith?  Consider engaging in a program of reading, even if it's just a little bit each day or most days.  Some people find it helpful to start with the Gospel of Mark, which is the shortest, quickest account of the ministry and passion of Jesus.  For reading from the tradition, C.S. Lewis is an easy place to begin.  Try Mere Christianity.

• Have you chosen a word to "fasten to your heart."  Continue to carry your word with you, letting it speak in your heart.

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment just to be aware and present to your soul and to the God who dwells there.

* Spiritual Directors International has an on-line guide to help you find a spiritual director near you.  Members of SDI come from a wide variety of faith traditions.  If you are looking for more information, or if you have something you would like to share privately, please feel free to e-mail me.

Lenten Journey: The Voice from the Cloud

While he was still speaking, a cloud came and cast a shadow over them, and they became frightened when they entered the cloud.  Then from the cloud came a voice that said, "This is my chosen Son; listen to him."  After the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone.

- Luke 9:34-36

For Reflection...

The cloud is God's form of self-revelation to the Israelites as the flee from Egypt.  As here, on this mountain, the voice from the cloud recalls the voice from heaven declaring Jesus as the beloved Son in his baptism (Luke 3:21-22).  Moses and Elijah are gone, so the one to whom we are to listen is made clear.  It is Jesus.

What does it look like for me to listen to Jesus?  It was easy for Peter, James, and John, I might say.  Jesus was with them in the flesh.  And even they struggled to hear and understand (see, for example, Luke 9:45, just a few verses from the passage above).

How can we listen to the voice of God in our lives today?  Our noisy, busy world, all marketplace and technology, does not make it easy.

As Jesus brings the disciples up the mountain, as we have paused to take up these Lenten devotions, we might consider time apart as the first movement in hearing God speak.  The next movement is allowing our time apart to be bathed in silence.

For some people, silence may seem easy and natural, but, if you are anything like me, it may have to begin as an uncomfortable discipline.  And why is that?  For me, when I enter the silence, my first experience is to notice the deafening noise in my head.  The radio, television, chatter, and whatnot aside, nothing could be more preoccupying than the voice nattering inside of me.

I can't turn it off.  Trying only makes it worse.

The problem isn't new to me, to us, to our generation.  Centuries ago, in the late Middle Ages, a now anonymous author wrote about this challenge.  His work has come down to us as The Cloud of Unknowing, and he is known only as the author of The Cloud.  He offers pointed advice to the disciple searching to meet the God whose voice comes from the cloud.  He directly addresses the need to be relieved of the tyranny of the interior noise that blocks our meeting.

The advice of the author of The Cloud is unexpectedly simple.  He suggests choosing a word:

[Take] a short word, preferably of one syllable...The shorter the word the better, being more like the working of the Spirit.  A word like "God" or "love."  Choose which you like, or perhaps some other, so long as it is of one syllable.  And fix this word fast to your heart, so that it is always there, come what may.

That's the centerpiece.  Choose a word.  Fasten it to your heart.  When distractions arise, allow the word to rise up instead.  This is the beginning of contemplation, of surrendering all else in the expectation of hearing the voice that is spoken from the cloud.


For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  If your mind is preoccupied, allow the thoughts to come and to go.  Notice what you feel in your body, in your heart.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• There are many ways we might listen for God's voice -- the words of scripture, prayers, sermons, or books, the voices of friends, children, or teachers.  Where have you heard God's speaking?

• What do you think about listening for the voice of Jesus inside of yourself, the indwelling voice of the Holy Spirit?  Have you heard him speak?

• How do you feel about silence?  Have you had any experience of spending time in intentional silence? If so, how has that been for you?

• Make a plan to spend some time in silence during the next few days.  Notice what you hear.  Is there noise inside when the noise outside stops?  What is that like?

• Choose a word to "fasten to your heart."  Pray about what it might be.  Maybe it will be a single syllable, maybe two.  It can be a "spiritual" word or any word that speaks to your heart.  Some examples might be Jesus, God, one, peace, love, quiet, Spirit, joy.  You can't do this wrong.  

• Carry your word around with you, in your heart.  Return to it during the day, or even if you awake at night.  Let it speak in your heart. 

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment to connect with your soul and with the God who dwells there.  

Lenten Journey: Setting Up Camp

As [Moses and Elijah] were about to part from him, Peter said to Jesus, "Master, it is good that we are here; let us make three tents, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."  But he did not know what he was saying.  

- Luke 9:33

For Reflection...

Perhaps, had we been there with Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration, once we shook ourselves fully awake to bear witness to God's glory, we would likewise have been tempted to set up camp.  It's hard not to love the mountaintop.

When I go to the mountaintop, I feel my doubts melt away.  I feel the presence of God so tangibly.  I know in my bones that God is good and that, however much worldly woes might seek to dissuade me, all shall be well.  All I want to do when I'm there is set up a tent and move in.

The Jewish Feast of Booths or Sukkot -- to which Peter's tent building likely refers -- is a commemoration of the provision of God for the people of Israel as they wandered forty years in the desert.  It is also a harvest festival, a celebration of the time for reaping what had been sown.

Maybe Peter believed that they had arrived at the harvest, here, on this mountain.  Jesus talks about the harvest (e.g., especially, John 4) as a way of pointing to the appointed time for God's fulfillment of God's plan.  Peter sees the radiance of God's glory in Jesus transfigured and believes that they are home at last.

It is not insignificant that a few verses early in the ninth chapter of Luke Peter has affirmed his understanding of Jesus as Messiah.  In Matthew's gospel (chapter 16), immediately following Peter's declaration, that same Peter roundly rejects the idea that the Messiah "must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised" (v. 21).  Although Jesus rebukes him in the strongest terms ("Get behind me, Satan!" v. 23), perhaps Peter is still determined that the fulfillment can happen on the mountaintop.

That's what I want too.  When I'm riding high up on the mountaintop, I want to stay.  I want to believe that, at last, all of my problems will be solved, that I can be forever peaceful and carefree.

But I, like Peter, do not know what I'm saying.  There is only one road to ultimate freedom, and it leads through death.  I don't want to hear it.  I don't want to think about it.  Like Peter, I want to say to the Master, "God forbid it, Lord.  This must never happen to you!" (Matthew 16:22), by which I also mean, this must never happen to me.


For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  If your mind is preoccupied, allow the thoughts to come and to go.  Notice what you feel in your body, in your heart.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Have you had a mountaintop experience where you wanted to remain?  Close your eyes, take your time, and really remember what that felt like.

• Have there been times in your life when you have been faced with a truth ("[The] Messiah must...undergo great suffering...") that you didn't want to confront?  What was that like for you?

• Have you experienced a significant death or deaths in your life?  Are you ever willing to pause and consider your own mortality?

• This season of Lent can be a time of reckoning with our own mortality.  The Christian creeds include the confession that death is not the end of our existence.  What are your beliefs about death and mortality or immortality?

• In "The Weight of Glory", C.S. Lewis says something about immortality that is worth quoting at length:

"It is a serious thing to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship [like Jesus in his transfigured state], or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare.  All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations...There are no ordinary people.  You have never talked to a mere mortal...[It] is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit -- immortal horrors or everlasting splendors."

What does this passage say to you about immortality -- yours and others'? 

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment to connect with your soul and with the God who dwells there.  Rejoice in God's intention for you to be reborn as an everlasting splendor.

Lenten Journey: Waking Up

Peter and his companions had been overcome by sleep, but becoming fully awake, they saw his glory and the two men standing with him.

- Luke 9:32

For Reflection...

Peter, James, and John had been called to the mountaintop to watch the Master pray.  That is the way with disciples of a rabbi; they watch and do as the rabbi does.  Do as I do, invites Jesus, as these three are called apart.  He prays and is transformed from glory to glory.  Do as I do.  But they fall asleep.

We are called up the mountain too.  We can recall our own mountaintop experiences, the times when our faces were aglow with God's glory.  We were awake then, awake to the Something More that tends to elude us in our day to day lives.  We knew the joy and presence of God not only in our heads, but in our hearts, our souls.  We became its embodiment.  And then we fell asleep.

It's easy to forget the mountaintop from the valley.  That's why we're here, on this journey together.  We, you and I, are keeping each other awake.  When we meet here, in this virtual communion, we remind each other to stay awake.

We need not just to open our eyes, but, like the disciples, to become fully awake.  Half measures won't do.  The world is too much.  If we doze, even for a moment, if we pause to rest our eyes, we are overcome.  We do.  We succumb to sleep, so we have to be vigilant, and not just for ourselves, but for one another.  I will never be able to shake myself awake, but I can keep watch for you, and you can keep watch for me.

Because when we are fully awake, we witness the glory of God.

For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  If your mind is preoccupied, allow the thoughts to come and to go.  Notice what you feel in your body, in your heart.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• In what ways do you sleep through your life?  Where are you being called to wake up?

• Who are the people in your life who help you to stay awake?  Who might you ask to walk with you in this way?  If you feel hesitant to ask, notice that hesitation and wonder what it might be saying to you.

• Who can you serve who might desire your help to stay awake?  Don't offer if you haven't been asked, but listen.  Listen especially in prayer.  Who might be crying out for your companionship?

• We often wake up only to fall asleep again.  When we are fully awake, we cannot avoid the truth as it comes to us, and sometimes that feels hard.  What keeps you from staying awake?

• How is your prayer life today?  Will you set aside time, today, to stay awake?  You may witness the glory of God and come away with your face radiant.

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment to connect with your soul and enjoy the goodness that God has created in you.

Lenten Journey: Exodus

And behold, two men were conversing with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his exodus that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem. 

- Luke 9:30-31

For Reflection...

We talked last week about Jesus as the Jewish Messiah.  That identity could hardly be more evident than it is here, on the Mount of Transfiguration.  Who should be conversing with Jesus, but Moses, the lawgiver, and Elijah, prophet among prophets?  In Matthew 7:15, Jesus asserts that he has come not to abolish, but to fulfill the Law and the prophets.  He is the completion of the story that Moses and Elijah both represent and embody.

All three appear in glory.  They shine forth with the light of God in their faithful witness to God's purpose -- which is exodus and Jerusalem.

I am grateful that this translation (New American Bible, rev.) uses the word exodus, where others translate departure or death.  No.  Exodus is critical, because we are meant to be recalled to the exodus from Egypt, the foundational story of Israel and, thus, of Israel's Messiah.

The exodus from Egypt is the saving event in Israel's story of God's saving work.  Israel escapes slavery only through the Passover, the sparing of the firstborn of Israel amidst the death of the firstborn of Egypt.  The Israelites are kept safe by being marked with the blood of the sacrificial lamb (Exodus 12).  They will be saved through the waters of the parted sea (Exodus 14).  They will wander in the desert for forty years.  They will inherit the land God has promised.

Jesus prophetically enacts every move -- passing through the waters in his baptism (at the Jordan, the river across which the Israelites under Joshua finally enter the Promised Land; see Joshua 3), spending forty days in the desert.  He is leading us on a new exodus from slavery -- to sin -- into a new land of promise, the Kingdom of God.

And the road goes through Jerusalem.

Even from the mountaintop, we must set our faces toward Jerusalem (Luke 9:51).  Beyond Egypt, beyond the desert, Jerusalem is ground zero for the story of salvation.  Jerusalem is the capital, the Holy City, the place of sacrifice.  It is our final destination, the only destination.  God's glory shines forth from this city on this hill.  If we are going to be light-bearers, God-image-bearers, we too will have to continue on from the mountaintop toward Jerusalem.

For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  If your mind is preoccupied, allow the thoughts to come and to go.  Notice what you feel in your body, in your heart.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• The law can be seen as a way of maintaining a sound boundary.  It keeps us safe.  It can also keep others out, and it can oppress those who are "in."  How do you understand the role of the law in your spiritual life?  How does it relate to your sense of freedom?  Of responsibility?

• Psalm 119, the longest chapter in the Bible, is a hymn in praise of God's law.  Spend the next few days reading some or all of it.  Write or reflect about what you discover about the law.  Does Psalm 119 change your view?  Reinforce it?

• Who have been the lawgivers and keepers in your life?  What are the laws you have been expected to live by, either by others or by yourself?  Which, if any, would you like to have seen abolished?  Which laws, if any, have been flouted that you wanted to defend?

• Jesus says that he has come not to abolish -- and not to defend -- but to fulfill the law.  Spend some time reflecting on this saying.  What might it mean to you, in your life today?

• From what in your life are you looking to experience an "exodus" of freedom and deliverance?  Can you ask God to lead you out of your enslavement, your Egypt?

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment to connect with your soul and with the God who made you and is sustaining you this day, in this moment.  Notice your breathing.  Remember that it is a gift.

Lenten Journey: Reflecting God's Glory

Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray.  While he was praying his face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white.  And behold, two men were conversing with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his exodus that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem.   Peter and his companions had been overcome by sleep, but becoming fully awake, they saw his glory and the two men standing with him.  As they were about to part from him, Peter said to Jesus, "Master, it is good that we are here; let us make three tents, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."  But he did not know what he was saying.  While he was still speaking, a cloud came and cast a shadow over them, and they became frightened when they entered the cloud.  Then from the cloud came a voice that said, "This is my chosen Son; listen to him."  After the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone.  They fell silent and did not at that time tell anyone what they had seen.

- Luke 9:28b-36 

For Reflection...

"Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray. While he was praying..."

Do we notice that this story which we refer to as the transfiguration of Jesus takes place while Jesus was praying?  We've spent some time already this Lent reflecting on prayer and even more time practicing  prayer.  We have talked together about prayer as the act of becoming present to the God who, even now, is waiting for us to notice that God is always present to us.  We have considered the throat-parched cry of the desert prayer; we'll be there, in the desert with Jesus again, before Easter arrives.

But this week we are on the mountaintop.  We, with Peter and James and John, are invited to watch and learn from Jesus who has climbed to the heights to pray.

It is in the midst of this mountaintop prayer that Jesus, like Moses (Exodus 34:29ff), radiates the light of God's presence.  Like Moses in the tent of meeting (Exodus 33:11), Jesus approaches God face to face (cf. Hebrews 9:24), and Jesus invites his disciples -- us -- to do the same.

There is something about being in the presence of God that shows in my face.  I look different, even if the difference fades.  There is a glory in me that, when it encounters the glory of God, shines out of me like a light.  I become like a lamp in the darkness, a city on a hill (Matthew 5:14).

The dark world needs my light.  When I am shining, I become a sign to the nations, promised in Isaiah (49:6).  I become a part of the solution that God always intended to insure through Israel's Messiah.  I am equipped as part of the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 12) to participate in the work of reconciling the broken world -- healing, loving, forgiving.

It is no accident that Jesus transfigured appears clothed in "dazzling white," and we, at our baptism, are likewise adorned.  We put on the promise of transfiguration.  As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 3:18:

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

We are the mirror image of the glorious face of God.  We are called with Christ to be the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15).  Do we believe it?  Do we believe that when the light shines from our faces, it is God that people see?

For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  If your mind is preoccupied, allow the thoughts to come and to go.  Notice what you feel in your body, in your heart.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• What have been mountaintop experiences in your life?  What are the times when you have glowed with joy or wonder or peace or delight?

• Choose one or more of your mountaintop experiences.  Ask yourself, when you were there, on the mountaintop, where was God?

• Sometimes it can be difficult for me to see my own light.  Can you think of a time when you saw someone else's face aglow with the glory of God?  Who was it?  What were the circumstances?  How did it make you feel?

• How have others been touched by your light?  Has there been a time when you knew you were shining God's light into the world?  What was that experience like for you?  Was there something about that experience and your role in it that stands out for you?

• Make a list of the ways in which God has gifted you.  What are the talents that you bring to the world?  Can you give humble thanks to God for inviting you into God's healing work?

- As you finish this quiet time, take a moment to connect with your soul and enjoy the goodness that God has created in you.

Lenten Journey: Second Sunday - The Mountaintop

Scripture Readings for the Day

Genesis 15: 5-12, 17-18

Psalm 27

Philippians 3:17-4:1

Luke 9:28b-36

For Reflection...

"Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray."

The desert is real -- all too real-- but it hardly encompasses our whole experience of our human condition.  There is also the mountaintop.

At times we get a glimpse of Something More.  We know that, while our feet are grounded in the earth, there is a part of us that is made for Heaven.  Maybe it is only a pinprick of light in an otherwise dark country.  Maybe it is as blindingly bright as the sun.  It may last a long time, or it may pass in an instant, but either way, it is a window on eternity.

And something in our souls recognizes it.

There is something about me that resonates with something I cannot finally name.  I might call it Joy or Love or Grace or Glory, and all those things will be true even as they somehow fall short.  I cannot describe what I see or capture what I feel.  Doubt might creep in from the valley.

But from my view from the mountaintop, I know it's absolutely true.

For Entering In...

- Spend a few moments becoming present to yourself.  Notice how it feels to be in your body, here, now.

- Invite God to be present with you.

- Reflect on these questions:

• Take some time to read the readings of the day.  Read them all and then choose one -- or just choose one.  

• Whatever you have chosen, read it again, slowly.  Notice what speaks to you in this passage.  Is it a phrase?  A word?  Jot it down.

• Hold that word or phrase lightly.  What we are aiming for is for you to take that word or phrase into your heart.  Rather than thinking about what it means, even what it means to you, allow your soul to engage in a kind of free-association.  What comes up for you as you hold the word or phrase?  Just let it come.

• What might God want you to take from this word into your life this week?  Today?  Ask God and quietly listen.  Again, what does your heart say?  Don't let your head tell you it doesn't make sense.  It's okay if it seems like it doesn't.  Just let it be.

• Spend a few minutes in silence with God.  Thank God for whatever you heard during this time of prayer.