Saturday, November 29, 2014

Mark 13:35-37

“Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

Stay awake

 

 Stay awake. Christ is coming ... to you.

The deep cry of our hearts is to know Christ coming to us, touching, filling us with the love that makes us alive, so that no matter our condition--joy or struggle, strength or illness--we know we are safe and well in the Love who comes to each of us … again and again … to join himself with us … that we might have his light and life … in ourselves.

Jesus’ call to stay awake is grace, an invitation to welcome Christ in all the ways he comes to us.

The business of life, the rush of this season, lulls us to sleep even as it exhausts us. We fall utterly unconscious to what is happening in our souls. What am I thinking? Feeling? What is giving me real life and joy; what is stealing it from me?

We don’t know unless we struggle to stay awake through prayer and love. These two keep us awake.

We must listen to our needs and the needs of our wounded world and pray, “Come Lord Jesus,” responding with generosity to the needs of God’s hungry and suffering ones in the world.

And we must cultivate love for life, love for God’s world, love for others next door or a world away. Love begins with gratitude, by saying “thank you” every single day for the blessings our life, focusing on the graces you have received … not on what we don’t have or imagine we must have to be happy.

And if you cannot find anything for which to be grateful, I invite you to take your pulse.

Stay awake. Christ is coming to you.

This month … find places of silence away from the distractions of work and entertainment.Stand in silence under the night sky, or look into the clear cobalt skies of winter afternoons and marvel at creation.

Listen to those who speak to you without worrying about what to say next. Read a favorite passage or book that opens you to the mystery of God’s love. Sit and talk, share a drink, a thought, a memory with someone who truly cherishes you. Listen to music that opens your soul.

Stay awake. Receive each day and moment that comes without insisting that it be like yesterday or anticipating all the ways tomorrow might be better. 

Stay open and try with all your might to love each day, knowing … that amid all that happens … Christ who is Love … is coming to you.

Light a candle … and know.

Pr. David L. Miller

Friday, November 28, 2014

Mark 13:32-37

“Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

Advent watching

For who and what

do we watch and

wait? And how to

stay awake when

waiting is long?

Only love knows

how; only those who

love stay awake, for

they know their life

depends on hearing

again the voice their

hunger craves, the smile

that cures all fear,

the words that speak

the love their hearts

must hear … and know

for life to be life

for them.

With love we wait

and watch for Love’s

appearing; it is no

burden or task

but eager longing,

for what we know

will come, a waiting

with joy for what

Love … alone

can bring.

Pr. David L. Miller

Thursday, November 27, 2014

Mark 13:32-37

“Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

Awakened

Crisp air awakens my cheeks as I step into the starless night, the sky shrouded in low November clouds.

It does not matter. Skylight is not needed. Brisk air awakens inner light and raises my eyes to the sky to give thanks late on this eve of Thanksgiving.

“Thank you,” I say aloud in the darkness. “Thank you for cold winter air that makes me glad I am alive.

“Thank you for awakening my heart. Thank you for the gratitude that springs suddenly to life and fills me.

“Whatever You are, so mysterious, so far beyond anything I can think or imagine, thank you that my soul is alive to this moment, that my eyes search the dark night sky in wonder that You should come to me and that I should know … this joy, this love.”

Stay awake. That’s what Jesus says. Here, under the night sky, in an empty parking lot, I am awake, and there is nothing in me but love and gratitude for life--and for the gift of this wakefulness.

How did it come? Why am I awake to love and life now and not always?

Were I so awake at all times my anger would never get the best of me, my patience would be unflappable, my heart would always flow with grace, eager to bless those who come my way whether they like me or not.

This is what I would be were I always awake to this mysterious love within me. But these moments come and go, and it seems I am powerless to produce them because they under the command of a Mystery I do not control.

Jesus commands us to stay awake. You do not know when I will come to you, he says. But I cannot wake myself. It is his coming that awakens us.

The Love he is awakens this same Love that lives in us, the Love that is our truest self.

Once you have been awakened to this Love, you want to stay awake and watch for every small way it comes to you that you may know the joy of communing with him, knowing what God from all eternity wants you to know.

We keep falling asleep. But maybe we can work to stay awake. Maybe we can cultivate a silence of heart unfilled by the distractions of work and entertainments. Maybe we can stand in silence under the night sky. Maybe we can listen to those who speak to us without worry about what to say next.Maybe we listen to music that opens the door of our souls.

Maybe we can receive each day and moment that comes, not insisting that it be like yesterday or anticipating all the ways tomorrow might be better. Maybe we can receive each day for what it is … with whatever challenges and graces it brings.

Maybe this will keep us awake to the Love that comes on November nights.

Pr. David L. Miller

Tuesday November 25, 2014

Today's text

Mark 13:32-37

‘But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Beware, keep alert; for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his slaves in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch. Therefore, keep awake—for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all: Keep awake.’

For what we wait

There is a joining we know and a joining for which we wait, a joy we know and a joy that aches for completion only the Holy One can provide.

Christmas celebrates the joining of divine reality with human substance, revealing what we each are but which we have not become.

We look at Jesus in his mother’s arms and wonder at the beauty of the child. We believe and know he is the face of heaven shining on us and making us alive once more.

This is the joining we know. His light warms and heals hidden longings for which no other fulfillment can be found.

We see him and know the love who is Love touching us and quieting the inner ache, whispering once more, “Rest, my love is enough for you.”

We are creatures made from Love, by Love and for the Love Christ is. In him, we see what we each are and what we … and all nature and history … will be.

Our joy is to be finally and fully joined with the Love shining from his face that it might also shine from ours, in our hopes and tears, our longings and our laughter.

This joining is our Advent longing. We do not await the birth of Jesus who has already come but the birth of Christ in us and all creation, the full joining of the divine heart with our human hearts so that everywhere we look and all we shall see is Christ, the perfect unity of God and creation.

We stay awake for he comes to join with our hearts in all times and every moment.

Pr. David L. Miller