El Verbo

Cause me to hear Thy lovingkindness in the morning; for in Thee do I trust:

Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk; for I lift up my soul unto Thee.

Deliver me, O Lord, Teach me to do Thy will; for Thou art my God: Thy spirit is good;

Quicken me, O Lord, I lift up my soul unto Thee. Psalm 143:7-11

Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ John 7:38

So I do several things in my life that make my smart and wise kids feel a little nervous and uncomfortable. One is riding to work down the bike lane on Broadway, because of course this world is full of distracted drivers who are not exactly paying attention, particularly to cyclists in the early morning traffic.

I also welcome guests through WarmShowers, a cyclist thing technically offering a place in the backyard to camp and a warm shower, but in reality, it more often opens up to being able to sleep on the couch and a cup of lentil soup with a grilled cheese sandwich, like last night for my guest riding his bike from Arkansas to California to visit his mother. It was going to freeze last night, so even though I wasn’t that excited about his profile, I didn’t turn him away, the Christmas season and all.

And that still small voice that I am always trying to hear more clearly and quickly.

I mean, today’s verses were written into a chorus I learned, um, exactly 40 years ago, in the living room of Luci and Harold Shaw. And I have been humming these words over and over again ever since then. Up and down the hill outside the refugee camp where I lived in San Jose de Ocoa as I tried to “ralk” Little Nicole to sleep; scrubbing diapers on a cement slab under a mesquite tree at Rancho La Argentina, prayer walking around and around the neighborhood vuelta across Country Club Road by Arrollo Chico with wandering javelinas y coyotes. And even now, as I peddle down the street, trying to dodge potholes and watch for cars pulling out into traffic.

And last night’s guest was a talkative chap, prattling on and on and on about all of the folks he was meeting. And he was shocked that I could speak “Guatemalan.” And that there was more to this border issue than “Obama started the problem when he was in office.” And then he asked some questions about sunrise and was really surprised to find out that dawn was later and nights are longer in the northern hemisphere during the winter. I tried to explain the earth’s tilt and rotation, but that was a little abstract even while twirling an orange.

And as he rode off this morning on his very loaded bike and cart that he can only maneuver five miles an hour, after asking the location of the nearest McDonald’s, I reflected on his visit. John’s visit. He has a name. And besides the obvious answer of the good practice of welcoming the stranger, I hope that I can grow ever tender and soft enough to love the least of these, each of these.

Even Me.

I reflected on his visit even as I chatted with Clay Pell who had called just as John was waving goodbye. Huh. Is Clay’s advice also part of that still small voice?

And what about Nate’s sermon about mixed metaphors today? Seriously, every single word about the Word and the Light and the Life was dead drop perfect. Is that an extra soft heart in action, or am I getting really much better at hearing clearly and quickly that still small voice?

El Verbo is an action word. Can Grace be an action word? Are we To Grace our way through life? To live as verbs within The Verb?

Knowing that this Light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not and will not overcome it.

And those post-service conversations, pulling out the iPhone 5 to insert dinner dates, a celebration of Kwanzaa and new contact numbers while snacking on crackers and cheese slices? How does technology and That Voice mesh? What about all those Casa Alitas *bings forming the background noise of my existence? Where do I draw the line?

The Verb in Genesis 1 is “Let there be…”

            Let there be?

As in something that is always becoming,

            A vision of God Spirit

            Always infusing the creation with something novel,

            Bringing into existence something good,

            Coming among us to do a new thing.

Deliver me O LORD. Teach me to do Thy will.

Quicken me O LORD. I lift up my soul unto Thee.

He is Good

Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good,

for His steadfast love endures forever. Psalm 138:1

So today we honor The Innocents, the under-two-year-old boys who were murdered by Herod in a desperate and quite-crazed and honestly futile attempt to protect his power.

And I am holding that thought in one hand while holding in the other hand Psalm 138 which frames every single event in and around and about Creation and the Creator with the refrain, for His steadfast love endures forever. Some versions call this steadfast love “mercy,” which is also a bit of a stretch.

Stretch as in tension. Stretch as in broadening perspective beyond the obvious. Stretch as in a leap of faith. A big fat leap of faith.

Yesterday there weren’t so many migrants released by ICE, so after translating for the medical team for a while and doing intake on one family from Honduras, I was rassled into giving two other families a ride to the airport.

One family was a woman and son, and one family was a man with daughter, but both kiddos were two-years-old and absolutely innocent. With round eyes and clutching fingers and slightly runny noses, these little ones are political pawns in a cruel game between the rich and greedy-to-be-richer who are shoving them about with the only goal of power protection. Once again.

As we walked through the process of parking the car, printing the tickets, weighing the tiny backpacks, watching the agent discretely push the secret code to bring in the security specialist to make a phone call to verify paperwork, jiggling weeping children while parents undergo a secondary inspection, pointing out the bathrooms and explaining the tickets, gate numbers and layovers in Houston and Atlanta before a final abrazo and “Dios les bendiga,” I was aware again and again of small gifts of His steadfast love or mercies being extended to our guests by kind agents erasing baggage costs, gracious repacking of emptied bags, or even simple eye contact and smiles.

So it’s one more day of trusting that somehow it is His hands that are actually holding this tension of an all Powerful and all Loving God allowing injustice and pain and that somehow He is Good.

And that I am called to be part of His Good, for this purpose I am God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for me to do.

And it must be Saturday, because once again I entered my Fixed Prayers with this prayer: For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

So be it.

For yet another day.

Blessed

Blessed is everyone who is in awe of Lord Jehovah and walks in His steps! Psalm 128:1 Aramaic Bible in Simple English

I am so very blessed.

Yes, I am even grateful for the eight days of stomach virus. Truly the end product of that week of writhing is gratitude.

Yesterday I read a conversation, deemed by The Washington Post to be the best television conversation of 2019, between Stephen Colbert and Anderson Cooper about grief and suffering and gratitude.

“It’s a gift to exist, and with existence comes suffering. There’s no escaping that.”

“I don’t want it to have happened,” Colbert clarified. “I want it to not have happened, but if you are grateful for your life, then you have to be grateful for all of it. You can’t pick and choose what you’re grateful for.”

Colbert continued: “So, what do you get from loss? You get awareness of other people’s loss, which allows you to connect with that other person, which allows you to love more deeply and to understand what it’s like to be a human being, if it’s true that all humans suffer.”

And I have a tiny humble understanding that my loss and discomfort is ever so minor on a global perspective, and I am reminded of that on a daily basis as migrants crowded together on old church pews tear up through my welcoming confession that we cannot even begin to grasp the pain and destruction and difficulties they have been walking through.

Ah yes the fires.

I have also been listening to and re-listening to Ryanhood’s “I Will Always Love You”:

No need to be so confused by all the fires you have to walk through
Cause they’re breaking you
And making you
And building you to be
Soft enough to love the least of these
Even Me

And my 10,000 Gifts Gratitude List churns forward through the sweet presence of beloved beings and piercingly good words of hope and shimmering light bouncing off the now-snow-capped Catalinas and possibly even train whistles in the not-so-far-distance.

My cup runneth over.

And may this cup be offered to each of the least of these today, and every day in this new year, making eye contact with the pain and destruction and difficulties, with tender gratitude and renewed resolution to walk alongside LORD Jehovah in His Kingdom work of restoration.

Hallowed be Thy Name.

Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

One cannot even begin to grasp the potency of this prayer, joining hearts around the world throughout all generations.

For Thine is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory forever and ever,

Amen.

Rest

December 20, 2019

Go

“Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to Your word.” Luke 1:38

We are all pilgrims on a journey to You, Lord.
May we contemplate Your time on earth,
and, with Your help, follow in Your footsteps

December 21, 2019

Rest

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,

for His steadfast love endures forever! Psalm 106:1

And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him,

the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,

the Spirit of counsel and might,

the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.

And His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.

He shall not judge by what His eyes see,

or decide disputes by what His ears hear,

But with righteousness He shall judge the poor,

and decide with equity for the meek of the earth. Isaiah 11:2-4

“Come to me all you who are burdened
and I will give you rest”
Here I am, Lord.
I come to seek Your presence.
I long for Your healing power.

I got into a little Facebook spat with Colin Winslow yesterday over what was the best Christmas carol. He declared “O Holy Night” to be the bestest, but I said that “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Eve” was the one that pierces my soul every time. Both of us agreed that we needed to hear Cameron sing them back-to-back to reach an agreement.

“I Heard the Bells” is based on a poem by grief-filled Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, written after the accidental death of his beloved wife and after his son ran off to fight in the Union army without his permission.

And in despair I bowed my head
There is no peace on earth I said
For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men

And the last few days I have been suffering from the most painfully gripping stomach flu ever, and have spent a lot of time writhing on my living room couch in front of my cute little fireplace and Christmas tree. Me being me, I have been distracting myself by rererereading A Tale of Two Cities.  Um, one thing is clear from old Dickens, besides his amazing character development skills, is that since the beginning of time, there is no peace on earth, this injustice and war and pain permeate the experience of life.

And yet.

In the quiet stillness, there is comfort and rest.

Come unto Me.

He is good.

For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord

as the waters cover the sea.

His steadfast love endures forever.

And in this promise we will rest.

Then rang the bells more loud and deep
God is not dead, nor does He sleep (peace on earth, peace on earth)
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men