Wednesday, October 02, 2013

Wednesday, October 2, 2013


 
Today’s text

Luke 17:5-10

The apostles said to the Lord, 'Increase our faith.' The Lord replied, 'If you had faith like a mustard seed you could say to this mulberry tree, "Be uprooted and planted in the sea," and it would obey you. 'Which of you, with a servant ploughing or minding sheep, would say to him when he returned from the fields, "Come and have your meal at once?" Would he not be more likely to say, "Get my supper ready; fasten your belt and wait on me while I eat and drink. You yourself can eat and drink afterwards?" Must he be grateful to the servant for doing what he was told? So with you: when you have done all you have been told to do, say, "We are useless servants: we have done no more than our duty." '

Reflection

What in the world is faith? When I was young I thought I knew what the word meant. I could define it and hold forth on the vocabulary of faith, citing each word in Hebrew and Greek.

Now, I wonder if I knew anything then, and I know that I know nothing now, nothing except this Wonder in my soul that I did not awaken. I did nothing to create or summon it. My only act is that of noticing.

In wordless speech, this Wonder speaks and assures me that all is well, that Love abides, that I have all I need, even when I feel like I have nothing of what I need.

It assures me that I have all that is needed to be who I am, which is all I am called to do.

Offer what love and grace as is in you, it says; that love and grace flows from an endless supply you cannot see, but which is always, always there.

It says, Go, do what is given you to do. It does not matter that you feel weak or inadequate or that you are convinced you do not have the internal resources to stand the heat or do what needs to be done. It does not matter that the challenge before you is great.

The Wonder in you is greater still, greater than anything you will ever face. Smile and know. Laugh in the face of struggle. Walk peacefully into each moment. Your seeming inadequacy does not matter. I matter, and I am greater.

I am the Wonder within and so far beyond you. You have what you need … to live.

Faith comes in hearing the Voice, a gift to be received each new day.

Pr. David L. Miller





Monday, September 30, 2013

Monday, September 30, 2013

Today’s text


Psalm 37:5-6

Commit your life to the Beloved,
     confident that Love will act          
on your behalf,
Making clear you pathway,
     Bright as the sun at midday.

Reflection

Sooner or later circumstances reduce you to what is most basic. It does not feel good, but it is great grace.

There are many forms. You come to see your best efforts aren’t enough to change things or do what needs to be done. Unmoved shoulders shrug and walk away from your deepest thoughts and heartfelt labor.

Finitude whispers in wordless speech the body knows: a subtle ache that refuses to leave, a small cough that interrupts sleep, a trembling hand that won’t do what it did with ease yesterday. Where did it come from? And why? 

None of this matters as much as the humble embrace of one’s humanity and of the certainty that human life is and always will be unpredictable and unfair--and no words can make it seem otherwise.

But only the humble, those who feel the ache in the night, the chill of fear and the pain of shrugged shoulders can hear the Voice of Love who breaks through the barriers of our aloneness.

The Voice speaks in the breeze of autumn mornings, still warm with remembrance of summer days. The soul hears and knows: the breeze blows because Love is. The leaves turn because Love is.

Love speaks and awakens itself in the soul, singing Love’s song, reminding the soul that this day is lit by a sun much warmer and brighter than Earth’s midday star.

And just as certainly as life is unfair, this greater sun is more unfair still, more unfair than our failures and finitude, our fears, pains and longings. For, it comes without our asking, and stays beyond our deserving--and never quits.

Love will act, the Voice says at a place so deep in the heart that it is inaccessible to all but the One who made it. So trust and know.

Trust is not an act of will or human accomplishment. It is the gift of Love in the soul, awakened by the breeze that speaks and the leaves that sing a single song:

Love is. Love will be. Love will light your days and abide with you on lonely nights when you long for that Voice that tells you the truth.

Trust and live.

Pr. David L. Miller