Today’s text
Colossians 1:3-4
We give thanks for you to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, continually in our prayers, ever since we heard about your faith in Christ Jesus and the love that you show towards all God's holy people because of the hope which is stored up for you in heaven.
Reflection
Love through hope: that is the sequence, and it stirs both hope and skepticism in me this morning.
You call us to yourself, Holy One, promising a love that outstrips every other we know or seek. Falling into the Love you are, our souls fly open, no longer grasping at life but relishing all we see and touch as a gift from your open hand.
Knowing you stirs hope that all our days will be immersed in the grace that transports our souls in moments your love frees us from gray despondency.
This land of grayness has been my home in recent days. More than anything it is the church that confines me there.
I need to feel the love hope stirs in your holy people, as you call us. But are we really?
I find too much, that is not love, that doesn’t reflect the holy presence of the love you awaken in depth of soul when we know that we eternally belong to your gracious care.
The hope stored up for us has not so impressed itself on our busy, distracted hearts that its seed can grow into the love that I need to find, if I am to escape the land of grayness.
Disappointed, I often turn from the church in despair, distancing myself from the people and place that first taught me that I have a soul and that every grace points to that Source for whom I yearn for union.
I turn from the home that long has pointed me toward Home, the people who at their best have been a sacrament of your welcome. I turn from those I need, disappointed that they cannot love any better than I can--or sometimes not nearly as much.
Can we, who are distracted, too busy and often apathetic and callous, bear the love you awaken in your people in so many other times and places?
I am skeptical, yet I hope. Mine is a fearing hope that wonders if we can truly be your people, brimming with the love you are, awakened by the hope that we are forever yours.
Remind us again that we are forever yours. Perhaps, today, we will listen … and learn to love.
Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
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Tuesday, July 06, 2010
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Today’s text
Isaiah 65:1
I have let myself be approached by those who did not consult me. I have let myself be found by those who did not seek me. I said, 'Here I am, here I am!' to a nation that did not invoke my name.
Reflection
I seek you, my Lord. Yet, my seeking is wane and weak. So much gets in the way, blocking the path, and I let it happen.
And still you seek my heart; still you haunt my mind; still you call in my restlessness, stirring me in the hunger I cannot satisfy, the yearning that knows no fulfillment.
I know where fulfillment lies. It rests hidden in the moment of mercy, the exquisite timelessness when nothing matters but your enveloping love.
In that blessed time--in that time alone, I know you. All other knowledge fades to beige in the bright light of Presence, and the completeness of your love completes my soul, rendering irrelevant everything else that I think I know.
I have lived too long and too far removed from the time of knowledge, but even now in the nagging and longing of an unsatisfied heart I feel you. I hear you calling, ‘Hear I am. Right here!”
You wave your arms in my hunger. You shout aloud in my yearning. You beckon me to come home and to find you who are eager to be found.
For I am never lost to you, no matter how far I wander from the places of true knowledge where you are all and all is in you.
And you find me again, even here and definitely now.
Pr. David L. Miller
Isaiah 65:1
I have let myself be approached by those who did not consult me. I have let myself be found by those who did not seek me. I said, 'Here I am, here I am!' to a nation that did not invoke my name.
Reflection
I seek you, my Lord. Yet, my seeking is wane and weak. So much gets in the way, blocking the path, and I let it happen.
And still you seek my heart; still you haunt my mind; still you call in my restlessness, stirring me in the hunger I cannot satisfy, the yearning that knows no fulfillment.
I know where fulfillment lies. It rests hidden in the moment of mercy, the exquisite timelessness when nothing matters but your enveloping love.
In that blessed time--in that time alone, I know you. All other knowledge fades to beige in the bright light of Presence, and the completeness of your love completes my soul, rendering irrelevant everything else that I think I know.
I have lived too long and too far removed from the time of knowledge, but even now in the nagging and longing of an unsatisfied heart I feel you. I hear you calling, ‘Hear I am. Right here!”
You wave your arms in my hunger. You shout aloud in my yearning. You beckon me to come home and to find you who are eager to be found.
For I am never lost to you, no matter how far I wander from the places of true knowledge where you are all and all is in you.
And you find me again, even here and definitely now.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 8:26-28
They came to land in the territory of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. He was stepping ashore when a man from the city who was possessed by devils came towards him; for a long time the man had been living with no clothes on, not in a house, but in the tombs. Catching sight of Jesus he gave a shout, fell at his feet and cried out at the top of his voice, 'What do you want with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God? I implore you, do not torture me.'
Reflection
Sanity, reason, hope, healing--that is why you come, Jesus, not to exact torture on a world bent on forgetting its Source, its Creator, its purpose.
You come to us to restore us to our right mind, for much of the time we live insane lives in one way or another.
There is no apparent end to the variety of ways we lose our minds. The old prophet, Isaiah, asked the operative question: “Why do you spend your money on that which is not food, on what does not satisfy?”
Like children finding their voice, we insist on finding and going our own way, thinking that autonomy, independence is the highest human expression. But we do so ignoring the markers of what it is to be human.
We seek ourselves in our fun, in lives overburdened with activities, in work, success or the obsession with making and having and doing enough. We cram every possible minute with some activity or another.
And often we wonder why our bodies and minds are restless; why do the ways we invest our hours do not totally delight the heart and leave us at peace, at rest?
Since we are insane, we scheme to find what we are missing and make plans to do more of the kinds of things we are already doing, expecting different results, the very definition of insanity.
Why have you come to us, Jesus?
Not to torture a confused and harried race, not to exact punishment for forgetting who we are or for ignoring our need to know the One who put us here. Not at all.
You come to restore our sanity that comes only when we listen to you, when we know you, when we hear the voice of a love that enters our insanity with a quiet word of mercy.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 8:26-28
They came to land in the territory of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. He was stepping ashore when a man from the city who was possessed by devils came towards him; for a long time the man had been living with no clothes on, not in a house, but in the tombs. Catching sight of Jesus he gave a shout, fell at his feet and cried out at the top of his voice, 'What do you want with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God? I implore you, do not torture me.'
Reflection
Sanity, reason, hope, healing--that is why you come, Jesus, not to exact torture on a world bent on forgetting its Source, its Creator, its purpose.
You come to us to restore us to our right mind, for much of the time we live insane lives in one way or another.
There is no apparent end to the variety of ways we lose our minds. The old prophet, Isaiah, asked the operative question: “Why do you spend your money on that which is not food, on what does not satisfy?”
Like children finding their voice, we insist on finding and going our own way, thinking that autonomy, independence is the highest human expression. But we do so ignoring the markers of what it is to be human.
We seek ourselves in our fun, in lives overburdened with activities, in work, success or the obsession with making and having and doing enough. We cram every possible minute with some activity or another.
And often we wonder why our bodies and minds are restless; why do the ways we invest our hours do not totally delight the heart and leave us at peace, at rest?
Since we are insane, we scheme to find what we are missing and make plans to do more of the kinds of things we are already doing, expecting different results, the very definition of insanity.
Why have you come to us, Jesus?
Not to torture a confused and harried race, not to exact punishment for forgetting who we are or for ignoring our need to know the One who put us here. Not at all.
You come to restore our sanity that comes only when we listen to you, when we know you, when we hear the voice of a love that enters our insanity with a quiet word of mercy.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 7:36-39
One of the Pharisees invited him to a meal. When he arrived at the Pharisee's house and took his place at table, suddenly a woman came in, who had a bad name in the town. She had heard he was dining with the Pharisee and had brought with her an alabaster jar of ointment. She waited behind him at his feet, weeping, and her tears fell on his feet, and she wiped them away with her hair; then she covered his feet with kisses and anointed them with the ointment. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, 'If this man were a prophet, he would know who this woman is and what sort of person it is who is touching him and what a bad name she has.'
Reflection
You did not care, Jesus. You are unfazed by the tension that charged the air.
The irony is that the one who criticized you for being no prophet knew nothing of prophecy. If he had, he would have known that what glorifies God is mercy to the poor, the widow, the outcast, the alien. He would have understood that the Holy One desires mercy not sacrifice, compassion not self-righteousness.
But faith for him was a matter of division--separating the clean from the unclean, the divine from the common, the holy from the unholy, the righteous from the unrighteous.
Draw lines and stay on the ‘right side’ and all is well. Cross the line and you enter the disfavor of God and the rejection of those who know better.
His religion was a tool of prejudice, rejection, arrogance and self-aggrandizement. It was a device to lift him above the common run of men and women.
His understanding was a tool of detachment, with which he kept humanity’s crying needs at arms length, pretending he was not as needy or vulnerable as the woman weeping at your feet, Jesus.
It’s an attitude with which we are most familiar. We turn on the television and see CEOs and politicians able to accept anything except responsibility for their errors, failures and shortsightedness. Masters of the universe--then and now--are quite alike. Image control is always at the front of their minds.
Of course, denying one’s humanity and frailty is a sure way to fan mistrust, destroy relationships--and avoid receiving anything from you.
For the face you turned to the world showed little concern for purity or image control. You had nothing to give to those living the illusion of their mastery of life.
You were and are a paradigm of the prophetic faith of Isaiah and others before you who were consumed by the incomprehensible mercy and grandeur of the God who transcends our every thought and attempt to understand.
Faith in the face you reveal has nothing to do with drawing lines or separating oneself from impurity. It is about trusting an unspeakable mercy and loving each other in the holy fellowship of gratitude for what we will never fathom.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 7:36-39
One of the Pharisees invited him to a meal. When he arrived at the Pharisee's house and took his place at table, suddenly a woman came in, who had a bad name in the town. She had heard he was dining with the Pharisee and had brought with her an alabaster jar of ointment. She waited behind him at his feet, weeping, and her tears fell on his feet, and she wiped them away with her hair; then she covered his feet with kisses and anointed them with the ointment. When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, 'If this man were a prophet, he would know who this woman is and what sort of person it is who is touching him and what a bad name she has.'
Reflection
You did not care, Jesus. You are unfazed by the tension that charged the air.
The irony is that the one who criticized you for being no prophet knew nothing of prophecy. If he had, he would have known that what glorifies God is mercy to the poor, the widow, the outcast, the alien. He would have understood that the Holy One desires mercy not sacrifice, compassion not self-righteousness.
But faith for him was a matter of division--separating the clean from the unclean, the divine from the common, the holy from the unholy, the righteous from the unrighteous.
Draw lines and stay on the ‘right side’ and all is well. Cross the line and you enter the disfavor of God and the rejection of those who know better.
His religion was a tool of prejudice, rejection, arrogance and self-aggrandizement. It was a device to lift him above the common run of men and women.
His understanding was a tool of detachment, with which he kept humanity’s crying needs at arms length, pretending he was not as needy or vulnerable as the woman weeping at your feet, Jesus.
It’s an attitude with which we are most familiar. We turn on the television and see CEOs and politicians able to accept anything except responsibility for their errors, failures and shortsightedness. Masters of the universe--then and now--are quite alike. Image control is always at the front of their minds.
Of course, denying one’s humanity and frailty is a sure way to fan mistrust, destroy relationships--and avoid receiving anything from you.
For the face you turned to the world showed little concern for purity or image control. You had nothing to give to those living the illusion of their mastery of life.
You were and are a paradigm of the prophetic faith of Isaiah and others before you who were consumed by the incomprehensible mercy and grandeur of the God who transcends our every thought and attempt to understand.
Faith in the face you reveal has nothing to do with drawing lines or separating oneself from impurity. It is about trusting an unspeakable mercy and loving each other in the holy fellowship of gratitude for what we will never fathom.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, June 03, 2010
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 7:12-16
Now when [Jesus] was near the gate of the town there was a dead man being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a considerable number of the townspeople were with her. When the Lord saw her he felt sorry for her and said to her, 'Don't cry.' Then he went up and touched the bier and the bearers stood still, and he said, 'Young man, I tell you: get up.' And the dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Everyone was filled with awe and glorified God saying, 'A great prophet has risen up among us; God has visited his people.'
Reflection
The moment of reunion most moves me in this story. I can see it. Jesus stands beside the litter where the widow’s dead son had lain.
The young man stands between him and the widow, as Jesus, hand on his shoulder, moves him gently toward his astonished mother.
I do not see her face, but I feel her amazement in that split section before startled disbelief turns to exhilaration. And I feel my own tears at the pathos of the moment when the lost is returned and life is restored, not just to the young man but also to his mother.
This scene is frozen in time that I may leisurely take it in and know its meaning, a meaning that is better known by heart than mind. So I listen to my tears to hear what they say about human longing (or at least mine) and about the mystery of God.
What do I desire? What do I, like the widow, need returned to me by the One called Lord, because he has the power over life and death?
The widow surely enfolded her son in her arms and felt the life restored to his body. Surely, she wept, reunited with the one she most needed and wanted for her to know joy and the protection of a loved one.
The lonely silence of a too-quiet house and an empty soul was broken apart by happy tears in the presence of love personified. And she stepped into the arms of love personified: no, not the love of her child alone, but an incarnation of the love that she didn’t need to hold … because this is a love that holds her.
Stepping into her son’s arms, she stepped into the Love who seeks the soul on every day of every street. In this precious moment, she felt and knew beyond all the shadows of all doubts that Love who is Lord, the power of life who brings life from our every death.
I want to know what she knew. I want that love to melt away every sadness and still all anxiety. I want to step into the arms of love personified in every encounter and relationship.
I hunger for days and places this is real, and I grow weary when the joy of the woman is nowhere in sight, when life is more like a sad march to the grave than a celebration of reunion with my heart’s desire
That’s my want. But then it is what God wants, too.
My want--so average and human--is not different from the desire of the divine heart. It is a mirror image of what God wants to give every day, and especially on days we trudge along as if to a cemetery, instead of to a great party of life and love that is without end.
Restore to us the joy we lose, Lord of Life. This day, may we step into personifications of your love present on our way.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 7:12-16
Now when [Jesus] was near the gate of the town there was a dead man being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a considerable number of the townspeople were with her. When the Lord saw her he felt sorry for her and said to her, 'Don't cry.' Then he went up and touched the bier and the bearers stood still, and he said, 'Young man, I tell you: get up.' And the dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him to his mother. Everyone was filled with awe and glorified God saying, 'A great prophet has risen up among us; God has visited his people.'
Reflection
The moment of reunion most moves me in this story. I can see it. Jesus stands beside the litter where the widow’s dead son had lain.
The young man stands between him and the widow, as Jesus, hand on his shoulder, moves him gently toward his astonished mother.
I do not see her face, but I feel her amazement in that split section before startled disbelief turns to exhilaration. And I feel my own tears at the pathos of the moment when the lost is returned and life is restored, not just to the young man but also to his mother.
This scene is frozen in time that I may leisurely take it in and know its meaning, a meaning that is better known by heart than mind. So I listen to my tears to hear what they say about human longing (or at least mine) and about the mystery of God.
What do I desire? What do I, like the widow, need returned to me by the One called Lord, because he has the power over life and death?
The widow surely enfolded her son in her arms and felt the life restored to his body. Surely, she wept, reunited with the one she most needed and wanted for her to know joy and the protection of a loved one.
The lonely silence of a too-quiet house and an empty soul was broken apart by happy tears in the presence of love personified. And she stepped into the arms of love personified: no, not the love of her child alone, but an incarnation of the love that she didn’t need to hold … because this is a love that holds her.
Stepping into her son’s arms, she stepped into the Love who seeks the soul on every day of every street. In this precious moment, she felt and knew beyond all the shadows of all doubts that Love who is Lord, the power of life who brings life from our every death.
I want to know what she knew. I want that love to melt away every sadness and still all anxiety. I want to step into the arms of love personified in every encounter and relationship.
I hunger for days and places this is real, and I grow weary when the joy of the woman is nowhere in sight, when life is more like a sad march to the grave than a celebration of reunion with my heart’s desire
That’s my want. But then it is what God wants, too.
My want--so average and human--is not different from the desire of the divine heart. It is a mirror image of what God wants to give every day, and especially on days we trudge along as if to a cemetery, instead of to a great party of life and love that is without end.
Restore to us the joy we lose, Lord of Life. This day, may we step into personifications of your love present on our way.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, June 01, 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 7:11-13
It happened that soon afterwards he went to a town called Nain, accompanied by his disciples and a great number of people. Now when he was near the gate of the town there was a dead man being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a considerable number of the townspeople were with her. When the Lord saw her he felt sorry for her and said to her, 'Don't cry.'
Reflection
She had every reason to cry. A widow without a son to care for her was bereft. She had no means of economic support and no one to care for her in her old age.
Her son’s death condemned her to a life of loneliness, scraping by on the handouts of others in a community that would treat her as an object of God’s disfavor--and their own. You can almost hear the tongues wag.
“She is about as low as you can get.”
“I heard she was difficult to get on with.”
“They say she didn’t treat her family well.”
“And now they’re gone.”
Nothing like this ever happens today, of course. We are much more compassionate than ancient societies that treated widows as disfavored by God. Nor do we cut ourselves off from those who suffer great loss and grief, or those who suffer from mental illness, or from the loss of job or foreclosure, or from other tragedies. Right?
A deep repellent force within us resists getting too close to suffering and misfortune. We may say, “I don’t know what to say to her,” but most of the time this is cover for deeper psychological reactions we don’t understand.
Most of those reactions spring from fear of vulnerability. Even the idea that we need to know what to say comes from that fear. We want to be in control and being with those who suffer reminds us that we are not.
Being with those who grieve, who are caught up in irresolvable dilemmas and pain reminds us that it could be us, and we resist that awareness. We don’t want to see it, for to see it shakes us into the undeniable reality that we are mortal.
In our society talking about death, about one’s mortality is an obscenity, something that is not done in polite company--or perhaps in any company.
But there are those among us who run into burning houses, so to speak. They do not shy from the grief of the mourner, the struggle of the cancer patient, the fear of those for whom the future impends threat.
And there are parts of our fearful souls that want to be involved, that want to care, that may even want to say with Jesus, “Don’t cry. I am here.”
Those parts of our souls are inhabited by the Spirit of Jesus. His Spirit is not hard to recognize. It is the desire to care, the yearning to live beyond the safety of our walls, the craving to become the compassion we feel in depths of our soul that we too seldom visit.
That Spirit is known in the hope that the touch of Jesus will also raise us when our life is slipping away. And it continues to say, “Don’t cry. Grace is here … and life. No matter what.
Pr David L. Miller
Luke 7:11-13
It happened that soon afterwards he went to a town called Nain, accompanied by his disciples and a great number of people. Now when he was near the gate of the town there was a dead man being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a considerable number of the townspeople were with her. When the Lord saw her he felt sorry for her and said to her, 'Don't cry.'
Reflection
She had every reason to cry. A widow without a son to care for her was bereft. She had no means of economic support and no one to care for her in her old age.
Her son’s death condemned her to a life of loneliness, scraping by on the handouts of others in a community that would treat her as an object of God’s disfavor--and their own. You can almost hear the tongues wag.
“She is about as low as you can get.”
“I heard she was difficult to get on with.”
“They say she didn’t treat her family well.”
“And now they’re gone.”
Nothing like this ever happens today, of course. We are much more compassionate than ancient societies that treated widows as disfavored by God. Nor do we cut ourselves off from those who suffer great loss and grief, or those who suffer from mental illness, or from the loss of job or foreclosure, or from other tragedies. Right?
A deep repellent force within us resists getting too close to suffering and misfortune. We may say, “I don’t know what to say to her,” but most of the time this is cover for deeper psychological reactions we don’t understand.
Most of those reactions spring from fear of vulnerability. Even the idea that we need to know what to say comes from that fear. We want to be in control and being with those who suffer reminds us that we are not.
Being with those who grieve, who are caught up in irresolvable dilemmas and pain reminds us that it could be us, and we resist that awareness. We don’t want to see it, for to see it shakes us into the undeniable reality that we are mortal.
In our society talking about death, about one’s mortality is an obscenity, something that is not done in polite company--or perhaps in any company.
But there are those among us who run into burning houses, so to speak. They do not shy from the grief of the mourner, the struggle of the cancer patient, the fear of those for whom the future impends threat.
And there are parts of our fearful souls that want to be involved, that want to care, that may even want to say with Jesus, “Don’t cry. I am here.”
Those parts of our souls are inhabited by the Spirit of Jesus. His Spirit is not hard to recognize. It is the desire to care, the yearning to live beyond the safety of our walls, the craving to become the compassion we feel in depths of our soul that we too seldom visit.
That Spirit is known in the hope that the touch of Jesus will also raise us when our life is slipping away. And it continues to say, “Don’t cry. Grace is here … and life. No matter what.
Pr David L. Miller
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Today’s text
John 16:13-14
However, when the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth, since he will not be speaking of his own accord, but will say only what he has been told; and he will reveal to you the things to come. He will glorify me, since all he reveals to you will be taken from what is mine.
Reflection
I shy away from any notion that I can possess “complete truth.” How can my finite mind and heart grasp that which is total, complete, leaving nothing out?
And how would I ever be aware of it even if, for a moment, I knew such truth? With what measure would I judge it to be true and real, let alone complete?
Yet, isn’t this your outrageous promise, Jesus, that I will be led into complete truth?
And this is to say … into you, for you are complete truth.
This is our crazy confession. You are the ultimately real, the solid, the lasting, the unerring and unchanging.
Looking into your face, perceiving the reality that you are is to gaze into the Truth which is before time, the Truth which will remain when our old earth is frozen stone-cold and gray, rotating silent and lifeless for countless millennia around a burnt-out sun, collapsing beneath its own dying weight.
But we will not end in such lifeless futility. For you send your Spirit, the Spirit of truth who lives and breathes your present Presence, encompassing my little existence.
Your Spirit’s hungry desire is to lead me--and all--into complete Truth--into you, so that the life that I am--and the life that is in all--is taken into the fullness of the loving intimacy and eternal life that you share with the One you call Father.
And there, in this intimacy, we shall live where life is complete, where there is nothing but life.
I cannot imagine this, except in rare moments, moments even now. For moments come when some sweet Spirit transports me into a ‘space,’ into a moment of truest being in which I know complete love--and recognize it as truth unchanging and unassailable.
And I know: this is not a truth I possess, but the Truth who possesses me.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 16:13-14
However, when the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth, since he will not be speaking of his own accord, but will say only what he has been told; and he will reveal to you the things to come. He will glorify me, since all he reveals to you will be taken from what is mine.
Reflection
I shy away from any notion that I can possess “complete truth.” How can my finite mind and heart grasp that which is total, complete, leaving nothing out?
And how would I ever be aware of it even if, for a moment, I knew such truth? With what measure would I judge it to be true and real, let alone complete?
Yet, isn’t this your outrageous promise, Jesus, that I will be led into complete truth?
And this is to say … into you, for you are complete truth.
This is our crazy confession. You are the ultimately real, the solid, the lasting, the unerring and unchanging.
Looking into your face, perceiving the reality that you are is to gaze into the Truth which is before time, the Truth which will remain when our old earth is frozen stone-cold and gray, rotating silent and lifeless for countless millennia around a burnt-out sun, collapsing beneath its own dying weight.
But we will not end in such lifeless futility. For you send your Spirit, the Spirit of truth who lives and breathes your present Presence, encompassing my little existence.
Your Spirit’s hungry desire is to lead me--and all--into complete Truth--into you, so that the life that I am--and the life that is in all--is taken into the fullness of the loving intimacy and eternal life that you share with the One you call Father.
And there, in this intimacy, we shall live where life is complete, where there is nothing but life.
I cannot imagine this, except in rare moments, moments even now. For moments come when some sweet Spirit transports me into a ‘space,’ into a moment of truest being in which I know complete love--and recognize it as truth unchanging and unassailable.
And I know: this is not a truth I possess, but the Truth who possesses me.
Pr. David L. Miller
Monday, May 24, 2010
Monday, May 24, 2010
St. Cashmere, pray for us
Cashmere Castillo was found yesterday.
He was eight. Full of play and mischief, he wandered too near the quick current of the Chicago River at a park near his home on the northwest side of Chicago.
It took a week to find his body. I think his school photo appeared in the paper every day that the search continued, and every day tears came to my eyes when I saw his face.
Dozens of stories go by us every week. Tragedies and successes, murder and mayhem fill hundreds of column inches and hours of television overage each week. Most of those stories pass by our eyes leaving no mark.
Then one comes along that grabs you by the heart and won’t let go.
I can’t say why this one has attached itself to my heart. Maybe I look into Cashmere’s young face and see the colors and contours of two of my grandsons, who share his Latino heritage.
Maybe it’s because I chase those boys around and witness the utter abandon of their playful joy that eliminates all awareness of danger. Maybe it’s because I know how easily what happened to Cashmere could happen to them.
Maybe the fragility of life is so real because I read and respond to the prayer list that hits my desk at the beginning of each week.
And maybe I will never figure out real reason why Cashmere’s photo pulls at my heart. I just know that the boundaries that protect me from caring about a hundred other stories in the paper disappear each time I see his photo.
May God grant him the fullness of joy. May he run free in the fields of heaven.
And may he be a holy saint revealing the thrill of being alive, the delight that God intends--and the joy that comes when we realize how fully we are loved and can love. May he teach us how utterly beautiful and gratuitous life on this planet is.
His young face teaches me at least this much, lest I forget. And I often do.
It seems profane to say it, but this child’s death has made me more alive. His face makes me aware that there is a love in me that hungers to get out. I didn’t create it. It’s just there. And I feel more alive when this love bursts the narrow confines of my constricted concerns.
This should not surprise anyone. God is love. Christian tradition said this from the start. To love, to feel love, to have love awakened within is to know God truly, literally, physically inside one’s body.
To feel love awakened is to know the Infinite Source of life within your own life, moving you beyond isolation, connecting you with the beauty and tragedy of living--telling you that all you are and all that is rests securely in the hand of the Love who reveals holiness in the face of eight year olds.
Pray for us, St. Cashmere. Break down our walls that we might truly live.
Pr. David L. Miller
Cashmere Castillo was found yesterday.
He was eight. Full of play and mischief, he wandered too near the quick current of the Chicago River at a park near his home on the northwest side of Chicago.
It took a week to find his body. I think his school photo appeared in the paper every day that the search continued, and every day tears came to my eyes when I saw his face.
Dozens of stories go by us every week. Tragedies and successes, murder and mayhem fill hundreds of column inches and hours of television overage each week. Most of those stories pass by our eyes leaving no mark.
Then one comes along that grabs you by the heart and won’t let go.
I can’t say why this one has attached itself to my heart. Maybe I look into Cashmere’s young face and see the colors and contours of two of my grandsons, who share his Latino heritage.
Maybe it’s because I chase those boys around and witness the utter abandon of their playful joy that eliminates all awareness of danger. Maybe it’s because I know how easily what happened to Cashmere could happen to them.
Maybe the fragility of life is so real because I read and respond to the prayer list that hits my desk at the beginning of each week.
And maybe I will never figure out real reason why Cashmere’s photo pulls at my heart. I just know that the boundaries that protect me from caring about a hundred other stories in the paper disappear each time I see his photo.
May God grant him the fullness of joy. May he run free in the fields of heaven.
And may he be a holy saint revealing the thrill of being alive, the delight that God intends--and the joy that comes when we realize how fully we are loved and can love. May he teach us how utterly beautiful and gratuitous life on this planet is.
His young face teaches me at least this much, lest I forget. And I often do.
It seems profane to say it, but this child’s death has made me more alive. His face makes me aware that there is a love in me that hungers to get out. I didn’t create it. It’s just there. And I feel more alive when this love bursts the narrow confines of my constricted concerns.
This should not surprise anyone. God is love. Christian tradition said this from the start. To love, to feel love, to have love awakened within is to know God truly, literally, physically inside one’s body.
To feel love awakened is to know the Infinite Source of life within your own life, moving you beyond isolation, connecting you with the beauty and tragedy of living--telling you that all you are and all that is rests securely in the hand of the Love who reveals holiness in the face of eight year olds.
Pray for us, St. Cashmere. Break down our walls that we might truly live.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Thursday, May 20, 2010
Today’s text
Acts 2:5-8
They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak different languages as the Spirit gave them power to express themselves. Now there were devout men living in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven, and at this sound they all assembled, and each one was bewildered to hear these men speaking his own language. They were amazed and astonished. 'Surely,' they said, 'all these men speaking are Galileans? How does it happen that each of us hears them in his own native language?
Reflection
It had been years, but it happened again last week. I joined hands with another man to pray. Seconds into my prayer for the healing of his heart and relationships, a soft and persistent river of sound flowed from his depths.
It was no language I understood, yet I understood everything. He was speaking in tongues.
A rhythmic pattern of consonants stumbling over a few vowels streamed from his lips in a counterpoint to my attempt to put his need into words. However strange, the stream of sound didn’t overwhelm or drown out my speaking. It moved in tandem, a continuo bass line beneath my prayer, a foundation holding it up, affirming plain language in an unexpected harmony.
It didn’t feel strange, nor was I was startled even for a moment. It all fit together. Two voices, two ‘languages’ in one human speaking, from the Spirit within us to the Spirit who was so far beyond us, seeking the full presence of the Holy Mystery who bound us together, though an hour before we’d never met.
I have no idea what my prayer partner was saying, nor do I feel any need to know whether my companion in prayer had any idea what was coming out of his mouth.
It didn’t matter. I understood that God was being praised, honored and sought. The core of our humanity was affirmed and expressed as words, understood and incomprehensible, flowed from us, bearing our need and hunger for the Inexpressible One, who transcends all human speaking.
Unity in love and purpose was spoken in a harmony of words the meaning of which transcended our abilities to comprehend.
Pentecost happened again. As always, it was a gift. We did nothing to make it happen, except, I suppose, to open our mouths and speak from our hearts.
Pr. David L. Miller
Acts 2:5-8
They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak different languages as the Spirit gave them power to express themselves. Now there were devout men living in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven, and at this sound they all assembled, and each one was bewildered to hear these men speaking his own language. They were amazed and astonished. 'Surely,' they said, 'all these men speaking are Galileans? How does it happen that each of us hears them in his own native language?
Reflection
It had been years, but it happened again last week. I joined hands with another man to pray. Seconds into my prayer for the healing of his heart and relationships, a soft and persistent river of sound flowed from his depths.
It was no language I understood, yet I understood everything. He was speaking in tongues.
A rhythmic pattern of consonants stumbling over a few vowels streamed from his lips in a counterpoint to my attempt to put his need into words. However strange, the stream of sound didn’t overwhelm or drown out my speaking. It moved in tandem, a continuo bass line beneath my prayer, a foundation holding it up, affirming plain language in an unexpected harmony.
It didn’t feel strange, nor was I was startled even for a moment. It all fit together. Two voices, two ‘languages’ in one human speaking, from the Spirit within us to the Spirit who was so far beyond us, seeking the full presence of the Holy Mystery who bound us together, though an hour before we’d never met.
I have no idea what my prayer partner was saying, nor do I feel any need to know whether my companion in prayer had any idea what was coming out of his mouth.
It didn’t matter. I understood that God was being praised, honored and sought. The core of our humanity was affirmed and expressed as words, understood and incomprehensible, flowed from us, bearing our need and hunger for the Inexpressible One, who transcends all human speaking.
Unity in love and purpose was spoken in a harmony of words the meaning of which transcended our abilities to comprehend.
Pentecost happened again. As always, it was a gift. We did nothing to make it happen, except, I suppose, to open our mouths and speak from our hearts.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Today’s text
Acts 2:1-4
When Pentecost day came round, they had all met together, when suddenly there came from heaven a sound as of a violent wind which filled the entire house in which they were sitting; and there appeared to them tongues as of fire; these separated and came to rest on the head of each of them. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak different languages as the Spirit gave them power to express themselves.
Reflection
Wind, fire, energy, movement … all in all it sounds like what happens when my grandsons visit, including strange languages.
The boys descend on the house with sound and fury and exhausting dynamism. Ethan, at two, the youngest, gestures emphatically, arms open wide as he declaims in a language unknown to me but for a stray word here and there.
So it is with the Spirit, and this shatters conventional understandings of church, worship and of being Christian.
The Spirit is about one thing: life.
From the beginning to the end of the Bible when the Spirit shows up there is life. With the appearance of the air, the wind, the breath, the Spirit of God, all the same thing, life happens. There is movement, energy, purpose, compassion and joy.
Without Spirit we are dispirited, disheartened, discouraged, dejected; the wind is knocked out of us. We don’t feel truly alive; our arms and spirits fall limp and lifeless.
So send out your Spirit, Jesus, the Spirit of your resurrected life, for I want to feel alive. I want to be alive.
I want to feel the pulse of your energy, joy and purpose in my inner being. I want to be filled with courage for the purpose of God, the desire of the Spirit, which is the fullness of life, not just for me but for all God’s creation.
The life to which you call us is not one of playing safe, being cautious, avoiding risks or fearing failure. It is life come fully alive, filled with courage and hope, a life beyond the fear of giving myself--all my energies and joys--to the world that you so love.
The Spirit moves the desire to pour myself out fully, so that when I come to the end there is nothing left to be given, for it has all been spilled out on the great field of living.
This honors you. This praises you and glorifies you who loved his own and loved them to the end, until all was finished and there was nothing left of you to give.
Can I live like that? Can I be so fully given? Can this heart so easily cowed and anxious at the normal exchanges of living begin to live into the fullness of Spirit, speaking the language of given-ness that every soul understands?
There are days, my Lord, my best days. May today be such a day. And tomorrow I will return again … with the same prayer.
Pr. David L. Miller
Acts 2:1-4
When Pentecost day came round, they had all met together, when suddenly there came from heaven a sound as of a violent wind which filled the entire house in which they were sitting; and there appeared to them tongues as of fire; these separated and came to rest on the head of each of them. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak different languages as the Spirit gave them power to express themselves.
Reflection
Wind, fire, energy, movement … all in all it sounds like what happens when my grandsons visit, including strange languages.
The boys descend on the house with sound and fury and exhausting dynamism. Ethan, at two, the youngest, gestures emphatically, arms open wide as he declaims in a language unknown to me but for a stray word here and there.
So it is with the Spirit, and this shatters conventional understandings of church, worship and of being Christian.
The Spirit is about one thing: life.
From the beginning to the end of the Bible when the Spirit shows up there is life. With the appearance of the air, the wind, the breath, the Spirit of God, all the same thing, life happens. There is movement, energy, purpose, compassion and joy.
Without Spirit we are dispirited, disheartened, discouraged, dejected; the wind is knocked out of us. We don’t feel truly alive; our arms and spirits fall limp and lifeless.
So send out your Spirit, Jesus, the Spirit of your resurrected life, for I want to feel alive. I want to be alive.
I want to feel the pulse of your energy, joy and purpose in my inner being. I want to be filled with courage for the purpose of God, the desire of the Spirit, which is the fullness of life, not just for me but for all God’s creation.
The life to which you call us is not one of playing safe, being cautious, avoiding risks or fearing failure. It is life come fully alive, filled with courage and hope, a life beyond the fear of giving myself--all my energies and joys--to the world that you so love.
The Spirit moves the desire to pour myself out fully, so that when I come to the end there is nothing left to be given, for it has all been spilled out on the great field of living.
This honors you. This praises you and glorifies you who loved his own and loved them to the end, until all was finished and there was nothing left of you to give.
Can I live like that? Can I be so fully given? Can this heart so easily cowed and anxious at the normal exchanges of living begin to live into the fullness of Spirit, speaking the language of given-ness that every soul understands?
There are days, my Lord, my best days. May today be such a day. And tomorrow I will return again … with the same prayer.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, May 14, 2010
Friday, May 14, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 24:49-50
'And now I am sending upon you what the Father has promised. Stay in the city, then, until you are clothed with the power from on high.' Then he took them out as far as the outskirts of Bethany, and raising his hands he blessed them.
Reflection
You blessed them. This is my favorite posture in which to see you, an image carved deep in my soul.
Perhaps it started in the old limestone church in Warren. From behind the high pulpit a mural looked back at me every Sunday. You were risen and ascending high in the air, your hands held head-high, your palms open and wounded in a gesture of blessing.
You looked down at your huddled friends in the painting and at us, a huddled few, gathered to go again through motions of standing, sitting, praying, singing and listening.
Week after week it went on, always under your gaze from the wall, as you silently blessed us, the confused and uncomprehending
Simple things, frequently seen, seem to leave the deepest mark.
The mural is still there, looking down on the generations who followed me in those pews. You are still there, Jesus, blessing them … and me. Only now, miles and years removed from the old church I carry the image in my mind. But it is no less vivid.
It tells me that blessing is what you are about, blessing the confused and uncomprehending, the failed and the fools, the stumbling and the wounded, the arrogant and those who believed they had no need of you or that room and fled as quickly as they could.
Sinners, all of us, that we much held in common, that and the truth that you bless us with a peace and presence that is ever for us, if we realize for the briefest moment that our lives are forever held in the mystery of those up-raised hands.
Silently, unceasingly, they tell us who we are and that we, who huddled beneath your gaze, are intended to live as free beloved, owing you nothing more than to be ourselves, that self that comes out to play and laugh when we know what those hands tell us.
I am sure I undershoot the mark, but for me this is the power from on high, the power, the freedom to be what we are, ourselves, and to give ourselves to those who need us without anxiety or arrogance, self-importance or worries about how we shall be seen or judged. This is power. And it flows from those hands.
You blessed me from that wall. Your hands told who I am, for what I am made and gave me the life you intend me to live. They tell me the power I will have from the Loving Mystery on those days I have the good sense to let you bless me.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 24:49-50
'And now I am sending upon you what the Father has promised. Stay in the city, then, until you are clothed with the power from on high.' Then he took them out as far as the outskirts of Bethany, and raising his hands he blessed them.
Reflection
You blessed them. This is my favorite posture in which to see you, an image carved deep in my soul.
Perhaps it started in the old limestone church in Warren. From behind the high pulpit a mural looked back at me every Sunday. You were risen and ascending high in the air, your hands held head-high, your palms open and wounded in a gesture of blessing.
You looked down at your huddled friends in the painting and at us, a huddled few, gathered to go again through motions of standing, sitting, praying, singing and listening.
Week after week it went on, always under your gaze from the wall, as you silently blessed us, the confused and uncomprehending
Simple things, frequently seen, seem to leave the deepest mark.
The mural is still there, looking down on the generations who followed me in those pews. You are still there, Jesus, blessing them … and me. Only now, miles and years removed from the old church I carry the image in my mind. But it is no less vivid.
It tells me that blessing is what you are about, blessing the confused and uncomprehending, the failed and the fools, the stumbling and the wounded, the arrogant and those who believed they had no need of you or that room and fled as quickly as they could.
Sinners, all of us, that we much held in common, that and the truth that you bless us with a peace and presence that is ever for us, if we realize for the briefest moment that our lives are forever held in the mystery of those up-raised hands.
Silently, unceasingly, they tell us who we are and that we, who huddled beneath your gaze, are intended to live as free beloved, owing you nothing more than to be ourselves, that self that comes out to play and laugh when we know what those hands tell us.
I am sure I undershoot the mark, but for me this is the power from on high, the power, the freedom to be what we are, ourselves, and to give ourselves to those who need us without anxiety or arrogance, self-importance or worries about how we shall be seen or judged. This is power. And it flows from those hands.
You blessed me from that wall. Your hands told who I am, for what I am made and gave me the life you intend me to live. They tell me the power I will have from the Loving Mystery on those days I have the good sense to let you bless me.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Today’s text
John 24:44-46
Then he [Jesus] told them, 'This is what I meant when I said, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, in the Prophets and in the Psalms, was destined to be fulfilled.' He then opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, 'So it is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead … .'
Reflection
Destined … it needed to happen. But didn’t you have choices, Jesus? Surely you did, or you are not human like me, and I know that you are, though perhaps with fewer struggles over whom you really are and for what you were made.
You knew your destiny, and your decisions were guided by that knowing. You knew your life was to be a sign of the Father’s rule.
You knew every moment of your existence--of every person’s existence--was lived in the field of Loving Presence. You knew the truth you lived would be resisted and denounced.
You knew your life was a threat to ‘business as usual,’ a contradiction to life as we most often live it. You knew this contradiction would bring conflict and that faithfulness to God’s dream would destroy you.
It was destined, necessary, and you chose that destiny. I love you for this. You move me. You chose, and the life you choose is a portrait of everything I want, everything I most value and everything the world should and will be.
But try as I might may soul falls downcast when the things I do are not successful, when my life seems so forgotten and lived in a corner, so different from once upon a time.
Can I surrender to this destiny, to living and loving in my place, knowing my successes will be few and small, my failures common and my best labors soon forgotten or dismissed as having little import?
Can I choose, as you chose, the necessity of living and loving in the place and way the Loving Mystery has given me?
And why, oh why, should that last sentence bring such tears?
They are tears not of shame but of recognition of the central truth of one’s life: how small and yet how great one person’s life truly is … when the destiny of time, place and circumstance are not refused but chosen.
In that choosing, we--I--become as you, one who recognizes in the next task, in the day’s simple duties the destiny for which one came into the world, a simple destiny: to love, to give oneself, to choose one’s place and time as gift and grace, however great or obscure.
In that choosing, the Father’s holy kingdom shines amid whatever struggles, resistance or apathy prevails. But by choosing and living that destiny, in given-ness to our moments the Word in us is fulfilled, and the heart comes to know that this, alone, is enough.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 24:44-46
Then he [Jesus] told them, 'This is what I meant when I said, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, in the Prophets and in the Psalms, was destined to be fulfilled.' He then opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, 'So it is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead … .'
Reflection
Destined … it needed to happen. But didn’t you have choices, Jesus? Surely you did, or you are not human like me, and I know that you are, though perhaps with fewer struggles over whom you really are and for what you were made.
You knew your destiny, and your decisions were guided by that knowing. You knew your life was to be a sign of the Father’s rule.
You knew every moment of your existence--of every person’s existence--was lived in the field of Loving Presence. You knew the truth you lived would be resisted and denounced.
You knew your life was a threat to ‘business as usual,’ a contradiction to life as we most often live it. You knew this contradiction would bring conflict and that faithfulness to God’s dream would destroy you.
It was destined, necessary, and you chose that destiny. I love you for this. You move me. You chose, and the life you choose is a portrait of everything I want, everything I most value and everything the world should and will be.
But try as I might may soul falls downcast when the things I do are not successful, when my life seems so forgotten and lived in a corner, so different from once upon a time.
Can I surrender to this destiny, to living and loving in my place, knowing my successes will be few and small, my failures common and my best labors soon forgotten or dismissed as having little import?
Can I choose, as you chose, the necessity of living and loving in the place and way the Loving Mystery has given me?
And why, oh why, should that last sentence bring such tears?
They are tears not of shame but of recognition of the central truth of one’s life: how small and yet how great one person’s life truly is … when the destiny of time, place and circumstance are not refused but chosen.
In that choosing, we--I--become as you, one who recognizes in the next task, in the day’s simple duties the destiny for which one came into the world, a simple destiny: to love, to give oneself, to choose one’s place and time as gift and grace, however great or obscure.
In that choosing, the Father’s holy kingdom shines amid whatever struggles, resistance or apathy prevails. But by choosing and living that destiny, in given-ness to our moments the Word in us is fulfilled, and the heart comes to know that this, alone, is enough.
Pr. David L. Miller
Saturday, May 08, 2010
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Today’s text
John 14:28-29
You heard me say: I am going away and shall return. If you loved me you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. I have told you this now, before it happens, so that when it does happen you may believe.
Reflection
Your friends hear you, Jesus. But they hear only that you are going away, and sadness with fear sinks their souls.
‘Don’t go,’ their hearts immediately cry. They can’t help it. The reaction is involuntary not chosen. They know only the sadness immense loss. ‘Don’t go,’ that is the entire awareness of their souls.
‘Don’t go. We have barely come to know you. Only now have we begun to know how you change us. We are more alive when you are here. The air is warmer and clearer. We feel lighter, safer and happier. Our hearts are secure in your nearness. We are less alive, no; we don’t really live without you.’
But the cry is not theirs. It is mine. I understand them completely. My soul languishes in sadness and distraction of its own making and confusion when I don’t feel you near.
I fall into self-preoccupation, consumed with my failure to live a truly human life; a life lived in joy, aware of its purpose, filled with the energy of eternity which is that glistening love with which you fill me in those times when I am most aware of your presence.
So don’t go, Jesus. When I don’t sense you near my life is but a half-life, a shadow life in which the light of your face fails to shine through the gray mask of my melancholy.
But you go, and you go in order to return. You come back to me again and again, appearing with the full gifts of the Father’s great and invincible heart to light my soul with joy. I know that you go to enter the fullness of the One who is Fullness of life and joy. You go so that you may pour the nectar of this living delight into souls who run dry.
So pour your life onto the dry dust of this soul that I may live as fully as you, brimming with a joy born not in pleasant moments but in the deep reaches of the divine heart.
Then I shall be alive, and all the death that clings shall be washed away.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 14:28-29
You heard me say: I am going away and shall return. If you loved me you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. I have told you this now, before it happens, so that when it does happen you may believe.
Reflection
Your friends hear you, Jesus. But they hear only that you are going away, and sadness with fear sinks their souls.
‘Don’t go,’ their hearts immediately cry. They can’t help it. The reaction is involuntary not chosen. They know only the sadness immense loss. ‘Don’t go,’ that is the entire awareness of their souls.
‘Don’t go. We have barely come to know you. Only now have we begun to know how you change us. We are more alive when you are here. The air is warmer and clearer. We feel lighter, safer and happier. Our hearts are secure in your nearness. We are less alive, no; we don’t really live without you.’
But the cry is not theirs. It is mine. I understand them completely. My soul languishes in sadness and distraction of its own making and confusion when I don’t feel you near.
I fall into self-preoccupation, consumed with my failure to live a truly human life; a life lived in joy, aware of its purpose, filled with the energy of eternity which is that glistening love with which you fill me in those times when I am most aware of your presence.
So don’t go, Jesus. When I don’t sense you near my life is but a half-life, a shadow life in which the light of your face fails to shine through the gray mask of my melancholy.
But you go, and you go in order to return. You come back to me again and again, appearing with the full gifts of the Father’s great and invincible heart to light my soul with joy. I know that you go to enter the fullness of the One who is Fullness of life and joy. You go so that you may pour the nectar of this living delight into souls who run dry.
So pour your life onto the dry dust of this soul that I may live as fully as you, brimming with a joy born not in pleasant moments but in the deep reaches of the divine heart.
Then I shall be alive, and all the death that clings shall be washed away.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, May 06, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Today’s text
John 14:25-27
I have said these things to you while still with you; but the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all I have said to you. Peace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace which the world cannot give, this is my gift to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.
Reflection
“Don’t let your hearts be troubled even when life is troubling.” That’s what you say this morning, my Friend. “My peace I leave you, even when life is troubling. The Spirit of Life abides with and in and around you.
“You have all you need, for you have my words, my life and my love ringing in your ears and stirring in your soul, surrounding you in the hearts of those who love me. You are not and never alone. You have me, and I have you.
“So don’t be troubled or afraid even when life is fearful and threats lurk unseen in the bushes waiting to pounce. Every trouble and fear is already overcome, overwhelmed, over-powered by that from which the universe springs, by Love Itself, and Love Itself abides every place, breaking the walls of tombs and fear.
“Even in the loneliest haunts of your soul, in the hollow halls of mind where your voice echoes weak and alone, longing for some presence to break up the fearful emptiness, I am there. Your silent voice is heard.
“Hear also mine: ‘Let your heart not be troubled, for I am greater than your heart, greater than your troubles.’ In the beginning, my love exploded, making a world in which I take delight, and my delight is for you. Never are you alone or forgotten. Love forgets not its own.
“Every moment, every trouble and fear, yes, every joy, too, is an invitation to intimacy; to come near; to speak your heart into the darkness trusting that the darkness has ears. Every moment is an invitation to know that I am the enveloping darkness you cannot see, surrounding and encompasses even the darkest and most fearful places in the immensity of Love Unimaginable.
“Nothing will steal you from the enveloping cloud of my presence.
“So don’t let your hearts be troubled or afraid. Even your troubles and fear are held in the grasp of life and love. In darkest moments, I whisper, ‘Trust. Believe. All is well. Come close to my heart. Bring all that is in your own, fear, trouble, the whole load.’
“You dwell in the field of my immensity. Everything does. And everything that will ever come to you is a door into a love of which you will never know the end.”
Pr. David L. Miller
John 14:25-27
I have said these things to you while still with you; but the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all I have said to you. Peace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace which the world cannot give, this is my gift to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.
Reflection
“Don’t let your hearts be troubled even when life is troubling.” That’s what you say this morning, my Friend. “My peace I leave you, even when life is troubling. The Spirit of Life abides with and in and around you.
“You have all you need, for you have my words, my life and my love ringing in your ears and stirring in your soul, surrounding you in the hearts of those who love me. You are not and never alone. You have me, and I have you.
“So don’t be troubled or afraid even when life is fearful and threats lurk unseen in the bushes waiting to pounce. Every trouble and fear is already overcome, overwhelmed, over-powered by that from which the universe springs, by Love Itself, and Love Itself abides every place, breaking the walls of tombs and fear.
“Even in the loneliest haunts of your soul, in the hollow halls of mind where your voice echoes weak and alone, longing for some presence to break up the fearful emptiness, I am there. Your silent voice is heard.
“Hear also mine: ‘Let your heart not be troubled, for I am greater than your heart, greater than your troubles.’ In the beginning, my love exploded, making a world in which I take delight, and my delight is for you. Never are you alone or forgotten. Love forgets not its own.
“Every moment, every trouble and fear, yes, every joy, too, is an invitation to intimacy; to come near; to speak your heart into the darkness trusting that the darkness has ears. Every moment is an invitation to know that I am the enveloping darkness you cannot see, surrounding and encompasses even the darkest and most fearful places in the immensity of Love Unimaginable.
“Nothing will steal you from the enveloping cloud of my presence.
“So don’t let your hearts be troubled or afraid. Even your troubles and fear are held in the grasp of life and love. In darkest moments, I whisper, ‘Trust. Believe. All is well. Come close to my heart. Bring all that is in your own, fear, trouble, the whole load.’
“You dwell in the field of my immensity. Everything does. And everything that will ever come to you is a door into a love of which you will never know the end.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, May 05, 2010
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Today’s text
John 14:25-27
'I have said these things to you while still with you; but the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all I have said to you. Peace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace which the world cannot give, this is my gift to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.'
Reflection
What is your peace, Jesus, if not the inseparable oneness you shared with the Holy Mystery, the Father?
Most often I confuse peace with imperturbability. It is undisturbed serenity, free from distress and disordered desire. But if this is peace, you didn’t have it yourself, Jesus, so how can you give it to me?
You were disturbed, angry, disappointed, distressed and deeply moved. Your generous heart knew pain and impatience over suffering and cruelty, hatred and apathy.
But did you also know some paradoxical peace amid the swirl of distress?
Part of me wants peace without distress, serenity freed from the tensions of living. But this doesn’t exist. It can’t be had, and I wouldn’t want it even if you gave it to me. For it would be a peace stripped of feeling for life. It would not know revulsion at hunger and suffering, or the swells love that wash over me when I touch and bless the heads of my little grandsons.
Who wants a life without such feeling? Such stirring within reflects deep connection with the world its needs and joys. Serenity without passion has nothing to do with you, Jesus. It is not an expression of your Spirit.
Still, I want peace, and your offer to give it draws me to you. I want to dwell, to make my home in the peace you knew, and the only way I can conceive of your peace is as unity, harmony, oneness with the Eternal Love to which your soul was transparent.
You lived in felt awareness of the loving delight in which the Father held you. You constantly knew your life was a singular expression of the Being of the One who is Love. Your life was not yours but the substance of the Infinite Source who is Life.
Dwelling in that awareness released joy, mercy and freedom from self-conscious anxiety so that a fountain of love flowed through you.
My lack of peace is comes because I lose awareness of truth you never lost.
I am no more separated from the Loving Mystery than were you, Jesus. My life at every moment is an expression of the Ultimate Source of Being and Love. It is always held, treasured and delighted in by a Love that beggars all description.
That’s what you knew Jesus. Always. That’s what my anxious self forgets.
But it is this awareness that you give to me, so that even now I feel the power of Being in my hands, my heart and my mind, and know again what you always knew.
Today let me not forget.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 14:25-27
'I have said these things to you while still with you; but the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all I have said to you. Peace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace which the world cannot give, this is my gift to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.'
Reflection
What is your peace, Jesus, if not the inseparable oneness you shared with the Holy Mystery, the Father?
Most often I confuse peace with imperturbability. It is undisturbed serenity, free from distress and disordered desire. But if this is peace, you didn’t have it yourself, Jesus, so how can you give it to me?
You were disturbed, angry, disappointed, distressed and deeply moved. Your generous heart knew pain and impatience over suffering and cruelty, hatred and apathy.
But did you also know some paradoxical peace amid the swirl of distress?
Part of me wants peace without distress, serenity freed from the tensions of living. But this doesn’t exist. It can’t be had, and I wouldn’t want it even if you gave it to me. For it would be a peace stripped of feeling for life. It would not know revulsion at hunger and suffering, or the swells love that wash over me when I touch and bless the heads of my little grandsons.
Who wants a life without such feeling? Such stirring within reflects deep connection with the world its needs and joys. Serenity without passion has nothing to do with you, Jesus. It is not an expression of your Spirit.
Still, I want peace, and your offer to give it draws me to you. I want to dwell, to make my home in the peace you knew, and the only way I can conceive of your peace is as unity, harmony, oneness with the Eternal Love to which your soul was transparent.
You lived in felt awareness of the loving delight in which the Father held you. You constantly knew your life was a singular expression of the Being of the One who is Love. Your life was not yours but the substance of the Infinite Source who is Life.
Dwelling in that awareness released joy, mercy and freedom from self-conscious anxiety so that a fountain of love flowed through you.
My lack of peace is comes because I lose awareness of truth you never lost.
I am no more separated from the Loving Mystery than were you, Jesus. My life at every moment is an expression of the Ultimate Source of Being and Love. It is always held, treasured and delighted in by a Love that beggars all description.
That’s what you knew Jesus. Always. That’s what my anxious self forgets.
But it is this awareness that you give to me, so that even now I feel the power of Being in my hands, my heart and my mind, and know again what you always knew.
Today let me not forget.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Today’s text
John 14:23
Jesus replied: ‘Anyone who loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.’
Reflection
Tuesday comes. The day off ends, not that it was devoid of work anyway. Responsibilities and care intrude even on the most protected days.
But with the morning light, the unending to-do list asserts itself with unrelenting vigor. I suppose I should be thankful for good work to do, but I am not.
Insistent anxiety compels me to rush by these quiet, daybreak minutes and rush headlong into the fray. I’m driven to silence the nagging voice that hectors my mind until I can cross a clutch of neglected tasks off the list.
Peace of mind, I am certain, depends upon getting things done. Only then can the heart rest.
It’s a lie, of course. It isn’t true. The list will always be there. Faces and phone calls, administration and neglected conversations you will always have with you. (Didn’t you say something like that, Jesus?)
I cannot meet all the needs on the list, let alone do all that I demand of myself. Not even close.
This awareness splinters consciousness at the very point--now--when I want (and badly need) to dissolve all self-consciousness in you, so that there’s awareness only of Presence, so that I know that I am with and in you, so that I feel my being encompassed in divine immensity; so that this awareness fills every internal space, and the peace of oneness floods the mind.
A divided mind cannot have this awareness, only a mind that turns again and again from habitual lies to singular truth.
I love the awareness of oneness with you, so I keep your word, which, I believe, means waiting here, refusing the urge to throw myself into the day before my soul has had time to be with you and receive its freedom.
The word I keep is the truth that I am made by and for you. You hunger to dwell in me, even as I yearn to dwell in you. So being here, with you, must be the day’s first business, a quiet keeping of the truth in the face of noisy lies.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 14:23
Jesus replied: ‘Anyone who loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.’
Reflection
Tuesday comes. The day off ends, not that it was devoid of work anyway. Responsibilities and care intrude even on the most protected days.
But with the morning light, the unending to-do list asserts itself with unrelenting vigor. I suppose I should be thankful for good work to do, but I am not.
Insistent anxiety compels me to rush by these quiet, daybreak minutes and rush headlong into the fray. I’m driven to silence the nagging voice that hectors my mind until I can cross a clutch of neglected tasks off the list.
Peace of mind, I am certain, depends upon getting things done. Only then can the heart rest.
It’s a lie, of course. It isn’t true. The list will always be there. Faces and phone calls, administration and neglected conversations you will always have with you. (Didn’t you say something like that, Jesus?)
I cannot meet all the needs on the list, let alone do all that I demand of myself. Not even close.
This awareness splinters consciousness at the very point--now--when I want (and badly need) to dissolve all self-consciousness in you, so that there’s awareness only of Presence, so that I know that I am with and in you, so that I feel my being encompassed in divine immensity; so that this awareness fills every internal space, and the peace of oneness floods the mind.
A divided mind cannot have this awareness, only a mind that turns again and again from habitual lies to singular truth.
I love the awareness of oneness with you, so I keep your word, which, I believe, means waiting here, refusing the urge to throw myself into the day before my soul has had time to be with you and receive its freedom.
The word I keep is the truth that I am made by and for you. You hunger to dwell in me, even as I yearn to dwell in you. So being here, with you, must be the day’s first business, a quiet keeping of the truth in the face of noisy lies.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Today’s text
John 13:34-35
[Jesus said], 'I give you a new commandment: love one another; you must love one another just as I have loved you. It is by your love for one another, that everyone will recognize you as my disciples.'
Reflection
All my life I have read these words as an individual invitation and challenge. “Come,” you say. “Enter the love that I am. Be transformed by infinite warmth that welcomes you and always will. Then live your life in the warmth of my embrace.”
I still hear that, but now so much more.
Your words are spoken to community, a group. The love you are is the air your church is invited to breathe and to become. Breathe this air for a while, and grace becomes flesh, even in one’s own.
Sitting on the floor talking to children, goofy kids, hearing their memories and stories it occurs to me that we breathe that air, Jesus, the fresh breath of Spirit. They listen to each other as well as they can, and I have the urge to tell them how much I love them all. I want to gather them in my arms and love out of them anything that keeps them from knowing and feeling the wonder that each of them is.
I want to become the love you are for them, at least as best I can, which isn’t much I admit. But sitting there on the floor, laughing and telling stories, there is a moment when affection is mutual, and your command to love is utterly unneeded for loving is as natural and easy as looking at each other and realizing that we are not many but one.
Somehow, we are one beating heart in harmonious rhythm, moved by a force invisible as air but just as undeniable. It’s holy, and we are part of it, not as individuals but as a single body whose principle is an affection and care that feels limitless.
I’m not entirely sure how this happens. I don’t know what any of us did to open the door that let eternity flood the moment. Maybe we just opened our hearts and spoke of what we love, what makes us laugh and brings joy. Maybe we were just ourselves … beyond any fears that who we are or what we say isn’t welcome. That certainly happened.
And in its happening your command, your desire for us became as real as the hugs with which we sent each other on our way. And just then, loving as you love was no towering achievement or act of will, but a gift given in community by children who had no idea the wonder they freely gave to one tired soul.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 13:34-35
[Jesus said], 'I give you a new commandment: love one another; you must love one another just as I have loved you. It is by your love for one another, that everyone will recognize you as my disciples.'
Reflection
All my life I have read these words as an individual invitation and challenge. “Come,” you say. “Enter the love that I am. Be transformed by infinite warmth that welcomes you and always will. Then live your life in the warmth of my embrace.”
I still hear that, but now so much more.
Your words are spoken to community, a group. The love you are is the air your church is invited to breathe and to become. Breathe this air for a while, and grace becomes flesh, even in one’s own.
Sitting on the floor talking to children, goofy kids, hearing their memories and stories it occurs to me that we breathe that air, Jesus, the fresh breath of Spirit. They listen to each other as well as they can, and I have the urge to tell them how much I love them all. I want to gather them in my arms and love out of them anything that keeps them from knowing and feeling the wonder that each of them is.
I want to become the love you are for them, at least as best I can, which isn’t much I admit. But sitting there on the floor, laughing and telling stories, there is a moment when affection is mutual, and your command to love is utterly unneeded for loving is as natural and easy as looking at each other and realizing that we are not many but one.
Somehow, we are one beating heart in harmonious rhythm, moved by a force invisible as air but just as undeniable. It’s holy, and we are part of it, not as individuals but as a single body whose principle is an affection and care that feels limitless.
I’m not entirely sure how this happens. I don’t know what any of us did to open the door that let eternity flood the moment. Maybe we just opened our hearts and spoke of what we love, what makes us laugh and brings joy. Maybe we were just ourselves … beyond any fears that who we are or what we say isn’t welcome. That certainly happened.
And in its happening your command, your desire for us became as real as the hugs with which we sent each other on our way. And just then, loving as you love was no towering achievement or act of will, but a gift given in community by children who had no idea the wonder they freely gave to one tired soul.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Today’s text
John 13:31-32
When he had gone, Jesus said: Now has the Son of man been glorified, and in him God has been glorified. If God has been glorified in him, God will in turn glorify him in himself, and will glorify him very soon.
Reflection
It’s intriguing that this exclamation should come right after Judas leaves the room. Emotionally, the scene feels right, but it also makes you, Jesus, look too much like me.
It’s as if Judas leaves, and immediately you are freed to be … yourself, as if something hindered you from being the fullness of who you are.
That is not exactly good news to me, although I empathize with your feeling, if I understand what might be happening in you.
There is nothing more that I want today than to be myself, and it seems there is nothing harder to be. Why is that?
There are moments of flowing freedom when the feeling, the passion I have for the people and things I love streams effortlessly from my soul.
Defensiveness flees, self-consciousness disappears and the soul is a fountain of generosity. All that matters is this flow in which action and identity are one, and there is no separation, no distinction between the heart’s deepest desire and one’s words and acts.
But there are far too many moments when the mouth can’t or won’t speak the truth the heart knows. Fears and angers block the flow, and the core of the soul is lost from view. Try as I might, I can’t prime the pump and make it come out and reveal itself.
I want to return there; to find the center of the soul, to live from the fountain that I know is there, but something blocks the way.
Until it is removed, until those fears or angers or struggles subside, what I most deeply am remains hidden, and life has no flow.
I don’t know how I dare project all this on you, Jesus. But I can’t help but notice: Judas leaves, his simmering hatred of what is happening with you and your inner circle departs the room, and your first word is of glory.
And this?
Glory is the showing forth of the love in which you live, the love that lives in you.
Can it be that the humble love that is God’s glory cannot flow so smoothly or cleanly in the presence of hatred? Hatred and overheated emotions surely block the flow of your life in me, but in you, Jesus?
Did you, like me, feel stymied by fears or concern about the reactions of others? Did you struggle to be the soul you knew yourself to be, the soul of holy love, craving to be known and given?
I want to believe you are above all this, elevated beyond the frailties that hem in my heart. Certainly, you struggled with these more valiantly and successfully than I. But I wanted to imagine that if I fully could give myself to you, this struggle would cease for me--just as I imagined that it had for you.
But it can’t, for the love that is the heart of your soul--and so deeply hidden in mine--is endless and infinite. Revealing such a glory can’t help but be a struggle for finite, mortal flesh.
Revealing this glory is central struggle of our lives, the one that makes us human and opens our souls to the joy of knowing and being the glory you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 13:31-32
When he had gone, Jesus said: Now has the Son of man been glorified, and in him God has been glorified. If God has been glorified in him, God will in turn glorify him in himself, and will glorify him very soon.
Reflection
It’s intriguing that this exclamation should come right after Judas leaves the room. Emotionally, the scene feels right, but it also makes you, Jesus, look too much like me.
It’s as if Judas leaves, and immediately you are freed to be … yourself, as if something hindered you from being the fullness of who you are.
That is not exactly good news to me, although I empathize with your feeling, if I understand what might be happening in you.
There is nothing more that I want today than to be myself, and it seems there is nothing harder to be. Why is that?
There are moments of flowing freedom when the feeling, the passion I have for the people and things I love streams effortlessly from my soul.
Defensiveness flees, self-consciousness disappears and the soul is a fountain of generosity. All that matters is this flow in which action and identity are one, and there is no separation, no distinction between the heart’s deepest desire and one’s words and acts.
But there are far too many moments when the mouth can’t or won’t speak the truth the heart knows. Fears and angers block the flow, and the core of the soul is lost from view. Try as I might, I can’t prime the pump and make it come out and reveal itself.
I want to return there; to find the center of the soul, to live from the fountain that I know is there, but something blocks the way.
Until it is removed, until those fears or angers or struggles subside, what I most deeply am remains hidden, and life has no flow.
I don’t know how I dare project all this on you, Jesus. But I can’t help but notice: Judas leaves, his simmering hatred of what is happening with you and your inner circle departs the room, and your first word is of glory.
And this?
Glory is the showing forth of the love in which you live, the love that lives in you.
Can it be that the humble love that is God’s glory cannot flow so smoothly or cleanly in the presence of hatred? Hatred and overheated emotions surely block the flow of your life in me, but in you, Jesus?
Did you, like me, feel stymied by fears or concern about the reactions of others? Did you struggle to be the soul you knew yourself to be, the soul of holy love, craving to be known and given?
I want to believe you are above all this, elevated beyond the frailties that hem in my heart. Certainly, you struggled with these more valiantly and successfully than I. But I wanted to imagine that if I fully could give myself to you, this struggle would cease for me--just as I imagined that it had for you.
But it can’t, for the love that is the heart of your soul--and so deeply hidden in mine--is endless and infinite. Revealing such a glory can’t help but be a struggle for finite, mortal flesh.
Revealing this glory is central struggle of our lives, the one that makes us human and opens our souls to the joy of knowing and being the glory you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Today’s text
John 10:22-26
It was the time of the feast of Dedication in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was in the Temple walking up and down in the Portico of Solomon. The Jews gathered round him and said, 'How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us openly.' Jesus replied: I have told you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father's name are my witness; but you do not believe, because you are no sheep of mine.’
Reflection
Where is the place of meeting? We can only notice this. No one can really tell us. We must answer: Do heaven and earth meet here? Are eternal realities known here?
It is the reason my fingers are on these keys, Holy One. This is a place of meeting, a temple where the holy and the mundane overlap and your beauty pours into and through me.
It doesn’t happen every time. Or does it?
Perhaps it’s best to say that I don’t feel it every time. But this little space in a basement office, this time of listening to no one but you, this desk where my fingers poise over dark keys ready to receive a word from you, this is a temple, a place of holy meeting.
The grace of all eternity comes to me here. You cross whatever invisible membrane that separates my consciousness from knowing you near, and the joy of awareness of you who are love comes and touches me and makes me alive again.
So this must be a temple, for you and I meet here. It doesn’t look much like a holy place. There are books and papers on the desk, a printer and this computer. Three or four cards with symbols and religious pictures perch precariously atop the book case, and Dixie’s photos of flowers and trees peer at me from the wall.
So I suppose there are those elements that point to your beauty and the heart ties that bind me to other souls who love and need you as much as I do.
But it is not these external signs but an internal awareness that moves me to come and sit here this place of meeting where I wait for you to break through my dimness and light my heart with the joy of love.
I wonder about those who asked you to answer, “Are you the Christ.” Did they ever ask themselves what it was like when they were with you? Did they ever feel moved to praise God for the power or the grace present in your deeds?
Did they ever look into their hearts and notice if that eternal love for which no name will do … did that One come to expression in you?
Perhaps they couldn’t because you defied all their expectations. But I think that’s what you wanted them to do: to stop, to look and to ask, “Do heaven and earth meet here?
If so, then you are the temple, Jesus, the place of meeting, the one even I meet even here.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 10:22-26
It was the time of the feast of Dedication in Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was in the Temple walking up and down in the Portico of Solomon. The Jews gathered round him and said, 'How much longer are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us openly.' Jesus replied: I have told you, but you do not believe. The works I do in my Father's name are my witness; but you do not believe, because you are no sheep of mine.’
Reflection
Where is the place of meeting? We can only notice this. No one can really tell us. We must answer: Do heaven and earth meet here? Are eternal realities known here?
It is the reason my fingers are on these keys, Holy One. This is a place of meeting, a temple where the holy and the mundane overlap and your beauty pours into and through me.
It doesn’t happen every time. Or does it?
Perhaps it’s best to say that I don’t feel it every time. But this little space in a basement office, this time of listening to no one but you, this desk where my fingers poise over dark keys ready to receive a word from you, this is a temple, a place of holy meeting.
The grace of all eternity comes to me here. You cross whatever invisible membrane that separates my consciousness from knowing you near, and the joy of awareness of you who are love comes and touches me and makes me alive again.
So this must be a temple, for you and I meet here. It doesn’t look much like a holy place. There are books and papers on the desk, a printer and this computer. Three or four cards with symbols and religious pictures perch precariously atop the book case, and Dixie’s photos of flowers and trees peer at me from the wall.
So I suppose there are those elements that point to your beauty and the heart ties that bind me to other souls who love and need you as much as I do.
But it is not these external signs but an internal awareness that moves me to come and sit here this place of meeting where I wait for you to break through my dimness and light my heart with the joy of love.
I wonder about those who asked you to answer, “Are you the Christ.” Did they ever ask themselves what it was like when they were with you? Did they ever feel moved to praise God for the power or the grace present in your deeds?
Did they ever look into their hearts and notice if that eternal love for which no name will do … did that One come to expression in you?
Perhaps they couldn’t because you defied all their expectations. But I think that’s what you wanted them to do: to stop, to look and to ask, “Do heaven and earth meet here?
If so, then you are the temple, Jesus, the place of meeting, the one even I meet even here.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Today’s text
John 21:15-18
When they had eaten, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these others do?' He answered, 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my lambs.' A second time he said to him, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' He replied, 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Look after my sheep. Then he said to him a third time, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' Peter was hurt that he asked him a third time, 'Do you love me?' and said, 'Lord, you know everything; you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. In all truth I tell you, when you were young you put on your own belt and walked where you liked; but when you grow old you will stretch out your hands, and somebody else will put a belt round you and take you where you would rather not go.’
Reflection
So it is. The things we love take us beyond ourselves, beyond our limits, beyond our will.
Do you love me? It all comes does to this. Am I playing a religious game, clever with words and ideas about ultimate concerns and unsolvable mysteries?
Or do I love you, Jesus?
Do I love the thought and sight of you? Do I love the mysterious someone who touched and healed those that society tossed to the edges of life?
Do I love the non-conformist way you fought with all who drew lines to separate people from God and each other?
Do I love the soul I meet when I turn your words over in my mind?
The fact is that I do. In you, 20 centuries later, I feel like I am meeting the only real human being who ever lived, one who knew the mystery of his connection with the Infinite Source for whom no name will do.
In you I meet a true soul who was always, unfailingly himself. In you I see a beauty I am not, but which I want to be.
So ‘yes,’ I say with some surprise. Yes, this morning I discover that I love you more than I thought I did. I have known that love in recent days, and it takes me beyond where I want to go.
Loves does that.
I am not like Peter, led away by brutal hands that inflict physical wounds and, ultimately, death. But something similar happens for all of us who love you.
For me it’s more like this: The phone rings, a shaky voice asks for conversation. It happens most often in the middle of dinner and especially when I am tired and feel that I have nothing left to give. I want my couch, a glass of wine and some gentle conversation.
I don’t want to go. I’m tired. But I go. I go beyond the limits of what I think is reasonable because the love you are requires it, Jesus, because the love you have put in me moves it.
This is no external force compelling me. But it’s something no less deniable, the presence of love for the love you are moving me beyond myself, beyond my limits, beyond my own willing.
And for that time, I am as human as you, Jesus, and as blessed. And I am happy. Funny how that is.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 21:15-18
When they had eaten, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these others do?' He answered, 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my lambs.' A second time he said to him, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' He replied, 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Look after my sheep. Then he said to him a third time, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' Peter was hurt that he asked him a third time, 'Do you love me?' and said, 'Lord, you know everything; you know I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. In all truth I tell you, when you were young you put on your own belt and walked where you liked; but when you grow old you will stretch out your hands, and somebody else will put a belt round you and take you where you would rather not go.’
Reflection
So it is. The things we love take us beyond ourselves, beyond our limits, beyond our will.
Do you love me? It all comes does to this. Am I playing a religious game, clever with words and ideas about ultimate concerns and unsolvable mysteries?
Or do I love you, Jesus?
Do I love the thought and sight of you? Do I love the mysterious someone who touched and healed those that society tossed to the edges of life?
Do I love the non-conformist way you fought with all who drew lines to separate people from God and each other?
Do I love the soul I meet when I turn your words over in my mind?
The fact is that I do. In you, 20 centuries later, I feel like I am meeting the only real human being who ever lived, one who knew the mystery of his connection with the Infinite Source for whom no name will do.
In you I meet a true soul who was always, unfailingly himself. In you I see a beauty I am not, but which I want to be.
So ‘yes,’ I say with some surprise. Yes, this morning I discover that I love you more than I thought I did. I have known that love in recent days, and it takes me beyond where I want to go.
Loves does that.
I am not like Peter, led away by brutal hands that inflict physical wounds and, ultimately, death. But something similar happens for all of us who love you.
For me it’s more like this: The phone rings, a shaky voice asks for conversation. It happens most often in the middle of dinner and especially when I am tired and feel that I have nothing left to give. I want my couch, a glass of wine and some gentle conversation.
I don’t want to go. I’m tired. But I go. I go beyond the limits of what I think is reasonable because the love you are requires it, Jesus, because the love you have put in me moves it.
This is no external force compelling me. But it’s something no less deniable, the presence of love for the love you are moving me beyond myself, beyond my limits, beyond my own willing.
And for that time, I am as human as you, Jesus, and as blessed. And I am happy. Funny how that is.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Today’s text
Psalm 30:8-10
To you, Yahweh, I call, to my God I cry for mercy. What point is there in my death, my going down to the abyss? Can the dust praise you or proclaim your faithfulness? Listen, Yahweh, take pity on me, Yahweh, be my help!
Reflection
My soul cries for a great open space where my heart may breathe free.
The morning sun awakens in the Earth the full promise of spring. Green shoots push insistently through winter’s cold dust. Nothing can stop it. The good Earth will bloom with joy and color.
May it lift also me, for the weight of the past clings to my heart. I want only that my steps should slow and anxiety cease. I hunger for freedom from all constriction that tightens the chest and prevents me from living in the fullness of loving joy. This alone is really living.
In my mind’s eye, I see the life I want, a life I sometimes live but too often am unable to enter. I see the life for which you intend me: unrushed, confident, gentle, a soul quiet amid the contingencies and constant changes of life.
It is the calm of love that I want, the peace of walking in a love that is so total, so complete that the slings and arrows of dumb chance and human pettiness no longer disturb.
Death is not a condition at the end of my days. It is any day when such love is not known in the pit of one’s soul. For it is this that made me, and this for which I am made. Apart from such knowing of love I feel separated from my Source, from the fountain that is your life.
So I cry for mercy. No great peril faces me this day, only small challenges. But it is these that most threaten the soul as years and decades pass. They slowly wean us from the richness of love we need.
So slowly, so insidiously we begin to imagine we can live, truly live, without this sublime knowledge of you, Holy One. After a while we fail to notice we are eating crumbs from the table, scrambling to get by, living on morsels of the banquet of grace that would flood our soul and fill our being with the love you are.
Our souls are famished for want of the love that fills the heart with every confidence and the music of easy laughter.
So have mercy on me. Do not let me fall into death this day. May the life I know only in the fullness of your love fill me--and fill another heart well known to me, a soul who this day faces challenges far greater than my own.
Lord, have mercy. Do not let her fall into the abyss, for who can praise you there?
Pr. David L. Miller
Psalm 30:8-10
To you, Yahweh, I call, to my God I cry for mercy. What point is there in my death, my going down to the abyss? Can the dust praise you or proclaim your faithfulness? Listen, Yahweh, take pity on me, Yahweh, be my help!
Reflection
My soul cries for a great open space where my heart may breathe free.
The morning sun awakens in the Earth the full promise of spring. Green shoots push insistently through winter’s cold dust. Nothing can stop it. The good Earth will bloom with joy and color.
May it lift also me, for the weight of the past clings to my heart. I want only that my steps should slow and anxiety cease. I hunger for freedom from all constriction that tightens the chest and prevents me from living in the fullness of loving joy. This alone is really living.
In my mind’s eye, I see the life I want, a life I sometimes live but too often am unable to enter. I see the life for which you intend me: unrushed, confident, gentle, a soul quiet amid the contingencies and constant changes of life.
It is the calm of love that I want, the peace of walking in a love that is so total, so complete that the slings and arrows of dumb chance and human pettiness no longer disturb.
Death is not a condition at the end of my days. It is any day when such love is not known in the pit of one’s soul. For it is this that made me, and this for which I am made. Apart from such knowing of love I feel separated from my Source, from the fountain that is your life.
So I cry for mercy. No great peril faces me this day, only small challenges. But it is these that most threaten the soul as years and decades pass. They slowly wean us from the richness of love we need.
So slowly, so insidiously we begin to imagine we can live, truly live, without this sublime knowledge of you, Holy One. After a while we fail to notice we are eating crumbs from the table, scrambling to get by, living on morsels of the banquet of grace that would flood our soul and fill our being with the love you are.
Our souls are famished for want of the love that fills the heart with every confidence and the music of easy laughter.
So have mercy on me. Do not let me fall into death this day. May the life I know only in the fullness of your love fill me--and fill another heart well known to me, a soul who this day faces challenges far greater than my own.
Lord, have mercy. Do not let her fall into the abyss, for who can praise you there?
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, April 09, 2010
Friday, April 9, 2010
Today’s text
John 20:27-29
Then he spoke to Thomas, 'Put your finger here; look, here are my hands. Give me your hand; put it into my side. Do not be unbelieving any more but believe.' Thomas replied, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘You believe because you can see me. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.’
Reflection
Thomas routinely gets a bad rap, and we get a bad example. Thomas bashing through the centuries has made people ashamed of their questions and doubts. He becomes the deficient disciple, lacking a heart of faith, the perfect illustration of what not to be.
So we squelch our searching questions, our confusion and doubts, hiding them from public view.
What’s missed is that Thomas’ doubts and his demand to see are the royal road to discovery and the joy of real faith.
It is Thomas and no one else who exclaims, “My Lord and my God,” which is the premiere affirmation of all that Jesus is. His words are not shaded in shame or sorrow but explode with the joy of discovering that your fondest hopes have been realized.
I want this joy, my Lord. No, I need it. When I don’t have it I die inside.
And I find it, or should I say it finds me, not in the utter blindness of faith, but when I see something that tells me again that you live. I need to see. We all do. Few of us believe or can believe without seeing something.
Prove that your mother loves you, the skeptic challenges. And we cannot. We can only point to actions, gestures and words that add up to something that suggests that we are or are not cherished.
So we look at the record, at what your disciples did, Jesus, how they witnessed to you, how they lived and died. We listen to their words and look at the lives of those who most closely clung to you, people we knew, people who touched us.
And we are moved to believe that something amazing and utterly incomprehensible occurred, that the life you are came out of that tomb and lives.
As for me, I look at your wounds, the wounds of those whom I know have loved you best. They bore wounds of love for the sake of others, for the sake of so many wounded by life’s great injustices.
I look at them and see you, Jesus. The marks they bear are your wounds, the wounds of love freely and fully given.
Seeing them, I believe. I believe that the immensity of the Love you are … lives, resurrected in lives and places where I may see and believe and say with Thomas, “my Lord and my God.”
Pr. David L. Miller
John 20:27-29
Then he spoke to Thomas, 'Put your finger here; look, here are my hands. Give me your hand; put it into my side. Do not be unbelieving any more but believe.' Thomas replied, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him: ‘You believe because you can see me. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.’
Reflection
Thomas routinely gets a bad rap, and we get a bad example. Thomas bashing through the centuries has made people ashamed of their questions and doubts. He becomes the deficient disciple, lacking a heart of faith, the perfect illustration of what not to be.
So we squelch our searching questions, our confusion and doubts, hiding them from public view.
What’s missed is that Thomas’ doubts and his demand to see are the royal road to discovery and the joy of real faith.
It is Thomas and no one else who exclaims, “My Lord and my God,” which is the premiere affirmation of all that Jesus is. His words are not shaded in shame or sorrow but explode with the joy of discovering that your fondest hopes have been realized.
I want this joy, my Lord. No, I need it. When I don’t have it I die inside.
And I find it, or should I say it finds me, not in the utter blindness of faith, but when I see something that tells me again that you live. I need to see. We all do. Few of us believe or can believe without seeing something.
Prove that your mother loves you, the skeptic challenges. And we cannot. We can only point to actions, gestures and words that add up to something that suggests that we are or are not cherished.
So we look at the record, at what your disciples did, Jesus, how they witnessed to you, how they lived and died. We listen to their words and look at the lives of those who most closely clung to you, people we knew, people who touched us.
And we are moved to believe that something amazing and utterly incomprehensible occurred, that the life you are came out of that tomb and lives.
As for me, I look at your wounds, the wounds of those whom I know have loved you best. They bore wounds of love for the sake of others, for the sake of so many wounded by life’s great injustices.
I look at them and see you, Jesus. The marks they bear are your wounds, the wounds of love freely and fully given.
Seeing them, I believe. I believe that the immensity of the Love you are … lives, resurrected in lives and places where I may see and believe and say with Thomas, “my Lord and my God.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, March 26, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 19:38-40
They cried out: Blessed is he who is coming as King in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heavens! Some Pharisees in the crowd said to him, 'Master, reprove your disciples,' but he answered, 'I tell you, if these keep silence, the stones will cry out.'
Reflection
We know the trappings of victory, Jesus. When the contest is won shiny medals hang around the victors' necks, and trophies are brandished high, glinting under spotlights and the flash of cameras.
Winners laugh, cry and hug each other, sharing their triumph which often has come after many thousands of hours of practice and too many set-backs to remember.
I, too, smile when I see such joy on the TV screen, but these moments stand in stark contrast to the joy and accolades lifting you, Jesus.
When the glory of heaven, the victory of God appears on earth, it rides a humble beast and is hailed by shouts of the poor waving palm branches, emblems of peace.
I take nothing from those who strive for excellence and find reward in human contests of strength and skill. These, too, teach us the excellence and striving for which the Holy One makes us.
But the contrast between our understanding of victory and your appearance, Jesus, is too striking to miss. You ride among the poor, the forgotten, those outside the inner circles of human significance.
You spent most of your days among those on whom no spotlight ever shined, ignoring human distinctions between winner and loser, rich and poor, acceptable and outcast. It is they who hail you as the glory of heaven on earth--not those whom we spend far too much of our life trying to impress.
They know: true glory is not the golden glint of victory, but the peace of God extended to every last living thing--no matter who, no matter what, and definitely to the most defeated parts of ourselves.
And when true glory appears, even the stones speak.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 19:38-40
They cried out: Blessed is he who is coming as King in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heavens! Some Pharisees in the crowd said to him, 'Master, reprove your disciples,' but he answered, 'I tell you, if these keep silence, the stones will cry out.'
Reflection
We know the trappings of victory, Jesus. When the contest is won shiny medals hang around the victors' necks, and trophies are brandished high, glinting under spotlights and the flash of cameras.
Winners laugh, cry and hug each other, sharing their triumph which often has come after many thousands of hours of practice and too many set-backs to remember.
I, too, smile when I see such joy on the TV screen, but these moments stand in stark contrast to the joy and accolades lifting you, Jesus.
When the glory of heaven, the victory of God appears on earth, it rides a humble beast and is hailed by shouts of the poor waving palm branches, emblems of peace.
I take nothing from those who strive for excellence and find reward in human contests of strength and skill. These, too, teach us the excellence and striving for which the Holy One makes us.
But the contrast between our understanding of victory and your appearance, Jesus, is too striking to miss. You ride among the poor, the forgotten, those outside the inner circles of human significance.
You spent most of your days among those on whom no spotlight ever shined, ignoring human distinctions between winner and loser, rich and poor, acceptable and outcast. It is they who hail you as the glory of heaven on earth--not those whom we spend far too much of our life trying to impress.
They know: true glory is not the golden glint of victory, but the peace of God extended to every last living thing--no matter who, no matter what, and definitely to the most defeated parts of ourselves.
And when true glory appears, even the stones speak.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 19:35-38
So they took the colt to Jesus and, throwing their cloaks on its back, they lifted Jesus on to it. As he moved off, they spread their cloaks in the road, and now, as he was approaching the downward slope of the Mount of Olives, the whole group of disciples joyfully began to praise God at the top of their voices for all the miracles they had seen. They cried out: Blessed is he who is coming as King in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heavens!Reflection
Strange details catch the eye. They lifted you on the colt. They surround you: a couple in back, another in front, while a fourth stoops in the dust, cups his hands and lifts your foot.
It’s a group effort, and there is joy on the faces of those blessed to touch you. Others gather around and smile at what they are doing for you. They know it is right and proper.
With joy they surround and praise you, waving their palms, little suspecting what would soon come. This is a moment of joy for hearts that are certain they have seen and been found by the presence that they never knew they’d always wanted and needed.
You offered a vision of a world where mercy not rigid lines of separation and division ruled, and their hearts hungered for it. Your words and way, the hunger in your eye for a world barely born, embodied all you taught about this kingdom that sought and treasured them, despite the outward circumstances of their lives.
So they came and praised you for miracles of healing and wholeness--and for the fact that they never felt more whole than when they were with you.
Blessed, you are, Jesus, for the fullness of God shines in your eyes and reaches out with your hands. You bring the peace of heaven that is the glory, the beauty and the wonder of God.
The peace you bring is not that of the conqueror who deposes the enemy, but of a grace that tears down the divisions that divide one human soul from another by boundaries of wealth or nation, culture or creed, color or language.
You draw all that is into the unity of your life where the only thing that matters is the one great sharing of love you are.
I see that unity as they lift you on your horse.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 19:35-38
So they took the colt to Jesus and, throwing their cloaks on its back, they lifted Jesus on to it. As he moved off, they spread their cloaks in the road, and now, as he was approaching the downward slope of the Mount of Olives, the whole group of disciples joyfully began to praise God at the top of their voices for all the miracles they had seen. They cried out: Blessed is he who is coming as King in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heavens!Reflection
Strange details catch the eye. They lifted you on the colt. They surround you: a couple in back, another in front, while a fourth stoops in the dust, cups his hands and lifts your foot.
It’s a group effort, and there is joy on the faces of those blessed to touch you. Others gather around and smile at what they are doing for you. They know it is right and proper.
With joy they surround and praise you, waving their palms, little suspecting what would soon come. This is a moment of joy for hearts that are certain they have seen and been found by the presence that they never knew they’d always wanted and needed.
You offered a vision of a world where mercy not rigid lines of separation and division ruled, and their hearts hungered for it. Your words and way, the hunger in your eye for a world barely born, embodied all you taught about this kingdom that sought and treasured them, despite the outward circumstances of their lives.
So they came and praised you for miracles of healing and wholeness--and for the fact that they never felt more whole than when they were with you.
Blessed, you are, Jesus, for the fullness of God shines in your eyes and reaches out with your hands. You bring the peace of heaven that is the glory, the beauty and the wonder of God.
The peace you bring is not that of the conqueror who deposes the enemy, but of a grace that tears down the divisions that divide one human soul from another by boundaries of wealth or nation, culture or creed, color or language.
You draw all that is into the unity of your life where the only thing that matters is the one great sharing of love you are.
I see that unity as they lift you on your horse.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 15:25-31
'Now the elder son was out in the fields, and on his way back, as he drew near the house, he could hear music and dancing. Calling one of the servants he asked what it was all about. The servant told him, "Your brother has come, and your father has killed the calf we had been fattening because he has got him back safe and sound." He was angry then and refused to go in, and his father came out and began to urge him to come in; but he retorted to his father, "All these years I have slaved for you and never once disobeyed any orders of yours, yet you never offered me so much as a kid for me to celebrate with my friends. But, for this son of yours, when he comes back after swallowing up your property -- he and his loose women -- you kill the calf we had been fattening." 'The father said, "My son, you are with me always and all I have is yours."
Reflection
All the years. All the wasted years. All the time he knew neither himself nor his father, missing the place of privilege that was always his.
The whole time he thought life was about him, about his faithfulness and hard work, about toeing the line, obeying the rules, keeping his nose clean and making sure the old man was happy.
He missed what was always there. What made his life possible had nothing to do with his work or being a good citizen.
He failed to notice that life is not about the brownie points he piled up, building credits he could cash in on a rainy day.
He thought life was about keeping score. He was wrong.
Life is about knowing its Source, the Giver of Life---and recognizing that all we ever are is receivers. No matter who we are or what we do we remain receivers from the Infinite Fountain who is always there, always willing, always sharing the gift that life always is.
“All that I have is yours. Always was. Always will be.
“The same way it is always there for the ones who wander off, finally to slink home at 3 a.m., smelling of stale beer and cheap perfume and offering apologies in which I have no interest.
“Didn’t you know this? Didn’t you see that you could take from my completeness at any time and know life in abundance, love without measure and joy beyond expectation?
“It was there for you all the time. Still is.
“Don’t waste another moment.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 15:25-31
'Now the elder son was out in the fields, and on his way back, as he drew near the house, he could hear music and dancing. Calling one of the servants he asked what it was all about. The servant told him, "Your brother has come, and your father has killed the calf we had been fattening because he has got him back safe and sound." He was angry then and refused to go in, and his father came out and began to urge him to come in; but he retorted to his father, "All these years I have slaved for you and never once disobeyed any orders of yours, yet you never offered me so much as a kid for me to celebrate with my friends. But, for this son of yours, when he comes back after swallowing up your property -- he and his loose women -- you kill the calf we had been fattening." 'The father said, "My son, you are with me always and all I have is yours."
Reflection
All the years. All the wasted years. All the time he knew neither himself nor his father, missing the place of privilege that was always his.
The whole time he thought life was about him, about his faithfulness and hard work, about toeing the line, obeying the rules, keeping his nose clean and making sure the old man was happy.
He missed what was always there. What made his life possible had nothing to do with his work or being a good citizen.
He failed to notice that life is not about the brownie points he piled up, building credits he could cash in on a rainy day.
He thought life was about keeping score. He was wrong.
Life is about knowing its Source, the Giver of Life---and recognizing that all we ever are is receivers. No matter who we are or what we do we remain receivers from the Infinite Fountain who is always there, always willing, always sharing the gift that life always is.
“All that I have is yours. Always was. Always will be.
“The same way it is always there for the ones who wander off, finally to slink home at 3 a.m., smelling of stale beer and cheap perfume and offering apologies in which I have no interest.
“Didn’t you know this? Didn’t you see that you could take from my completeness at any time and know life in abundance, love without measure and joy beyond expectation?
“It was there for you all the time. Still is.
“Don’t waste another moment.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 15:17-22
Then he came to his senses and said, "How many of my father's hired men have all the food they want and more, and here am I dying of hunger! I will leave this place and go to my father and say: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired men." So he left the place and went back to his father. 'While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with pity. He ran to the boy, clasped him in his arms and kissed him. Then his son said, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son." But the father said to his servants, "Quick! Bring out the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.'
Reflection
No speeches. Please no speeches. I have heard enough words, and all of them are tin and clatter on the ear.
I want no apologies, no explanations, no pious confessions, no wallowing in guilt or shame. I have no desire to listen to your attempts to name your sins or work up sorrow for your offenses. Keep it far from me
To offer me such is to misunderstand … everything.
I am not moved by your words. I am not changed by your sorrow or repenting. My plans are not altered by the pain you suffer when you wander far from me by rebellion or hardness of heart.
I remain what I always am, what I always have been, what I always will be. And that is love beyond all comprehension. I am abundance of heart beyond all knowing, immensity of compassion whose end you will never know.
I do not change when you come to your senses and decide you need to come home.
I simply am. I am the seeking love that haunts your heart and tells you that you are meant for more than some kind of half life. I am the hungry heart discontent until all that I love---all whom I love---are home in me.
I am the eager energy of every real love you will ever know. I am desire of the welcoming father who longs not for words or apologies, pieties, guilt or shame. I want none of it.
I want only that my beloved should know that they are just that … beloved--and that the abundance of my heart is theirs.
So, no speeches please; no words, no apologies, no explanations. Just come and receive the welcome I offer … and always will.
That’s all I want from you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 15:17-22
Then he came to his senses and said, "How many of my father's hired men have all the food they want and more, and here am I dying of hunger! I will leave this place and go to my father and say: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you; I no longer deserve to be called your son; treat me as one of your hired men." So he left the place and went back to his father. 'While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was moved with pity. He ran to the boy, clasped him in his arms and kissed him. Then his son said, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son." But the father said to his servants, "Quick! Bring out the best robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.'
Reflection
No speeches. Please no speeches. I have heard enough words, and all of them are tin and clatter on the ear.
I want no apologies, no explanations, no pious confessions, no wallowing in guilt or shame. I have no desire to listen to your attempts to name your sins or work up sorrow for your offenses. Keep it far from me
To offer me such is to misunderstand … everything.
I am not moved by your words. I am not changed by your sorrow or repenting. My plans are not altered by the pain you suffer when you wander far from me by rebellion or hardness of heart.
I remain what I always am, what I always have been, what I always will be. And that is love beyond all comprehension. I am abundance of heart beyond all knowing, immensity of compassion whose end you will never know.
I do not change when you come to your senses and decide you need to come home.
I simply am. I am the seeking love that haunts your heart and tells you that you are meant for more than some kind of half life. I am the hungry heart discontent until all that I love---all whom I love---are home in me.
I am the eager energy of every real love you will ever know. I am desire of the welcoming father who longs not for words or apologies, pieties, guilt or shame. I want none of it.
I want only that my beloved should know that they are just that … beloved--and that the abundance of my heart is theirs.
So, no speeches please; no words, no apologies, no explanations. Just come and receive the welcome I offer … and always will.
That’s all I want from you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 13:1-3
It was just about this time that some people arrived and told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with that of their sacrifices. At this he said to them, 'Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than any others, that this should have happened to them? They were not, I tell you. No; but unless you repent you will all perish as they did.'
Reflection
You don’t single out the worst of us for special treatment, my Lord. You don’t look upon our deeds and imagine that they require special handling by you.
You are not as shortsighted as we. Your purpose is eternal, and you seek it in every circumstance. You incorporate our free acts into your intentions, working in them, through them and in spite of them.
You waste nothing but are undeterred from the union of all things in love that is your goal. May your will be done; may that kingdom come.
So many fearful minds imagine their pain and misfortune is punishment from you. Bad things happen, and their consciences accuse them. They imagine that you have singled them out for some grave sin or rebellion. Often, it is the very good and overly sensitive who are so unnecessarily troubled.
Others operate by the “just world” theory. They think the world is or should be carefully ordered, and that if something bad happens to you it is right because you must have done … something. Earthquakes shake Haiti and Chile and hurricanes strike New Orleans because folk there are obviously bigger sinners than the rest of us.
It’s neat theory, though also crazy … and brutal, especially to those who suffer hunger and great deprivation. Obviously, it’s their fault or that of their ancestors.
No, you don’t single out certain sinners for special treatment, making an example of them for the rest of us. What kind of god would do this? Certainly not one deserving our praise, our service, our love.
Still, you call us to repent.
Perhaps what we most need to repent of … is every idea in our head that imagines that you are something less than love. Perhaps what we most need to change is the idea that you, Loving Mystery, are like us.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 13:1-3
It was just about this time that some people arrived and told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with that of their sacrifices. At this he said to them, 'Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than any others, that this should have happened to them? They were not, I tell you. No; but unless you repent you will all perish as they did.'
Reflection
You don’t single out the worst of us for special treatment, my Lord. You don’t look upon our deeds and imagine that they require special handling by you.
You are not as shortsighted as we. Your purpose is eternal, and you seek it in every circumstance. You incorporate our free acts into your intentions, working in them, through them and in spite of them.
You waste nothing but are undeterred from the union of all things in love that is your goal. May your will be done; may that kingdom come.
So many fearful minds imagine their pain and misfortune is punishment from you. Bad things happen, and their consciences accuse them. They imagine that you have singled them out for some grave sin or rebellion. Often, it is the very good and overly sensitive who are so unnecessarily troubled.
Others operate by the “just world” theory. They think the world is or should be carefully ordered, and that if something bad happens to you it is right because you must have done … something. Earthquakes shake Haiti and Chile and hurricanes strike New Orleans because folk there are obviously bigger sinners than the rest of us.
It’s neat theory, though also crazy … and brutal, especially to those who suffer hunger and great deprivation. Obviously, it’s their fault or that of their ancestors.
No, you don’t single out certain sinners for special treatment, making an example of them for the rest of us. What kind of god would do this? Certainly not one deserving our praise, our service, our love.
Still, you call us to repent.
Perhaps what we most need to repent of … is every idea in our head that imagines that you are something less than love. Perhaps what we most need to change is the idea that you, Loving Mystery, are like us.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 13:34
'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often have I longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you refused!’
Reflection
I want to get inside your emotion this morning, Jesus, but I am not there. Not yet, at least. So draw me in that I may know the love that burns at your soul for the lost and alone--yes, and for the lost and lonely parts of our hearts, too.
I want to crawl inside your heart, see through your eyes and know the pain of loving as you love. Maybe then I would know how to care for wounded souls within my reach.
They are beyond me, many of them, even though they are near. But I can not reach or touch the deep wounded places in their souls to set them free to live and breathe in fullness. Their lungs and lives remain constricted by festering wounds, pains and sorrows that tie their souls to earth’s cold crust.
Some wounds are self-inflicted; others the scars of cruelty and apathy, left by those who live their lives oblivious to the damage they left in their wake. Doesn’t seem fair, but then it isn’t.
But my anger for those who wound and abuse heals no one. It gathers no soul beneath protective wings so that the wounded little ones may at last come home and know the love you are, a love that covers all things--that forgives the sins, melts the wounds, heals the scars and leaves only tears of gratitude.
Can they know this, Jesus? Can they know you whole and complete? For knowing you so well is all that can make us well. And we hope and need to well again.
So let us in, let us feel, let us know the yearning you feel to gather all your little ones beneath your wings and make them whole. Let us feel this. Maybe then we shall be released.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 13:34
'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you that kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often have I longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you refused!’
Reflection
I want to get inside your emotion this morning, Jesus, but I am not there. Not yet, at least. So draw me in that I may know the love that burns at your soul for the lost and alone--yes, and for the lost and lonely parts of our hearts, too.
I want to crawl inside your heart, see through your eyes and know the pain of loving as you love. Maybe then I would know how to care for wounded souls within my reach.
They are beyond me, many of them, even though they are near. But I can not reach or touch the deep wounded places in their souls to set them free to live and breathe in fullness. Their lungs and lives remain constricted by festering wounds, pains and sorrows that tie their souls to earth’s cold crust.
Some wounds are self-inflicted; others the scars of cruelty and apathy, left by those who live their lives oblivious to the damage they left in their wake. Doesn’t seem fair, but then it isn’t.
But my anger for those who wound and abuse heals no one. It gathers no soul beneath protective wings so that the wounded little ones may at last come home and know the love you are, a love that covers all things--that forgives the sins, melts the wounds, heals the scars and leaves only tears of gratitude.
Can they know this, Jesus? Can they know you whole and complete? For knowing you so well is all that can make us well. And we hope and need to well again.
So let us in, let us feel, let us know the yearning you feel to gather all your little ones beneath your wings and make them whole. Let us feel this. Maybe then we shall be released.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 13:31-34
Just at this time some Pharisees came up. 'Go away,' they said. 'Leave this place, because Herod means to kill you.' He replied, 'You may go and give that fox this message: Look! Today and tomorrow I drive out devils and heal, and on the third day I attain my end. But for today and tomorrow and the next day I must go on, since it would not be right for a prophet to die outside Jerusalem.'
Reflection
Why Jerusalem?
I suppose there are historical reasons, but reasons of the heart have always been more persuasive to me, and why shouldn’t they be when the question is a matter of where one chooses to die, a rather personal concern no matter how you look at it.
Your last stand, last statement, final testament must occur there, in a place where messengers of the God’s mercy and justice had for centuries stood and spoke, even when no one listened. Prophet’s blood had been spilled before on those ancient cobblestones.
So you head there, Jesus, to the city considered the center of the universe, there to make clear the center of the divine heart, which long before had become the center of your own.
You journey to the center of the world to reveal the center of the One who is central to all of life in this and every cosmos.
It is as if you hang out a large blinking sign, “Watch! Don’t miss this! The final act reveals the meaning of the whole story!”
That would be the big story of all life … and of my life, Jesus. On those ancient cobblestones, a story plays out revealing holy beauty and human ugliness, divine intention and determined rejection, dogged hate and indomitable love.
These forces will parry and clash in Jerusalem, setting out the eternal conflict that goes on in human souls and societies in every time and place. But at the end, one will stand; one will emerge walking unbound from death’s bitter ashes.
And we will know … Love will have its way. This is the central truth shining bright at the central place where the whole story comes clear.
May that love form the center of my soul this and every day.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 13:31-34
Just at this time some Pharisees came up. 'Go away,' they said. 'Leave this place, because Herod means to kill you.' He replied, 'You may go and give that fox this message: Look! Today and tomorrow I drive out devils and heal, and on the third day I attain my end. But for today and tomorrow and the next day I must go on, since it would not be right for a prophet to die outside Jerusalem.'
Reflection
Why Jerusalem?
I suppose there are historical reasons, but reasons of the heart have always been more persuasive to me, and why shouldn’t they be when the question is a matter of where one chooses to die, a rather personal concern no matter how you look at it.
Your last stand, last statement, final testament must occur there, in a place where messengers of the God’s mercy and justice had for centuries stood and spoke, even when no one listened. Prophet’s blood had been spilled before on those ancient cobblestones.
So you head there, Jesus, to the city considered the center of the universe, there to make clear the center of the divine heart, which long before had become the center of your own.
You journey to the center of the world to reveal the center of the One who is central to all of life in this and every cosmos.
It is as if you hang out a large blinking sign, “Watch! Don’t miss this! The final act reveals the meaning of the whole story!”
That would be the big story of all life … and of my life, Jesus. On those ancient cobblestones, a story plays out revealing holy beauty and human ugliness, divine intention and determined rejection, dogged hate and indomitable love.
These forces will parry and clash in Jerusalem, setting out the eternal conflict that goes on in human souls and societies in every time and place. But at the end, one will stand; one will emerge walking unbound from death’s bitter ashes.
And we will know … Love will have its way. This is the central truth shining bright at the central place where the whole story comes clear.
May that love form the center of my soul this and every day.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 13:31-32
Just at this time some Pharisees came up. 'Go away,' they said. 'Leave this place, because Herod means to kill you.' He replied, 'You may go and give that fox this message: Look! Today and tomorrow I drive out devils and heal, and on the third day I attain my end.
Reflection
I admire your self-possession, Jesus. I envy and want it.
Faced with threat, it is not threat that determines your course. Your path is set by your own internal compass, not the decisions of others about you, not even when they seek your life.
You go your own way, your heart set to true north. There is work to do, a purpose to fulfill, a commitment to complete, a mystery to reveal.
Nothing deters you, not even the machinations of tin-pot despots whose hands drip with blood.
It is not your courage that most moves me, but your abiding sense of self, of identity. You know who you are, what you are to do and what must be done for your life to have served the purpose for which it is appointed.
How do you manage such singular focus? How is it that external events fail to bump you off course? Did you wake each day and claim again the Father’s purpose for you? Did you grit your teeth and steel yourself for whatever might come?
I don’t think so.
But my experience of waffling makes me wonder how you stayed on true north when resistance, rejection and threat blocked your path.
For you always walked true north, deeper with each step into the holy purpose of revealing a world ruled by mercy alone. My end will take care of itself, you said, and reaching that end was all that mattered to you.
I am moved by such single-hearted dedication to mercy’s deed. Always have been, always will.
What I notice when I look most closely is the lack of jut-jawed defiance in your words and bearing. I see a measure of humor--“that fox,” indeed! And I sense the conviction of mercy, of love, of compassion for every last and lost corner of earth.
The conviction of mercy moves you. That is true north, and you live joyously aware that this singular truth requires that your feet move always and only in one direction.
For mercy will come. Mercy will be all in all, and all you do must show this.
Accept my amazement and thanks, and hear my hope that perhaps, I, too, may walk as you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 13:31-32
Just at this time some Pharisees came up. 'Go away,' they said. 'Leave this place, because Herod means to kill you.' He replied, 'You may go and give that fox this message: Look! Today and tomorrow I drive out devils and heal, and on the third day I attain my end.
Reflection
I admire your self-possession, Jesus. I envy and want it.
Faced with threat, it is not threat that determines your course. Your path is set by your own internal compass, not the decisions of others about you, not even when they seek your life.
You go your own way, your heart set to true north. There is work to do, a purpose to fulfill, a commitment to complete, a mystery to reveal.
Nothing deters you, not even the machinations of tin-pot despots whose hands drip with blood.
It is not your courage that most moves me, but your abiding sense of self, of identity. You know who you are, what you are to do and what must be done for your life to have served the purpose for which it is appointed.
How do you manage such singular focus? How is it that external events fail to bump you off course? Did you wake each day and claim again the Father’s purpose for you? Did you grit your teeth and steel yourself for whatever might come?
I don’t think so.
But my experience of waffling makes me wonder how you stayed on true north when resistance, rejection and threat blocked your path.
For you always walked true north, deeper with each step into the holy purpose of revealing a world ruled by mercy alone. My end will take care of itself, you said, and reaching that end was all that mattered to you.
I am moved by such single-hearted dedication to mercy’s deed. Always have been, always will.
What I notice when I look most closely is the lack of jut-jawed defiance in your words and bearing. I see a measure of humor--“that fox,” indeed! And I sense the conviction of mercy, of love, of compassion for every last and lost corner of earth.
The conviction of mercy moves you. That is true north, and you live joyously aware that this singular truth requires that your feet move always and only in one direction.
For mercy will come. Mercy will be all in all, and all you do must show this.
Accept my amazement and thanks, and hear my hope that perhaps, I, too, may walk as you.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 9:28-32
Now about eight days after this had been said, he took with him Peter, John and James and went up the mountain to pray. And it happened that, as he was praying, the aspect of his face was changed and his clothing became sparkling white. And suddenly there were two men talking to him; they were Moses and Elijah appearing in glory, and they were speaking of his passing which he was to accomplish in Jerusalem. Peter and his companions were heavy with sleep, but they woke up and saw his glory and the two men standing with him.
Reflection
They woke up… and saw. How many times do we experience this, Jesus?
They woke and saw your glory, a glory of oneness with the Mystery to whom you prayed and called, “Father,” in utter love and trust. They saw the glory of a life transparent to utter mystery and love, to the Infinite Source of their being and all that is.
They saw, awaking to a truth they had begun to grasp in the valleys and plains, but here on the mountain, in an instant, all was clear, so, too, was the answer to the question of every human heart: To whom shall I listen? Who will tell me truth? Who can I trust in all things and places?
This one. You, Jesus.
This certainty, this clarity would not last for them. On the mountain, things are clear. In the muddy day-to-day, the mind forgets, and hearts fail to cling to the truth of unveiled moments. Fear uproots our certainties, as joy and confidence fade.
Always, we must return from the mountain to valleys and plains where hard work awaits, where disappointments occur, where people are difficult and the things we most fear come true.
We return to the daily and mundane, where average joys and common frustrations tempt us to think that this is all there is; this is reality; this is good as it gets.
But the mountain top tells us we are made for something more, for the truth of the love that shines through you, Jesus. We are made to known, to bask in it, to live it.
We are made for constant remembrance of the glory we see in you, wherever and how ever we see that glory. For it is this and these moments that tell us the truth of our lives, a truth that must be reclaimed many, many times.
Until face-to-face, we dwell fully in the glory you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 9:28-32
Now about eight days after this had been said, he took with him Peter, John and James and went up the mountain to pray. And it happened that, as he was praying, the aspect of his face was changed and his clothing became sparkling white. And suddenly there were two men talking to him; they were Moses and Elijah appearing in glory, and they were speaking of his passing which he was to accomplish in Jerusalem. Peter and his companions were heavy with sleep, but they woke up and saw his glory and the two men standing with him.
Reflection
They woke up… and saw. How many times do we experience this, Jesus?
They woke and saw your glory, a glory of oneness with the Mystery to whom you prayed and called, “Father,” in utter love and trust. They saw the glory of a life transparent to utter mystery and love, to the Infinite Source of their being and all that is.
They saw, awaking to a truth they had begun to grasp in the valleys and plains, but here on the mountain, in an instant, all was clear, so, too, was the answer to the question of every human heart: To whom shall I listen? Who will tell me truth? Who can I trust in all things and places?
This one. You, Jesus.
This certainty, this clarity would not last for them. On the mountain, things are clear. In the muddy day-to-day, the mind forgets, and hearts fail to cling to the truth of unveiled moments. Fear uproots our certainties, as joy and confidence fade.
Always, we must return from the mountain to valleys and plains where hard work awaits, where disappointments occur, where people are difficult and the things we most fear come true.
We return to the daily and mundane, where average joys and common frustrations tempt us to think that this is all there is; this is reality; this is good as it gets.
But the mountain top tells us we are made for something more, for the truth of the love that shines through you, Jesus. We are made to known, to bask in it, to live it.
We are made for constant remembrance of the glory we see in you, wherever and how ever we see that glory. For it is this and these moments that tell us the truth of our lives, a truth that must be reclaimed many, many times.
Until face-to-face, we dwell fully in the glory you are.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 6:19-20
People tormented by unclean spirits were also cured and everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all. Then fixing his eyes on his disciples he said: How blessed are you who are poor: the kingdom of God is yours.
Reflection
You turned your eyes from the desperate and hoping to find your friends. Overwhelming joy and gratitude swelled in your inner being, and you cried out, “Blessed. Blessed are you.”
I know why. You were healing, touching, making whole the broken lives and hearts of those who were loved far more than they could imagine. Their lives were … and are … enveloped in the height and depth of grace, held in the arms of the Loving Mystery for all eternity.
You saw this. No, you felt it. This grace expanded your heart to infinite proportions removing any and all doubt about the fundamental reality of our lives. We are held, known and treasured by an incalculable love that has neither beginning nor end.
Your heart stretched to the uttermost reaches of Earth’s forgotten corners,--and on … to the cosmic reach of darkest space. Your heart took it all in … and loved it, loved it as the Loving Mystery who is the Father embraces and loves it all.
Your heart and the Father’s were one, and now your heart and mine are no longer two but the same.
For a single moment, the blink of any eye, I enter your consciousness and see with the love that is there looking out at me … and at all that is.
And I, too, know beyond question why you cry out, “blessed are you poor.”
My faltering words cannot capture it, but I know you look at our broken and confused lives and see them enfolded in grace unbounded, and we in our poverty can receive, can know the grace that swells your heart in this tiny instant.
Our hearts, too, can expand and embrace the uttermost parts and the outermost reaches. We who are poor can know this. We can be this, for we know the emptiness of our hands and the incompleteness of our souls.
Yet, only in this state can we be filled by the fullness of the Love who is all Fullness, the holy and Loving Mystery who, in this moment, filled you, Jesus, and moved you to embrace the world without reservation in utter joy.
Make this joy mine not only for a moment, but for all time. It is in this moment, seeing through your eyes, that I know the end of time, and it is Love unspeakable.
And I know but one word for you, “blessed, blessed, blessed.
Beyond my wildest imagining, you are blessed, and it is exactly this into which you draw me. And all I have to offer is a single word of praise and a gratitude that’s beyond all words.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 6:19-20
People tormented by unclean spirits were also cured and everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all. Then fixing his eyes on his disciples he said: How blessed are you who are poor: the kingdom of God is yours.
Reflection
You turned your eyes from the desperate and hoping to find your friends. Overwhelming joy and gratitude swelled in your inner being, and you cried out, “Blessed. Blessed are you.”
I know why. You were healing, touching, making whole the broken lives and hearts of those who were loved far more than they could imagine. Their lives were … and are … enveloped in the height and depth of grace, held in the arms of the Loving Mystery for all eternity.
You saw this. No, you felt it. This grace expanded your heart to infinite proportions removing any and all doubt about the fundamental reality of our lives. We are held, known and treasured by an incalculable love that has neither beginning nor end.
Your heart stretched to the uttermost reaches of Earth’s forgotten corners,--and on … to the cosmic reach of darkest space. Your heart took it all in … and loved it, loved it as the Loving Mystery who is the Father embraces and loves it all.
Your heart and the Father’s were one, and now your heart and mine are no longer two but the same.
For a single moment, the blink of any eye, I enter your consciousness and see with the love that is there looking out at me … and at all that is.
And I, too, know beyond question why you cry out, “blessed are you poor.”
My faltering words cannot capture it, but I know you look at our broken and confused lives and see them enfolded in grace unbounded, and we in our poverty can receive, can know the grace that swells your heart in this tiny instant.
Our hearts, too, can expand and embrace the uttermost parts and the outermost reaches. We who are poor can know this. We can be this, for we know the emptiness of our hands and the incompleteness of our souls.
Yet, only in this state can we be filled by the fullness of the Love who is all Fullness, the holy and Loving Mystery who, in this moment, filled you, Jesus, and moved you to embrace the world without reservation in utter joy.
Make this joy mine not only for a moment, but for all time. It is in this moment, seeing through your eyes, that I know the end of time, and it is Love unspeakable.
And I know but one word for you, “blessed, blessed, blessed.
Beyond my wildest imagining, you are blessed, and it is exactly this into which you draw me. And all I have to offer is a single word of praise and a gratitude that’s beyond all words.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 6:17-19
He then came down with them and stopped at a piece of level ground where there was a large gathering of his disciples, with a great crowd of people from all parts of Judaea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon who had come to hear him and to be cured of their diseases. People tormented by unclean spirits were also cured and everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all.
Reflection
The scene is unsettled, noisy, disordered. People come from across the countryside, jostling for position amid the crowd trying to glimpse you. They come with hope but are moved by desperation, seeking release from their torments.
They want to touch you and to be touched by something they can’t understand. But I understand, for this is what I want too.
Some have known little more than torment in their lives. But the deepest intuition of their humanity tells them life is more than agitation of body and spirit.
They come seeking release. They want freedom, the freedom of wholeness, of health, of souls and arms they can lift to the sky with joy.
They want to feel what their lives can be beyond the distortion and diminishment of disease and suffering. They want to feel alive and human, joyously eager for each new day, something they may have never felt.
And you cured them. You released them. I wonder what that moment was like. How did they feel? What expressions filtered across their faces as they realized they were free from the chains that bound them to lives of struggle?
I imagine tears of joy, laughter and disbelief. I imagine praise to God and grateful souls falling into your embrace. I see faces struck dumb in stunned silence, but I also hear the thump of feet running for the first time in years. I can’t think of if without smiling.
And that smile is magic. It’s healing and freeing. It covers my face and fills my soul, releasing me from the bondage of sadness.
I see you touch desperate souls and once again, for the umpteenth thousand time, I, too, am touched by the love that I see, the Love whom I see.
“Come and see,” you once urged a would-be disciple. “Come and see.”
Today, I came, and I saw. And in seeing, you give me the healing I need. As of old, you touch and set free. And I discover that, just maybe, I know exactly how they felt.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 6:17-19
He then came down with them and stopped at a piece of level ground where there was a large gathering of his disciples, with a great crowd of people from all parts of Judaea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon who had come to hear him and to be cured of their diseases. People tormented by unclean spirits were also cured and everyone in the crowd was trying to touch him because power came out of him that cured them all.
Reflection
The scene is unsettled, noisy, disordered. People come from across the countryside, jostling for position amid the crowd trying to glimpse you. They come with hope but are moved by desperation, seeking release from their torments.
They want to touch you and to be touched by something they can’t understand. But I understand, for this is what I want too.
Some have known little more than torment in their lives. But the deepest intuition of their humanity tells them life is more than agitation of body and spirit.
They come seeking release. They want freedom, the freedom of wholeness, of health, of souls and arms they can lift to the sky with joy.
They want to feel what their lives can be beyond the distortion and diminishment of disease and suffering. They want to feel alive and human, joyously eager for each new day, something they may have never felt.
And you cured them. You released them. I wonder what that moment was like. How did they feel? What expressions filtered across their faces as they realized they were free from the chains that bound them to lives of struggle?
I imagine tears of joy, laughter and disbelief. I imagine praise to God and grateful souls falling into your embrace. I see faces struck dumb in stunned silence, but I also hear the thump of feet running for the first time in years. I can’t think of if without smiling.
And that smile is magic. It’s healing and freeing. It covers my face and fills my soul, releasing me from the bondage of sadness.
I see you touch desperate souls and once again, for the umpteenth thousand time, I, too, am touched by the love that I see, the Love whom I see.
“Come and see,” you once urged a would-be disciple. “Come and see.”
Today, I came, and I saw. And in seeing, you give me the healing I need. As of old, you touch and set free. And I discover that, just maybe, I know exactly how they felt.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, February 05, 2010
Friday, February 5, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 5:8-11
When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching. Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.
Reflection
At the end, what do I want to have done? Who do I want to have followed?
When all my time here is memory and few moments of earth’s sweet air remain for me, what do I want to be able to say, “This I have given? This I have thought. This I have loved. This I present to you, Jesus.”
They left everything and followed you, these few fishermen. Perhaps I should feel shame in the face of such self-giving, for I give so little. But I do not. Nor do I believe you want such feelings, despite the guilt your followers stir in themselves for no good purpose.
Joy and desire color my heart, not guilt or shame. I want the joy of giving each act and word, each hour and day to the love you are. And I want to do it mindfully, aware and present to each moment.
I want to rise above unconscious living, little thinking of how this moment can be lived in and for you. I want my mind to leave everything else to follow you so that in each moment, this is all that matters.
Yes, I know: I want a life beyond those lived by your first friends, this Simon, James and John. They were unconscious most of the time, and they followed you not knowing, not being aware of much of anything, except that being with you was better than being without you.
But they left everything to follow, and this stirs joy and desire in me to do the same in my own way and time. For I am little different from them, slightly more conscious, I suppose.
But I, too, know that being with you is better than being without you. And each time my mind wanders away to thoughts and motives other than your love, it enters a netherworld so monochrome and draining compared to the bright joy of knowing you near.
So keep calling to me when I wander. Call me from my meandering thoughts, my wild hare impulses, my self-indulgent narcissism and self-important posturing.
Call me to leave them all, even if you must call me a million times and more. I will keep leaving them, again and again, until the day I when all here is done for me, and I can say, “This I have done; you, I have loved.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 5:8-11
When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching. Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.
Reflection
At the end, what do I want to have done? Who do I want to have followed?
When all my time here is memory and few moments of earth’s sweet air remain for me, what do I want to be able to say, “This I have given? This I have thought. This I have loved. This I present to you, Jesus.”
They left everything and followed you, these few fishermen. Perhaps I should feel shame in the face of such self-giving, for I give so little. But I do not. Nor do I believe you want such feelings, despite the guilt your followers stir in themselves for no good purpose.
Joy and desire color my heart, not guilt or shame. I want the joy of giving each act and word, each hour and day to the love you are. And I want to do it mindfully, aware and present to each moment.
I want to rise above unconscious living, little thinking of how this moment can be lived in and for you. I want my mind to leave everything else to follow you so that in each moment, this is all that matters.
Yes, I know: I want a life beyond those lived by your first friends, this Simon, James and John. They were unconscious most of the time, and they followed you not knowing, not being aware of much of anything, except that being with you was better than being without you.
But they left everything to follow, and this stirs joy and desire in me to do the same in my own way and time. For I am little different from them, slightly more conscious, I suppose.
But I, too, know that being with you is better than being without you. And each time my mind wanders away to thoughts and motives other than your love, it enters a netherworld so monochrome and draining compared to the bright joy of knowing you near.
So keep calling to me when I wander. Call me from my meandering thoughts, my wild hare impulses, my self-indulgent narcissism and self-important posturing.
Call me to leave them all, even if you must call me a million times and more. I will keep leaving them, again and again, until the day I when all here is done for me, and I can say, “This I have done; you, I have loved.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 5:8-11
When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching. Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.
Reflection
A first act of courage is here, the first steps from a mind of fear to … well, they didn’t know. They did not know where they were going or what might happen. They had not idea what was just beginning.
But as they left their boats the way of fear was ending for them. This journey would take the rest of their lives and then some.
It’s that way for all of us, Jesus. You invite us beyond the mind of fear to a new mind, a new consciousness, a new way of seeing and being. Uneducated fishermen take their early steps on this way by being intrigued or amazed enough to follow you into the unknown.
They wanted to be near whatever you had, to hear whatever you might say, to see whatever you might do and to know whoever you are … because being with you was better than being anywhere without you.
This much they knew … and little else. But it didn’t matter. All that mattered was following, being with you.
In your presence the fear, the anxiety, the dead clay that weighs our spirits all fall away, as we find, to our amazement, that we are children of God’s abundant delight, whom the Father favors with grace everlasting and inexhaustible.
You knew this, Jesus. And when this awareness sinks into our minds, into our being and bearing, other souls feel lighter and more alive in our presence, captured by the life that is you.
Fill me with all that you are. Grant me your own mind, Jesus, that with the Christ mind I may live beyond my fears and with such joy that hearts may be warmed by your nearness, even in the likes of me.
I know; it’s a journey. You don’t arrive all at once. It takes a lifetime and then some. But today, may I take a few steps on the way.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 5:8-11
When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching. Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.
Reflection
A first act of courage is here, the first steps from a mind of fear to … well, they didn’t know. They did not know where they were going or what might happen. They had not idea what was just beginning.
But as they left their boats the way of fear was ending for them. This journey would take the rest of their lives and then some.
It’s that way for all of us, Jesus. You invite us beyond the mind of fear to a new mind, a new consciousness, a new way of seeing and being. Uneducated fishermen take their early steps on this way by being intrigued or amazed enough to follow you into the unknown.
They wanted to be near whatever you had, to hear whatever you might say, to see whatever you might do and to know whoever you are … because being with you was better than being anywhere without you.
This much they knew … and little else. But it didn’t matter. All that mattered was following, being with you.
In your presence the fear, the anxiety, the dead clay that weighs our spirits all fall away, as we find, to our amazement, that we are children of God’s abundant delight, whom the Father favors with grace everlasting and inexhaustible.
You knew this, Jesus. And when this awareness sinks into our minds, into our being and bearing, other souls feel lighter and more alive in our presence, captured by the life that is you.
Fill me with all that you are. Grant me your own mind, Jesus, that with the Christ mind I may live beyond my fears and with such joy that hearts may be warmed by your nearness, even in the likes of me.
I know; it’s a journey. You don’t arrive all at once. It takes a lifetime and then some. But today, may I take a few steps on the way.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 5:3-10
When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.' Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.' And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear, so they signaled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled both boats to sinking point. When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching.'
Reflection
“Do not be afraid.” How many times do those words appear on your lips, Jesus? How many times in all of Scripture?
It is as if this were the central truth we must know. Forget all else. Remember this: There is no reason for fear.
Life is uncontrollable. Unexpected and painful things will happen. Friends will forget and betray you. Work once meaningful will drain your soul. Youth, health and strength will fade. Threats from without and within will come.
But don’t worry. Don’t be afraid. All you are and all you have, all you hope and all you fear rests in the infinite abundance of the Father’s heart. Know this, and fear is gone.
There is such a contrast between you, Jesus, and those who surround you. Anxious crowds push nearer to hear, and you take to a boat. The fishermen doubt anything good can happen after a long night’s labor gains nothing. But you quietly direct them to deep water.
Amazed, they struggle at the nets to gather the catch. You stand silently in the background, watching. I wonder, do you smile at the startling abundance they haul in?
Peter confesses his unworthiness and the discomfort of being in your presence, a presence he cannot possibly understand. His eyes are fixed squarely on himself.
Wrong place. Everyone in the story dwells in the wrong place. Their hearts rest in their emptiness, their need, their inadequacy, their anxiety about having and being enough. Little wonder they are amazed when abundance appears.
But you are not surprised, Jesus. No amazement appears on your face or in your voice. You dwell in perfect peace, knowing the infinite abundance of the divine heart is always enough … and always will be.
May my mind dwell with yours, Jesus. May all your children share your peace.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 5:3-10
When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.' Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.' And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear, so they signaled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled both boats to sinking point. When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.' For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching.'
Reflection
“Do not be afraid.” How many times do those words appear on your lips, Jesus? How many times in all of Scripture?
It is as if this were the central truth we must know. Forget all else. Remember this: There is no reason for fear.
Life is uncontrollable. Unexpected and painful things will happen. Friends will forget and betray you. Work once meaningful will drain your soul. Youth, health and strength will fade. Threats from without and within will come.
But don’t worry. Don’t be afraid. All you are and all you have, all you hope and all you fear rests in the infinite abundance of the Father’s heart. Know this, and fear is gone.
There is such a contrast between you, Jesus, and those who surround you. Anxious crowds push nearer to hear, and you take to a boat. The fishermen doubt anything good can happen after a long night’s labor gains nothing. But you quietly direct them to deep water.
Amazed, they struggle at the nets to gather the catch. You stand silently in the background, watching. I wonder, do you smile at the startling abundance they haul in?
Peter confesses his unworthiness and the discomfort of being in your presence, a presence he cannot possibly understand. His eyes are fixed squarely on himself.
Wrong place. Everyone in the story dwells in the wrong place. Their hearts rest in their emptiness, their need, their inadequacy, their anxiety about having and being enough. Little wonder they are amazed when abundance appears.
But you are not surprised, Jesus. No amazement appears on your face or in your voice. You dwell in perfect peace, knowing the infinite abundance of the divine heart is always enough … and always will be.
May my mind dwell with yours, Jesus. May all your children share your peace.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Tuesday, February, 2, 2010
Today’s text
Luke 5:2-6
Jesus got into one of the boats -- it was Simon's -- and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.' Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.' And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear … .
Reflection
“If you say so … .” I doubt Peter’s words were spoken eagerly, as if he were itching to pull at the oars and lug the nets over the gunnels of the boat after a long night of wasted effort. Food and a nap in the heat of the day were far more attractive.
“But if you say so, Jesus, … we’ll do it again.”
That’s what I hear, resistance to hard work that already proved fruitless.
My body feels that on some days, but not today, despite the enervation of energy from my limbs. Perhaps it is an oncoming cold, perhaps just a snowy winter Monday resting heavy on my shoulders.
But despite these aching muscles I remain quietly unwilling to surrender to the voice that says it doesn’t matter, the work, that is--the commitment and effort required to stay faithful to the duties of the day. There are calls to be made, promises to keep, appointments to make, plus letters to write, scattered papers on the desk and yes, prayers for human pains likely to cross my path.
Who knows how many there will be? It’s still early.
The voice that asks, does any of this really matter, never fully goes away. I hear it as I step from the shower and dry my head. But the question doesn’t drag me into its gravity. It lacks power to discourage or stop me from taking the next step into the day.
This has nothing to do with the strength of my will or the courage of my resolve. I learned long ago not to depend too much on those.
I go, stepping into the duties of the day because you, Jesus, tell me to do it all again. Take care of the detail, pray with the people, make the calls and keep the appointments. Throw out the nets because … well, you never know.
Unexpected graces come. You need to be there to catch them.
Pr. David L. Miller
Luke 5:2-6
Jesus got into one of the boats -- it was Simon's -- and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.' Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.' And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear … .
Reflection
“If you say so … .” I doubt Peter’s words were spoken eagerly, as if he were itching to pull at the oars and lug the nets over the gunnels of the boat after a long night of wasted effort. Food and a nap in the heat of the day were far more attractive.
“But if you say so, Jesus, … we’ll do it again.”
That’s what I hear, resistance to hard work that already proved fruitless.
My body feels that on some days, but not today, despite the enervation of energy from my limbs. Perhaps it is an oncoming cold, perhaps just a snowy winter Monday resting heavy on my shoulders.
But despite these aching muscles I remain quietly unwilling to surrender to the voice that says it doesn’t matter, the work, that is--the commitment and effort required to stay faithful to the duties of the day. There are calls to be made, promises to keep, appointments to make, plus letters to write, scattered papers on the desk and yes, prayers for human pains likely to cross my path.
Who knows how many there will be? It’s still early.
The voice that asks, does any of this really matter, never fully goes away. I hear it as I step from the shower and dry my head. But the question doesn’t drag me into its gravity. It lacks power to discourage or stop me from taking the next step into the day.
This has nothing to do with the strength of my will or the courage of my resolve. I learned long ago not to depend too much on those.
I go, stepping into the duties of the day because you, Jesus, tell me to do it all again. Take care of the detail, pray with the people, make the calls and keep the appointments. Throw out the nets because … well, you never know.
Unexpected graces come. You need to be there to catch them.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Reflection
Happiness and Haiti, funerals and politics, Genesis and church chatter come together in unexpected ways.
A couple of years ago, a journalist published a book that lived on my daughter’s shelf until she gave it to me, knowing I was intrigued by the title, The Geography of Bliss. The book is a funny and illuminating read.
The author traveled to a dozen countries to learn why those who live there are so happy--or not. The countries were not picked at random. He chose his destinations after visiting the World Happiness Database (I’m not making this up) in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
The WHD compiles and compares studies from social scientists across the world, who examine the age-old mystery of what makes for happy contented lives. Countries even receive scores on a 1-10 scale, based on extensive surveying.
In case you’re wondering, the United States is not among the 20 happiest places on Earth. It ranks below places like Costa Rica, Malta, Malaysia, Bhutan and Iceland, way below Iceland.
No surprise there. During my lifetime, Americans have become many times richer, but the divorce rate has tripled, violent crime has quadrupled, the prison population quintupled and mental health disorders like anxiety and depression are much more common, not merely more commonly diagnosed.
This leads to the obvious conclusion that money matters less we imagine. After having enough to satisfy basic human needs, happiness plateaus and having more money makes little difference.
What matters are social and family connections, belonging to a people, a history and a culture that transcends oneself. Trusting others is essential, your neighbors and fellow citizens. Envy is totally toxic, as are unrealistic expectations for personal success and accomplishment.
Happy places allow people to try and fail without shame, providing them freedom to reinvent themselves. They have space for idleness beyond the daily rush. They also inspire an expansive consciousness, the awareness that life is bigger than me and my personal needs.
Summing up his view--and much of this happy, thoughtful book, a public official in the tiny nation of Bhutan said, “Happiness is 100% relational.”
The Bible connects here. Once we move beyond silly arguments about whether the creation stories of Genesis are literal history, the stories speak deep truth about human nature and how we connect with God.
We are created from and for each other, to complete each other. We are fashioned for harmony with the earth and those with whom we share it. Recognize it or not, we are deeply connected, and we find our joy and purpose in the community of those connections.
Little wonder that human happiness is 100% relational. We can’t deny our communal nature or hide it under the myth of the “self-made man” or beneath foolish ideas that suggest that we can live separate lives. We are intimately connected with every other human family with whom we share this planet.
Occasionally, the narcissistic walls that keep us from seeing these connections crumble. Earthquakes do this. Pictures from Haiti move us in ways we can neither understand nor deny, as we witness faces of suffering and recognize those faces as our own.
So we care, we act, we give, becoming more human and, dare I say it, happier, having fulfilled in our bodies the humanity and communal connection God fashioned in our depths.
This is why two funerals I recently led were happier places than the American political marketplace. At the funerals, we remembered, cried and laughed together. We felt the sinews of love, struggle and history that bind us together. Amid sorrow, there was joy as we experienced those connections--and our connection with God.
This is so different from American politics where the reality that we are all in this together is daily ripped asunder by tactics of denunciation and excoriation.
Different, too, were the circles of conversation that continued longer than normal in the narthex last Sunday. Serious exchanges and laughter spiced the air. People shared news of illnesses and treatment, of family visits and children’s activities, of hopes and anxieties for the coming week.
Connections were savored and nurtured, and we were happier and more human for it. In some not-so-hidden way, the kingdom of God’s delight was real.
Pr. David L. Miller
Happiness and Haiti, funerals and politics, Genesis and church chatter come together in unexpected ways.
A couple of years ago, a journalist published a book that lived on my daughter’s shelf until she gave it to me, knowing I was intrigued by the title, The Geography of Bliss. The book is a funny and illuminating read.
The author traveled to a dozen countries to learn why those who live there are so happy--or not. The countries were not picked at random. He chose his destinations after visiting the World Happiness Database (I’m not making this up) in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
The WHD compiles and compares studies from social scientists across the world, who examine the age-old mystery of what makes for happy contented lives. Countries even receive scores on a 1-10 scale, based on extensive surveying.
In case you’re wondering, the United States is not among the 20 happiest places on Earth. It ranks below places like Costa Rica, Malta, Malaysia, Bhutan and Iceland, way below Iceland.
No surprise there. During my lifetime, Americans have become many times richer, but the divorce rate has tripled, violent crime has quadrupled, the prison population quintupled and mental health disorders like anxiety and depression are much more common, not merely more commonly diagnosed.
This leads to the obvious conclusion that money matters less we imagine. After having enough to satisfy basic human needs, happiness plateaus and having more money makes little difference.
What matters are social and family connections, belonging to a people, a history and a culture that transcends oneself. Trusting others is essential, your neighbors and fellow citizens. Envy is totally toxic, as are unrealistic expectations for personal success and accomplishment.
Happy places allow people to try and fail without shame, providing them freedom to reinvent themselves. They have space for idleness beyond the daily rush. They also inspire an expansive consciousness, the awareness that life is bigger than me and my personal needs.
Summing up his view--and much of this happy, thoughtful book, a public official in the tiny nation of Bhutan said, “Happiness is 100% relational.”
The Bible connects here. Once we move beyond silly arguments about whether the creation stories of Genesis are literal history, the stories speak deep truth about human nature and how we connect with God.
We are created from and for each other, to complete each other. We are fashioned for harmony with the earth and those with whom we share it. Recognize it or not, we are deeply connected, and we find our joy and purpose in the community of those connections.
Little wonder that human happiness is 100% relational. We can’t deny our communal nature or hide it under the myth of the “self-made man” or beneath foolish ideas that suggest that we can live separate lives. We are intimately connected with every other human family with whom we share this planet.
Occasionally, the narcissistic walls that keep us from seeing these connections crumble. Earthquakes do this. Pictures from Haiti move us in ways we can neither understand nor deny, as we witness faces of suffering and recognize those faces as our own.
So we care, we act, we give, becoming more human and, dare I say it, happier, having fulfilled in our bodies the humanity and communal connection God fashioned in our depths.
This is why two funerals I recently led were happier places than the American political marketplace. At the funerals, we remembered, cried and laughed together. We felt the sinews of love, struggle and history that bind us together. Amid sorrow, there was joy as we experienced those connections--and our connection with God.
This is so different from American politics where the reality that we are all in this together is daily ripped asunder by tactics of denunciation and excoriation.
Different, too, were the circles of conversation that continued longer than normal in the narthex last Sunday. Serious exchanges and laughter spiced the air. People shared news of illnesses and treatment, of family visits and children’s activities, of hopes and anxieties for the coming week.
Connections were savored and nurtured, and we were happier and more human for it. In some not-so-hidden way, the kingdom of God’s delight was real.
Pr. David L. Miller
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