Friday, Nov. 27, 2015

Psalm 25:14

The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him,
   and he makes his covenant known to them. 

Rest

Worries of what will be

run night races ‘round

worn tracks of mind,

stealing sleep.

So I come here,

Dearest Friend, to

rest and hear your Voice

that breaks the race,

releasing the heart,

to sink into this familiar

chair and sit with you

a while in the silence

of knowing.

I come to know

my heart’s Friend, truly,

where silence settles

every noise of mind

and matter and that again

I might know who I am.

I know: I never

forget, ever, but there

is a knowing that stills

all else, evaporating all

distance I might feel

from you. For that I come,

light red candle and look

into the flame of love.

All works for good,

I hear, for your friends,

though goodness wears

disguises that require

patience and faith ‘til

joy appears in the dawn

of grace.

And morning comes …

now, dear Friend, a new day

in this time and song in which

I know … you are here,

awakening this old heart

haunted from earliest days

of its beating with the hope

of knowing you.

And I do, a knowing

that brings rest night cannot

give, the rest of sitting in

silence by this flame

that never dies.

Pr. David L. Miller

Thursday, Nov. 26, 2015

Psalm 25:4-5

Make me to know your ways, O Lord;
   teach me your paths. 
Lead me in your truth, and teach me,
   for you are the God of my salvation;
   for you I wait all day long. 

Thanksgiving

I know your path,

Love and from Love

born, filling the heart

sparkling eyes with

delight of hope undying

when Fullness fills

and stills every craving

of inner ache … with You.

The snow melts now,

brilliant shroud of white

too soon a blight of mud

beneath black limbs once

ago electric with color

now gone, asleep.

But … no worry,

I know: Color comes

in its time and always

will. It’s the way you

are. And luster never

leaves my heart

for I know … You.

You are the Love

who never leaves

when autumn falls,

coming to consciousness,

warming my world

with colors of Presence

and Nearness, of Knowing

the Love who changed

and changes … Everything.

You are never gone,

but ever here … and

there … and wherever

I go. Rush of life,

anxious days, troubles

come, mere clouds,

hiding what always

is and always will be …

You.

Today …

is filled with You,

every feeling acute

and clear, certain and sure,

everywhere I look, every note

that floats across the room,

sounds peace to my ear:

All is well. All is well.

Love lives and reigns,

Mystery ever near and

so far beyond, leaving

two words: Thank you

for being …

You.

Pr. David L. Miller

Monday, Nov. 23, 2015

Philippians 4:4-7

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. 

Of joy and pies

We are most like ourselves when we give. We are most like God when we share our souls in gifts from the heart.

A pie was sitting on my chair after Sunday worship. The giver was running a pie sale in the narthex of the church. The sale went well but better was the look on the sellers face when he told me there was a pie waiting for me on my office chair.

He also gave pies for other staff members and set several aside for a reception before the Thanksgiving Eve worship service. I appreciate the pies, although my waistline suggests that are contraindicated.

But much more I appreciate the man, and more: I am moved by what moves him.

Joy filled his smile as he scurried about delivering the sweet bounty. It felt good to give. His face told me so. He was having a good time. His heart was light, made so by being able to give.

Giving satisfies the soul. True, it can be done arrogantly or in ways that demean those who receive. But not for this man on this day.

The good pies came from a good heart made glad by giving without expectation of some quid pro quo where he would get something back. And his joy is the joy of God, the joy of human nature fulfilled.

Made in the image of God our inner nature finds fulfillment in giving, in blessing, in sharing, in loving in the manner of the Great Love God is.

Joy happens when our inner nature is fulfilled, when we are acting according to our identity as the image and likeness of God whose giving knows no ending.

The early theologians spoke of the Holy Trinity as a dance of self-giving Love. They described the Father as the Originating Source of all, the Giver. They called the Son of God the Gift of Love from the Father, calling the Spirit the ongoing Giving of God in the world and the souls of women and men.

The Love God is flows from the Giver as Gift and as unending Giving, a river of grace and Love that flows, truly, through all time and space.

When we give (yes, even pies) we jump into the divine flow, the river of grace, the stream of mercy and know ourselves … and God ... more fully than we ever thought possible.

Pr. David L. Miller

Wednesday Nov. 18, 2015

John 18:36-37

Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.’ Pilate asked him, ‘So you are a king?’ Jesus answered, ‘You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.

Listen

The news is filled the violence of ISIS and the response of nations around the world. They track down those who kill in the name of God, those who understand nothing of the Truth who beats at the heart of my brother Jesus.

My kingdom is not from this world, you say. No, my brother, it is not, and the very thought of this brings tears to my eyes. I long for your kingdom and feel the difference between your kingdom and any other.

Kingdoms and nations all rely on force to create a measure of order (if not also justice) among myriad competing interests and desires.

Not you, your kingdom is known by those who listen to the inner voice of love who is the Voice of the Loving Mystery who filled you.

“Those who know that Voice … know me,” you say, “and those who know me … know that Voice.

“Those who hunger to hear the voice of gracious welcome and acceptance to calm their hearts and quell their fears … these are my people, my kingdom, a community of Truth.

“They listen to life that they may hear the Truth who speaks in every beauty and grace of this world. They listen … and become the grace and beauty who is Truth, the Truth before time, the Truth who will be when time is no more.”

I hear you speaking in the music that plays in this place as a red candle burns and the clamor of the world quiets. You are always here … and everywhere I go. Truly.

You are the Voice of Love who hungers within for the Love who is so much more than any one heart can hold. But hold you I do and ever will.

And I know … you will speak through the moments of this day. All I need do is listen.

Pr. David L. Miller

Wednesday, November, 11, 2015

 Luke 1:72-75

Thus he has shown the mercy promised to our ancestors,
   and has remembered his holy covenant, 
the oath that he swore to our ancestor Abraham,
   to grant us that we, being rescued from the hands of our enemies,
might serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness
   before him all our days.

The God who remembers

The human heart hungers to be remembered. When we are forgotten we feel cast off, disconnected and without hope. The opposite of being re-membered is dis-membered, separated, broken in pieces scattered about. 

The human heart flees this terror. We long to be re-membered, our members—arms and legs, head and heart, body and soul—put back together and made whole, connected again with life.

In the days of his dying, Verel, a Korean War veteran relived the experience of war from his bed in a Nebraska nursing home. He crouched and curled up, feeling again the fear of crouching in a fox hole as artillery exploded around him.

“Remember me. Remember me,” he cried out again and again. This was his prayer. It's a good one. It speaks the deep fear of our hearts, crying to God to remember us in our distress lest we be torn apart by life and lost in death.

Verel’s prayer is everywhere. It stares back at us from our television screens in the hollow eyes of hungry children. It cries out in the fear of faces in war-torn places as missiles rain death from the sky in the darkness of night, destroying  towns and killing tens of thousands.

I head this prayer in every refugee camp I ever entered in my days of reporting. It didn’t matter what country or continent I was in. I saw it in their eyes and heard it every time they asked, “Does the world know? Are we forgotten?”

The prayer hits closer to home as I sit in a Bible study and listen as an older person wonders who will remember her when she is gone. Her children will remember, her grandchildren, too. But after that will she become an unknown face in an undated photo?

No, never. She will be remembered, her life whole and held in a Mercy beyond every expectation and hope. The refugee, the hungry child on the evening news, Verel, too, all of them—and us—remembered by the Loving Mystery who never forgets.

You are held, always, in the Love of the God who knows your name. Cast off all fear ... and know.

Pr. David L. Miller

Tuesday November 10, 2015

Luke 1:68-72

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, for he has come to his people, he has set them free, and he has established for us a saving power in the House of his servant David, just as he proclaimed, by the mouth of his holy prophets from ancient times, that he would save us from our enemies and from the hands of all those who hate us, and show faithful love to our ancestors, and so keep in mind his holy covenant.

The God who comes

People of faith have one hope through all history, and God has one story to impress on our hearts so that we know our hope is fulfilled ... and always will be.

One story: The story of God coming to us, to love and bless, to warm our hearts when they are cold and fill us with hope when all hope seems gone.

God comes and always will come to us to give us the treasure of God’s heart, the unfailing love that gives life to we who fear and fail, just as God has promised.

I reject the language that speaks of God’s intervention into human lives. God does not intervene. There is no need because God is present all along. There is no moment when God needs to step into a situation to change things for the better. God is always there, a living, loving presence, a saving power who lifts us from doubt and despair so that we know we dwell constantly in the land of God’s abiding nearness.

Yes, times come when events turn and it seems as if God has finally heard and answered our prayer: a moment of healing, a friend who offers exactly the help we need, a sudden change in our fortunes.

All these and so much more are gifts from the God of Light from whom all blessings come.  

But make no mistake: God has already come, and God is always coming. God first came in the burst of light at the dawn of creation and has been coming to creation ever since.

God comes in acts of deliverance and mercy, in every act of justice and compassion in the history of our world. God comes decisively in the incarnation of the divine heart in our brother Jesus, and in the depth of our love and longing for life for ourselves and for our whole dying world.

God comes and will continue to come in every time, every moment, to every heart until all things are filled with the Love God is.

Pr. David L. Miller

Thursday, Nov. 5, 2015

Isaiah 9:2

The people who walked in darkness
   have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
   on them light has shined. 

Light is life

Light lifts our hearts. We cling to the gentle autumnal light as fall fades into winter. Our eyes caress and delight in leaves of gold and rust that tenaciously cling to branches in the cool rays of November sun, as each day grows shorter.

We bask in the light, craving its rays, loving the orange sun sinking beneath strips of purple cloud before afternoon is done, eager again for it is rise to give us a new day.

Every morning, light gives birth to a new day from the dark of night, awakening our bodies and stirring our hearts to the beauty and goodness of life, a gift given again for us to know the goodness of the Giver.

Light is life. Without it there is no life, no growth, no glorious color to delight our senses and make us glad we are alive.

From ancient times, light has been associated with the presence of God and darkness with the feeling of God’s absence. Those who feel far from God dwell in the dark cold of absence where hope seems lost.

In the darkness, we hope for the light of morning to appear and awaken hope for life and love, for peace and beauty to appear again in their lives. We ache for the moment light breaks through and lifts our hearts that they may say again, “Thank you, O Lord, for you come to the dark places to lift my soul.”

You are light, O God. You shine in every love and grace-filled moment. Come shine in our darkness this day and awaken hope in our hearts for every tomorrow.

Pr. David L. Miller

November 4, 2015

Isaiah 9:2

The people who walked in darkness
   have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
   on them light has shined. 

Light of my life

Why is it, O Lord, that I seek you more in the darkness than the light?

Days of light come, sun shining, filling every corner in me until I burst with the joy of praise at being alive, knowing you are the Being, the Light, the Life I know within as well, no better, than I know myself.

And then days come when I know nothing, feeling all I am and ever have been is lost, wondering if I was ever worth mentioning. All I am and have done seems a wisp of smoke, thinnest of clouds, soon scattered, mattering not to anyone, even myself.

Why does this darkness weigh so heavily on my heart that light, joy and the Wonder of Love flee, leaving me as lost and alone as ever?

And why, even now, do these bleak words awaken tears of relief that lift edges of the dark curtain, allowing hope’s sweet light to enter the corners of consciousness?

I will never understand this heart of mine … or regret its ways. Never. For it always leads back to you and ever it shall be.

It is the darkness that brings me to my knees, aching for the Light of Love to open me to the soul within that I might know my true nature.

The heart’s inner darkness aches of emptiness, leaving only one place to go where again I might know that you are ever there, the depth of this soul.

The darkness drives me beyond my unfulfilled hopes, dreams and desires, grieving them all. And in my tears to see, again, the Light who is always, and always there, who appears whenever I spin my little words and release the contortions of my heart.

You are always there, loving me, the Light in the self’s dark land.

So I wonder: Do you to smile, Holy One, as I sink beneath black waves of despair? Do you see and say, “Soon, he will come home and know?”

And yes, I do know, thank you very much. I know the darkness is more friend than foe. It brings me back to you.

Pr. David L. Miller

Monday, October 26, 2015

Mark 10:50-52

See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

Revealed in beauty

In seeing we become what we see, what we love, what our eyes caress and treasure.

So it is with all of us, but certainly true of those who look to Jesus and know the Love he is. Seeing him they see anew the life and beauty, the Love he is in the lives of those who have graced this world by their presence before passing into the engulfing mystery of what follows this life.

We look into heart and memory and see faces, some long passed, some ever and blessedly still near us, breathing the same air, and gracing us with smiles that delight our hearts and humanize our days.

We look and see you, Holy One, in the lives of human beings who like autumn trees whose beauty excites the heart and remind us that this world … despite the carnage and hatred that roils the globe … remains truly alive with beauty that shines in the eyes of those whose love testifies to the Love you always are and always will be.

Thank you.

Thank you blessed ones, shining souls alive with the brilliant red and golden tones of the Love who is.

Thank you Blessed One, O Holy Mystery beyond my every thought. Just thank you for letting me see and know and, in your way and time with me, to be transformed into a better man, more alive and gracious, more graced with the beauty of your Love.

You are revealed in Love, dear brother, Jesus, the Love of the Eternal, that seeing we may become as you … and all your saints … truly are.

Pr. David L. Miller

Thursday, October 22, 2015

Mark 10:46-49

 They came to Jericho. As he and his disciples and a large crowd were leaving Jericho, Bartimaeus son of Timaeus, a blind beggar, was sitting by the roadside. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ Many sternly ordered him to be quiet, but he cried out even more loudly, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ Jesus stood still and said, ‘Call him here.’ And they called the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart; get up, he is calling you.’

Mercy

Have mercy on us. Open our eyes that we may see ourselves, our society, our nation and neighborhood. But this is a fearful thing. Do we really want to see our privilege and wealth, how entitled we are, a fact of which most are oblivious?

Have we lost sight of holiness and beauty? Can we feel the wonder of true human communion and know it as communion in the Love you are, a communion you happily create among us when we stop letting our lives run us and truly look at each other?

Can we again know and feel that these lives we are given are for something beyond ourselves? Can we still know the joy of being blessed, broken and given away in love for purposes far more holy than our own comfort?

Can we be truly human again, images of the Christ?

Days come when I lose hope for our society, for the neighborhood in which I live, for lives so caught up in the rush of western culture that they fail to see they no longer make choices but are driven, automatons of a society that knows nothing higher than self-seeking.

I know … it’s not so bad. Glimmers of hope and beauty often appear in the acts and eyes of those who are not entirely absorbed in the soup of our societal obsessions with more and more, faster and faster, me and more me.

Some are not blind but see beauty and wonder … and the pain of a world not so privileged as we. Some have suffered greatly, opening their broken hearts to see and bring solace and seek justice.

Some are filled with joy that escapes me when the world is heavy on my heart and anything I do seems fruitless. Their joy bears fruit, bearing the rest of us up on discouraging days. So does this time, this prayer of exploring the darkness of heart that sometimes comes.

Morning clouds clear even as I write. For I hear you whisper, “Take heart. I will open your eyes to see and know … me.”

This is all I need. Truly.

Pr. David L. Miller

Monday, October 19, 2015

Mark 10:50-52

So throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus. Then Jesus said to him, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ The blind man said to him, ‘My teacher, let me see again.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Go; your faith has made you well.’ Immediately he regained his sight and followed him on the way. 

Seeing

Morning wakes my eyes again.

Wake now this heart to feel,

To know the grace of morning,

Fresh hours of hope, eyes of heart

Open again to see, truly, the sparkle

In your eye when again I see you …

and know the Love that is always.

Blind … then he sees, first, you

And what is there? Not sorrow

Certainly. A smile more divine

Than any before? A furrowed

Brow of concentration? Maybe.

But I will opt for the smile

I carry within wherever I go.

I know … it brought you joy

To sight his eyes again, so take

Now your joy from me, opening

The eyes of this morning heart

Sluggish yet from sleep. Open

My eyes to see again the face I

Carry deep within.

You, shining, sparkling eyes

That speak only Love, quieting

Every longing, awash with tears

Of knowing what is known

Nowhere but in the Love

Who shines in the face I carry

That carries me.

Thank you … again

For Love that is Life, for

Opening morning eyes to see

Your face, your joy in sighting

Me that I might see what I must

See to know and live, truly …

With peace amid the noise.

Pr. David L. Miller

Wednesday, October 7, 2015

Isaiah 9:2

The people who walked in darkness
   have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
   on them light has shined. 

Just when

Just when clouds of darkness

within and around

choke out the sun.

Just when you wonder

whether light can illumine

again the heart’s inner room.

Just when hope grows lame

and you doubt Life

 again can live in your limbs.

Just when night demons haunt

and taunt the small hours and

emptiness aches the hollow heart.

Just then …

a place, a grace, a face,

a wanted smile, the smallest word

pierces the night.

Just then … exquisite beauty

shines, warming the cold heart

as hope springs skyward.

Just then life revives and

Becomes Life one more,

lifting limp limbs to praise.

Just then … you know ...

Life and Love live

always, and always will

to pierce the dreary clouds

of night, casting demons of doubt

to the hell from which they came,

Just then the empty ache flees,

filled now and knowing

the Light and Love who is …

Always.

Pr. David L. Miller