Two copper coins.

Where charity and love are, God is there.

Christ's love has gathered us into one.

The people of Israel called the bread manna. It was white like coriander seed and tasted like wafers made with honey. Exodus 16:31

By this we know love, that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?  Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. 1 John 3:16-18

 

God is sufficient.

 

Enough.

 

And in Sunday School as we walked through the very beloved and very familiar twenty-third Psalm, we paused big time on the “I shall not want.”

 

Does it mean I shall choose not to want anything outside of what He provides? Are we to reject our desires?

 

Or does it mean that each and every morning I chose to assert that He is trustworthy, no matter how my life may appear at the moment? Then I ponder how that might be true, noticing His trustworthiness, the evidence of His potent lovingkindness.

 

Jesus marveled at the widow’s bold assertation of God’s trustworthiness when she placed her two small copper coins, all she depended upon, into the treasury box.

 

Let us ask God to make us true in our love, to make us sacrificial beings, for it seems to me that sacrifice is only love put into action. - Elizabeth of the Trinity

 

God of love, forgive us when we make a mockery of love by only speaking of love. Burden us with your embodied love so that our first response may be to love with our hands and feet. May our love take on the flesh You so humbly bore. Amen.

 

Loving God, You are a trustworthy provider and protector. Even when our eyes are not on You, Your eyes are always on us. You know us inside and out. Teach us to trust You more and more, and bring us back to You when we lose our way; in Jesus’ name. Amen.

 

And the folks at AME always pause, take a deep breath, and sing Amen very clearly and together as one.

Dear Father, may Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from Him. Truly He is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God; He is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in Him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to Him, for God is our refuge. Psalm 62:5-8

It wasn’t just the church that was absent when I was molested behind the bushes by a homeless man after Sunday night service at the age of 6.

It wasn’t just the church that let me down when my former wife had a miscarriage and my marriage finally fell apart.

It wasn’t the church that failed to show up when my father died at 56.

The church wasn’t absent when I wrestled with soul crushing clinical depression for about 6 months.

I’m not saying the church is perfect or that I’ve never been hurt my Christians. I have. However, my problem is not with the church, it’s with God. I buried God a week after I buried my father. I didn’t leave the church until well after that. I still go from time to time and miss the sense of community it offered. I haven’t been able to find it elsewhere since.

I just wanted God to be the person I told others he was. Personal. Intimate. Available.

He’s been completely silent now for exactly 20 years. Whether it truly is or not, it has felt like divine absence, even abandonment. As an adopted child, that’s an especially hard feeling to deal with. So, I choose to believe otherwise. I choose to believe that it’s not personal, that he’s not personal. I choose to believe that his silence and distance are just part of his nature and that’s okay. I choose to believe that the wounds I’ve taken are not the fault of a distant God who is able to fix things but doesn’t out of lack of care. I’ve chosen to believe that he just was never there to begin with, or if he was, not close or present enough to really intervene.

The church is fine.

It just hurts to hear and sing about their God.

So, I slip out the back door usually half way through the service.

Life outside of the faith has been far less painful than in.

I found far more peace outside the sanctuary.

So a few years ago I met this guy at the Starbucks at Country Club and Speedway. I think both of us were grading high school essays or something like that. We found out we knew a bunch of the same people; I mean, Tucson is a small town really. I have no idea why we became Facebook “friends,” but we did, and I have been following his classroom tales and relationship angst ever since.

And I don’t really understand the crazy community of Facebook and the crazy spectrum of humanity that weaves itself together and speaks to me through these invisible strands.  But I do know that it keeps my heart tender to that beyond me, to the aches and concerns and celebrations and confusion of all peoples throughout the world, from Istanbul, Turkey to the San José de Ocoa, Republica Dominicana, from Nashville, Tennessee to Naples, Italy.

And today I will carry this friend in my thoughts and prayers as I stumble through the day, through the twirling DNA onto a glass rod, through the two musical recitals, through writing an argumentative essay about a kid who wanted to freely express himself by wearing a band t-shirt to school and through picking up Thao for family dinner. Dear Father in heaven.

Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from Him.

Why and how… those are the questions that I make my kiddos go back and answer when they scribble careless answers onto their college-lined papers. You made a claim, now give me the evidence.   I say this again and again all day long.

Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from Him.

And for me, the evidence lies all around me. Evil is easy to explain. Things fall apart. But why does that little kid smile as he picks himself up out of the dirt and brushes off the prickers? Or what about the guy with the violin standing next to the underpass with his sleeping dog, his knapsack and his upside down hat to welcome a few quarters?  What about me, as I pull myself out of Hillenbrand Pool yet another morning to marvel at the golden glints smoking off the once-again-ablaze Catalinas, and I breathe in deeply and am grateful for another day?

Dear Father in heaven, we thank you for this day and for all the loving kindness You pour out on us. Bless us in whatever we are allowed to do in Your service, that it may always be done in love to all people. May Your will be done throughout the world, so that at last all confusion may come to an end, Satan’s work may be destroyed, and Your children may shout for joy that your will is being done on earth as in heaven. Amen.

And oh yes, I read the Sunday paper in my hammock during just a lightest drizzle of rain.

The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup;
    You hold my lot.
The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
    indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.

I bless the Lord who gives me counsel;
    in the night also my heart instructs me.
I have set the Lord always before me;
    because He is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken.

Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices;
    my flesh also dwells secure. Psalm 16:5-9

Maybe I have a crazy low bar, but there are many things detailing my pleasant places, including teaching adult Sunday School and ushering yesterday and how I love the folks at AME, walking the Cyclovia trail afterwards with all of the pedaling laughing celebrating cyclists of Tucson, painting Heather and Dustin’s front and back porches yesterday afternoon with Dre and Adam and Nicole, listening to Simon and Garfunkel and eating the best carne asada tacos ever afterwards, and not least of all, having put together some rocking great lesson plans for teaching Genetics this week, and today we are going to gargle with salt water and spit into a cup and spool our DNA strands onto a glass rod (and Stand and Deliver our Romeo and Juliet lines and write an argumentative essay about whether student Don has the right to wear his band T-shirt to school citing the Bill of Rights and assorted court cases).  

My heart, therefore, is glad, and my spirit rejoices : my body also shall rest in hope.

And none of us have the tiniest clue about what lies ahead.

But He who is unbound by time holds us in His loving hands.

Therefore,

May the peace of the Lord Christ go with you : wherever He may send you;

May He guide you through the wilderness : protect you through the storm;

May He bring you home rejoicing : at the wonders He has shown;

May He bring you home rejoicing : at the wonders He has shown.

Crushed and broken to become something new together.

Oh Lord, let my soul rise up to meet You

As the day rises to meet the sun.

Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,

As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen

But the people of Israel walked on dry ground through the sea, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. Exodus 14

And He shall judge the world in righteousness, He shall minister judgment to the people in uprightness. Psalm 6

Today’s Scripture readings are all about overcoming: Psalm 6, Exodus 14 and 1 John 2. But it is not I overcoming. Rather it is He, the righteous Advocate, He who is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

Yesterday I went to my first new members class at Prince Chapel, which is a series of twelve two-hour classes, but we might be able to move through the teachings a little more quickly because there are only two of us. And actually, we covered the first four lessons in just one day: Out of the Darkness Into His Marvelous Light: God’s Plan for Salvation; Introduction to the Church: General Church Information, Church Liturgy, Order of Service and Church Manners; Fundamental Methodist Doctrine: 25 Articles of Religion; The Origin, History, Structure and Government of the AME Church.

And my homework for next week is to find Scriptural support of the doctrines and practices of Methodism. And we were reminded of those founding brothers, John and Charles Wesley, and their passion for disciplined prayer, for the study of God’s Word and for seeking out lost souls. And I remembered Susan Wesley, their mother, who was faithful and strong through many trials. And I remember how so many years ago, I resolved to be like unto her in her courage, her commitment to each individual child, and her commitment to begin each day on her knees.

And the African Methodist Episcopalian Church was founded in 1787 out of a desire to freely worship God in Spirit and in Truth. Because those of African descent were relegated to the back rows of church, not invited to the table of communion. Not invited into the body of Christ.

Eucharist is from the Greek eucharistein, meaning thanksgiving; communion is from the Latin, meaning “union with.”

And Christ asked us to remember Him in this way. “Re-member-ing” has to do with becoming something new, the body of Christ, in which we lose ourselves in something bigger than ourselves; we are re-membered into a new body. As often as Christian take the common elements of bread and wine, the re-member themselves into –Jesus. In the Eucharist, we don’t just remember-Jesus in general; we remember His suffering. The bread is a broken body, and the wine is poured like shed blood. Bother grain and grapes have to be crushed and broken to become something new together. If you are what you eat, the Eucharist is indeed the act of uniting yourself with the One who lovingly suffered at the hands of His enemies. (The Book of Common Prayer)

And the folks at AME take communion seriously. If members are unable to attend service, the pastor delivers communion to their homes.

And so I have been asked to lead the adult Bible study this morning. There are just a few of us gathering, but my, we all do love His Word. And the text today is the 23^rd Psalm, which is so beloved by me that variations of it are all my new internet passwords. And I am ushering today as well. And I have been asked to wear black and white, and they are going to loan me white gloves, and a big part of the ushers’ job is to stand at the door and make sure every single person feels welcome and I was chosen because I have such a big smile but there are a lot of Church Manners I am still learning, such as no walking about during prayer and Scripture reading, and no crossing the center aisle once service has begun, because Jesus Christ is in the center of our worship, and no applauding after the singing, no matter how glorious it is. And the folks at AME are pretty impressed with how I know all of the old hymns by heart.

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art

High King of Heaven, my victory won
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heav’n’s Sun
Heart of my own heart, whate’er befall
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all

And for the past two weeks, I have just been hitting “replay,” again and again, as the little dusty black Rabbit hops through Tucson traffic.

May this be true, great Father, that I truly know Thy Presence by heart. Waking or sleeping, may Thy Presence be my light. 

Selah.