And you have to wiggle them a little, so they don't break off at the stem.

Jesus taught us, saying: ‘You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, what can make it salty again? It is good for nothing, and can only be thrown out to be trampled under foot by men.’

If your only goal is to love, there is no such thing as failure. 

Francis willingly fell into the “bright abyss,” as poet and faith writer Christian Wiman calls it, where all weighing and counting are unnecessary and even burdensome. After Francis’ conversion, he lived the rest of his life in a different economy—the nonsensical economy of grace, where two plus two equals a hundred and deficits are somehow an advantage. –Richard Rohr

This is the math that my friend Peter was trying to sort out.

Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

Nonsensical Kingdom Math.

The context of what it means to be salty is the beatitudes: blessed are the poor in spirit, the mourning, the meek, the hungry and thirsty, the merciful, the pure in heart, and the peacemakers. The persecuted. The insulted. The lied against.

How quickly we forget. And allow the weeds of the world to take root.

And because I am a kind of goofy person, weed-pulling is part of my morning liturgy. Chris told us last night that liturgy is a translation of worship.  Every morning I kneel outside in the red gravel in front of our house and pull weeds. Not so many of them, because my morning runs on a very tight schedule, but I do it. And as I pull them, I repent for the pride and accusations and the unmercifulness that I have allowed to weasel their way into my thinking. The unlove.

My version of letting Jesus wash my dusty feet, grimy from the daily plodding through life.

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Instead of those choking weeds.

And this morning I wandered the prayer loop across the street, through the creosote bushes and past the little bunny rabbits hiding from coyotes. I didn’t think my knee could make it up Sentential Peak. And I remembered the years and years of praying through this loop, walking one of our assorted Barnies or Woofies or Daisys or even Bruce.  And there is still a hawk perched on the branch underneath the tree where I prayed for Nicole. And the wall where I prayed for my little Young Lives teen mother has been painted a new shade of green. And I marveled at His faithfulness over the years through the pain and heartbreak and doubts.

And my Joy Dare was cool, warm and sun-soaked, which totally describes the fall-tinted air, yet still-summer reality and the sun bouncing across the tops of the trees.

And may The Most Highest and Glorious God be praised.

And for me, pulling out a few more of those misplaced but rapidly growing mesquite sprouts is an act of worship.

Tumbling into the abyss of His love.  

Splashes across my foggy rearview mirror.

How long, O LORD? will you forget me for ever? how long will you hide your face from me? How long shall I have perplexity in my mind, and grief in my heart, day after day? how long shall my enemy triumph over me? Look upon me and answer me, O LORD my God; give light to my eyes, lest I sleep in death; Lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,” and my foes rejoice that I have fallen. But I put my trust in Your mercy; my heart is joyful because of Your saving help. I will sing to the LORD, for He has dealt with me richly; I will praise the Name of the Lord Most High. Psalm 13

Look upon me and answer me, O LORD my God; give light to my eyes.

That I might see.

That I might see. The Joy Dare for today is dusky light, surprising reflection, lovely shadow.

But really, things are pretty dark in my little world. The four-thirty-in-the-morning-living-room is pitch black except for my glowing computer screen with This morning’s office to be observed.  Yesterday I tried all day long to squint funny. Picture myself kneeling down. Repeat after me, my Strength and my Redeemer. Again and again. And I get it, in my head, that I am not wrestling against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world.

But really it looks like big mucky glops of mud on my windshield. Those squirmy cursing angry flesh and bloods all day long.

The darkness of this world.

Give me light.

Yesterday in chapel once again we sang, “This little light of mine. I’m gonna let it shine. Don’t let Satan puff it out, I’m gonna let it shine.”

But still, as we stood together in a crowded hallway at the end of the day with all of the honor roll students and said what we were thankful for before we gave everyone back their cell phones and let them go home or to the library or to the tutoring Centre next door where a fresh batch of momma cookies in ziplock bags was waiting, I wept tears of hopelessness. And last night, that’s how I went to sleep.

And on Tuesday night, when Pastor Chris asked me what was the point of the past year and a half, what was my take away, I could only shake my head sadly, and repeat again and again, I don’t know.

On Wednesday at the Tucson Museum of Art class, I painted a small canvas with a bright pink and purple and blue and green “Embrace” dancing across the center and sprinkled it with rock salt and blew bubbles of rubbing alcohol across it.

What does it look like to stop trying, and let Him? To let go and bury myself in His arms?

Every single day I try to step down from the throne of my heart. Bend my knee. Rest. Die like a seed.

Try. Try. Try.

IdolaTRY. Really?

What does it look like to stop trying, and let Him? To let go and bury myself in His arms?

And once again the Psalmist answers the question:  I will sing to the LORD; I will praise His name.

Eucharisteo comes before the miracle.

And as He entered a village, He was met by ten lepers, who stood at a distance and lifted up their voices, saying, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.”

Jesus, Master, have mercy on me.

And my Friday prayer for myself is and has been for oh-so-long: I pray that I will be a light to the nations as He declares new things. 

I’m gonna let it shine.

And when I step out of my dark little living room to head for Hillenbrand Pool, I am going to look for dusky light, surprising reflection, lovely shadow.

To notice.

You only have shadows when there is light.

And really all of the light looked dusky this morning as I drove home. There was not even a glimmer of sunrise on the eastern horizon.

And the biggest surprising reflection came from the pool of water that fills the new pothole at the corner of Broadway and Stratford boulevards that has eaten away more than half of the right lane.

And all of the shadows this morning were lovely, red and white and green lights splashes across my foggy rearview mirror.

I will sing to the LORD; I will praise His name.

May His face shine upon you.

The Refrain for the Morning Lessons

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my Strength and my Redeemer. Psalm 19:14 So the Joy Dare was about giving thanks for what was in my heart. And one thing in my heart is my lists of fixed prayer people. And while I would love to say that they are the continual meditation of my heart, I cannot. But when they are the meditation of my heart, it is an acceptable gift in His sight. And today I gave thanks for Seth and Karen Barnes, marveling whom they have become over the years since those steamy hot young years when we all worked in the Dominican Republic. And they visited us in the refugee camp when I Nicole had the measles which somehow slid into pneumonia and somewhere in there was the dehydration room. That was a rough spring. But certainly Seth and Karen have embraced their calling to follow him on The Grand Adventure. And it is indeed a great joy to be race around the world with them in my prayers. And the Adams. I remember them back when they were doing their residencies. And we saw each of them more than they saw each other. And when I brought Nicole back to the States, I took her to Mary at University Medical Center cause she was pretty much a two-year-old mess. And Mary called her supervisor, who called his supervisor, all the way to the top, and he made an announcement over the loudspeaker for all residents to come see something that they would never see again…four skin diseases layered one on top of the other.  And I will never forget all of those gowned bodies pressed into one small room looking at a rather shy Little Nicole. Rod over at infectious diseases always promised that if we brought him up a new and exciting giardia strain, he would name it after us. And now the Adams walked away, truly have given up house and brothers and sisters and children and property, for His sake and for the Good News; for the joy set before them, they picked up their cross and followed Him to northern Kenya where Rod teaches at the Aga Khan University Hospital and Mary coordinates community health projects for mothers and children. And I get to join them before the throne of Grace every single Wednesday morning. And my brother and his family in New Hampshire. And the Voelkels in Vermont. And some boys whose momma asked me to add them to my list. And a student from Wildcat who asked me to pray for him. And Kevin and Elaheh. And a list of Nicole’s friends from college, as well as the brother who visited us that Christmas, And each of my students and each of the Imago Dei staff. Pause over each one, each one who is in my heart. And all of the beloved people who have joined my heart family over the years: Cameron, Fernanda and Wilson, Charly, Markus, Chaska and Tika, Kate, Ira, Ray, Carla, Marco, Mateo, Ali, Wali, Igor, Fredric, Shaun, Giovanni, John, Manuel, Daniel. And Alan. Nicole, Heather, Dustin, Andrea. May each of these be my acceptable meditation today. And may I rest today in this place, kneeling before my Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. 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 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. How can I but not be filled with mercy and peace as I kneel before God our Maker? And may the words of mouth come from this treasure of my heart. Unlike a flame set on fire by hell itself. Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.  And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. My Strength and my Redeemer.

In the silence of the heart You speak. -Audrey Assad

I call with my whole heart; answer me, O LORD. Psalm 119:145

The Christian way is different: harder, and easier. Christ says “Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked – the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours. C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

We try; God transforms. Richard Foster, Devotional Classics

Embrace. Ann Voskamp, “When New Year’s Resolutions Seem Hopeless”

So yesterday, following the Voskamp’s Joy Dare, I was supposed to be grateful for three things I overheard. Which reminds me tons of Gideon, my go-to-guy who follows God in spite of his very much I-believe-help-my-unbelief sort of faith, and when he was looking for a little courage as he prepared to battle the Midianites and Amalekites and all the children of the who were like grasshoppers for multitude, and their camels were without number, as the sand by the sea side for multitude, he and his buddy snuck down to the camp and overheard a conversation between two soldiers about a dream and a barley loaf.

And Gideon’s response was worship.

The battle had not even taken place yet, but it was the LORD’s.

Wholly.

Which is a pretty cool word, if you look at it for very long. All His. Consecrated. Hallowed. Sanctified.

Everything.

And I didn’t really overhear anything yesterday. Even though I tried.

But all eyeballs were on me as I stepped into The Iron Fist.

·       And the principal sat with the kiddos (lots of them) during lunchtime detention so I could get a little bathroom and pizza break from ten hours with weary seventh graders.

·       And just as I was about to cave in at the very end, a teacher came and stood next to me and whispered words of encouragement.

·       And all of my phone call homes were to very supportive parents.

·       And Meg. Dear Meg. She read my little billowingsunrises musing about not even knowing what was for dinner and when I got home there was a crockpot of chili with corn and noodles and meat and beans and a packet of sharp cheddar cheese and a dozen cornmeal muffins waiting for me.

And so may I enter into thanksgiving before this day begins.

Worshipping the God Who Is Not Bound by Time, and Who knows the rest of the story.

The One Who Whispers “Embrace” every time my soul is quiet.

Splish, splash, to overflowing.

No holding back.