Today’s text
John 6:48-51
'I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate manna in the desert and they are dead; but this is the bread which comes down from heaven, so that a person may eat it and not die. I am the living bread which has come down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live for ever; and the bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of the world.'
Reflection
What feeds a human soul so that the heart remain full and strong, the soul quiet and at peace?
This is no idle question amid the changes and chances of life that come as quickly as a telephone ring, bearing news you do not want.
There is no need to list the losses and challenges that come to even the most sheltered lives. Human life is what it is … unpredictable, gloriously filled with joy one moment and pitted with angst or sorrow the next.
We may wish for a stable soul, calm amid the storms, quiet in the face of painful loss, but few enjoy such strength and stability.
Some may reach for this state through denial of what is happening within them or by trying not to care, pretending the ship of their soul doesn’t rock much on the waves of living.
But cares will and do come, the soul shakes, the heart quakes and we hunger for strength, an awareness that allows a peaceful heart amid an unpeaceful world.
Jesus asks us what we are eating: Are we eating him? Are we consuming what is in him that we know what he knows and our hearts dwell in the land where he dwells?
“Come and eat,” he bids. “Come and know. Come and lay down at the side of my great soul that your soul may enter the place of peace and eat the bread of knowledge, taking in the life that is in me.”
There is no other way to become a great soul, who remains full and quiet, at peace and full amid jangling nerves and unpleasant news, except by eating, again and again, the revelation Jesus bears.
He bears the Life of the One who is Life, the love of the One who is Love. In nearness to him, we eat the bread of his all-encompassing heart and know ourselves encompassed and filled with the life of eternity even now, amid the noise and news of living these days.
“All is well,” great souls have said in every age. They were not naïve or stupid. They had just eaten more than we have.
Pr. David L. Miller
http://prayingthemystery.blogspot.com/
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Thursday, August 09, 2012
Wednesday, August 08, 2012
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 4:31-5:2
Any bitterness or bad temper or anger or shouting or abuse must be far removed from you -- as must every kind of malice. Be generous to one another, sympathetic, forgiving each other as readily as God forgave you in Christ. As God's dear children, then, take him as your pattern, and follow Christ by loving as he loved you, giving himself up for us as an offering and a sweet-smelling sacrifice to God.
Reflection
So many walls divide the human family. Walls of language, culture and history divide nations. Old wounds and fears, unforgiven injuries and injustices, disrespect and insensitivities divide former friends and families, neighbors and communities.
Nations and peoples harbor anger and mistrust, arming themselves and striking when they fear the other might strike first.
We nurture grudges, repeating old stories about those who hurt or insulted us, hardening our attitudes and maintaining a safe distance between our hearts and their actions. It’s the human condition.
Amid such division the Spirit calls us to imitate the inimitable, to be as God, who tears down the walls that separate soul from soul, so the holy dream of God might come true--and all might be one in a great ocean of Love.
The first wall that must come down is that which distances our hearts from the divine heart, the undivided heart of God.
It’s hard to believe and trust that heart because we know our hearts, which are full of divisions and contradictions. The idea and experience of a heart that wills only one thing--complete and total love for all--is foreign to us, impossible to fathom.
We look at God as we look at others, wondering if we can trust that this heart. Does the heart of God seek to bless me at all times and in all things? What about all the crushing hardships, injustices and searing circumstances that cut to the heart and wear us down?
Even there? Even then?
Even there, even then: The great and undivided Heart who is God seeks our hearts, tearing down walls of fear, mistrust and doubt so that our hearts might be healed in the knowledge that there is One, … there is always One who loves and is love for us.
Only in the destruction of the walls of distrust that divide us from the fullness of the One who is full of love can our hearts imitate the inimitable, following the pattern of God who tears down walls that division may give way to unity and peace.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, August 07, 2012
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 4:31-32
Any bitterness or bad temper or anger or shouting or abuse must be far removed from you -- as must every kind of malice. Be generous to one another, sympathetic, forgiving each other as readily as God forgave you in Christ.
Reflection
Last night’s news featured a photo of a former army officer standing in front of a Nazi flag bearing the infamous swastika, the world’s most notorious symbol of hate. More photos followed accompanied by angry music with vile lyrics.
How? I wondered. How can anyone identify with such filth, such death? How can a soul become so twisted that they willingly drink this poison--and be moved to kill, as this young man did, riddling a Sikh temple with bullets?
Perhaps it is fear of the outsider, fear of those who are different that motivates such hate. We seek to destroy that which we fear.
The invitation of God’s grace is to live beyond fear, knowing God is good and gracious, trusting that neither life nor death nor anything else can separate us from an immeasurable love that holds us in every moment.
There is no fear in God, who is full of loving graciousness even to the enemies of God, as Jesus revealed in him life and ministry.
There are moments when this love also fills us until we overflow with peace and kindness, wanting nothing other than to appreciate and bless those around us, gently handling every moment and every heart.
In these moments, we truly know who God is; we know how we are loved and held, and we know how we are to live--beyond fear and in love, always in love, generous as God is generous, forgiving as we are forgiven
Only in knowing the Love who holds us can we live the love that lifts us above our fears of the other, of those we do not agree with or understand.
When we see such hate as sometimes fills our TV screens we reach again for that Love who is always reaching for us that we might be the antidote to the hate that rips human souls and societies. This is Christ’s call to us.
And know: God uses everything, wasting nothing, not even swastikas.
I was blessed watching the news. The hate-filled images moved my heart to embrace more deeply the gentleness of the Spirit within my own heart, grown there through years of praying and hearing the way of Jesus, the way of grace that makes us human.
Pr. David L. Miller
Ephesians 4:31-32
Any bitterness or bad temper or anger or shouting or abuse must be far removed from you -- as must every kind of malice. Be generous to one another, sympathetic, forgiving each other as readily as God forgave you in Christ.
Reflection
Last night’s news featured a photo of a former army officer standing in front of a Nazi flag bearing the infamous swastika, the world’s most notorious symbol of hate. More photos followed accompanied by angry music with vile lyrics.
How? I wondered. How can anyone identify with such filth, such death? How can a soul become so twisted that they willingly drink this poison--and be moved to kill, as this young man did, riddling a Sikh temple with bullets?
Perhaps it is fear of the outsider, fear of those who are different that motivates such hate. We seek to destroy that which we fear.
The invitation of God’s grace is to live beyond fear, knowing God is good and gracious, trusting that neither life nor death nor anything else can separate us from an immeasurable love that holds us in every moment.
There is no fear in God, who is full of loving graciousness even to the enemies of God, as Jesus revealed in him life and ministry.
There are moments when this love also fills us until we overflow with peace and kindness, wanting nothing other than to appreciate and bless those around us, gently handling every moment and every heart.
In these moments, we truly know who God is; we know how we are loved and held, and we know how we are to live--beyond fear and in love, always in love, generous as God is generous, forgiving as we are forgiven
Only in knowing the Love who holds us can we live the love that lifts us above our fears of the other, of those we do not agree with or understand.
When we see such hate as sometimes fills our TV screens we reach again for that Love who is always reaching for us that we might be the antidote to the hate that rips human souls and societies. This is Christ’s call to us.
And know: God uses everything, wasting nothing, not even swastikas.
I was blessed watching the news. The hate-filled images moved my heart to embrace more deeply the gentleness of the Spirit within my own heart, grown there through years of praying and hearing the way of Jesus, the way of grace that makes us human.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, August 02, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 4:1-3
I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you therefore to lead a life worthy of the vocation to which you were called. With all humility and gentleness, and with patience, support each other in love. Take every care to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together.
Reflection
Unity of Spirit is not toleration, not mere acceptance or the absence of mistrust and conflict. It is the loving awareness that swells when human hearts experience common faith, hope and endeavor.
A song at worship can do this, sweeping souls into a single hope, lifting them into awareness of the great love who holds them.
Common work or sorrow also brings unity. Times of great loss or destruction breaks open our individual cocoons and joins us in common efforts to care for each other or rebuild broken lives and homes.
Christians … others, too, for that matter … band together to send crews to towns ravaged by disasters. We say we do it to live the love of Christ, and that is true. The Spirit within moves us beyond ourselves.
But we do it not only to share the love of Christ but to know Christ’s love, to be swept up in a love that binds us to each other and to the One who is the Fountain of that love.
Amid the common labor--or in sharing the sorrow of one who has suffered great personal loss--the gulf between our souls disappears. Our aloneness in the world evaporates. We feel connected at the heart, and God’s hope and plan for the world becomes real.
Our completion, the Spirit’s fulfillment and salvation of our lives is not an individual reality but a communal one. We are not saved by ourselves, all alone, but as we are gathered in an ocean of love that holds us all, and all of together, knowing one love.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, August 01, 2012
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 4:1-3
I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you therefore to lead a life worthy of the vocation to which you were called. With all humility and gentleness, and with patience, support each other in love. Take every care to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together.
Reflection
There is a peace that binds us together and the name of that peace is Jesus.
In recent weeks, I sometimes have taken to repeating a simple phrase as a mantra. I say it under my breath or barely aloud: Jesus is our peace.
Sometimes, such as when I feel anxious, I speak it as a petition: Jesus be our peace.
It is not easy to say what this means to me, but I can share what it does. The phrase is a portal, a doorway into a fresh and immense reality.
I enter a space big as the universe or at least as large as the universe within the mystery of my own soul. The noisy chatter of my anxieties fall quiet, and I know the love that is in Jesus.
It is as if I enter the reality that he is, the world that is in him. In that world, the love of God is as embracing and pervasive as the sky, and I know beyond any doubt that there is nothing to fear.
I wish I could say there were particular images or words associated with this awareness, but right now I can name none. There is nothing I see that I can describe. I know only that I enter this immense space where I know union with the mystery of all that was in Jesus, loving unity.
I am in him, in the unity he shares with that Loving Mystery he called Father, who is a living fountain of love and life in such abundance that worry about … anything … disappears.
The world lights up as place of wonder where joy and peace of heart are not only possible but plentiful, even amid the challenges of the day. A desire emerges to live in peace with every living thing, every human soul and all creation.
The reality into which I enter is not an occasional reality but always there, waiting for my awareness to open the door, the awareness that comes in simplest prayer: Jesus is our peace.
Knowing this peace, seeking unity in the Spirit is not a chore but an invitation to live in the reality that Jesus is instead of the much more fearful world we create in our anxious imaginations.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 4:1-3
I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you therefore to lead a life worthy of the vocation to which you were called. With all humility and gentleness, and with patience, support each other in love. Take every care to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together.
Reflection
The grace that I have most consistently rejected in nearly 60 years of living is that of community, solidarity, togetherness.
I was raised in an age when individualism was at high tide. But I also nourished a deep personal strain that wanted to stand over and against others, seeking to establish an identity that was unique that I might pretend that ‘they do not--or cannot--understand me.’
At the same time, I wanted to be admired by those from whom I imagined that I was so different. As if I were less flesh and blood than those from whom I would distance myself; as if they felt all that much better understood by others than I did.
As if my sense of aloneness in the world was not shared by ... everyone.
I have imagined the journey of faith, too, as an individual endeavor, not as a pilgrimage to God’s eternal city in communion with other souls as blessed and needy as my own.
The grace to which I come in these years is one of realism, the grace of realizing I am a merely and blessedly human-- not some kind of separate uber-human species so different from all the others with whom I walk the streets.
They are like me. Just so, they are God’s gift to me as I am gift to them, whether any of us recognize or not.
But when we recognize it, surrender the arrogance of imagining we are so different from each other and seek to live with humility and gentleness, the gulf between our souls is bridged, the myth of our alones is shattered, our wounds find balm, and we feel the unity of life and heart God intends.
At our best, the church and each congregation is a place of knowing the grace of community that sets us free from ourselves for truly human lives.
Pr. David L. Miller
Ephesians 4:1-3
I, the prisoner in the Lord, urge you therefore to lead a life worthy of the vocation to which you were called. With all humility and gentleness, and with patience, support each other in love. Take every care to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together.
Reflection
The grace that I have most consistently rejected in nearly 60 years of living is that of community, solidarity, togetherness.
I was raised in an age when individualism was at high tide. But I also nourished a deep personal strain that wanted to stand over and against others, seeking to establish an identity that was unique that I might pretend that ‘they do not--or cannot--understand me.’
At the same time, I wanted to be admired by those from whom I imagined that I was so different. As if I were less flesh and blood than those from whom I would distance myself; as if they felt all that much better understood by others than I did.
As if my sense of aloneness in the world was not shared by ... everyone.
I have imagined the journey of faith, too, as an individual endeavor, not as a pilgrimage to God’s eternal city in communion with other souls as blessed and needy as my own.
The grace to which I come in these years is one of realism, the grace of realizing I am a merely and blessedly human-- not some kind of separate uber-human species so different from all the others with whom I walk the streets.
They are like me. Just so, they are God’s gift to me as I am gift to them, whether any of us recognize or not.
But when we recognize it, surrender the arrogance of imagining we are so different from each other and seek to live with humility and gentleness, the gulf between our souls is bridged, the myth of our alones is shattered, our wounds find balm, and we feel the unity of life and heart God intends.
At our best, the church and each congregation is a place of knowing the grace of community that sets us free from ourselves for truly human lives.
Pr. David L. Miller
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Today’s text
Ephesians 3:14-17a
This, then, is what I pray, kneeling before the Father, from whom every fatherhood, in heaven or on earth, takes its name. In the abundance of his glory may he, through his Spirit, enable you to grow firm in power with regard to your inner self, so that Christ may live in your hearts through faith … .
Reflection
The life to which we are called is not one of weakness or passive pieties but of strength, the strength that appears in Christ. His strength lives in us.
We don’t typically don’t believe that … or feel it. But the living Christ lives in us--and in every heart that is open to goodness and grace, beauty and wonder. For, Christ is all that is good and the good that is in all.
When we see and know goodness and grace in ourselves … or others … we encounter the living Christ, gracing life and giving us the power to grow into the expression of his life we each are intended to be.
We each are intended to be convinced of who we are, of what we are: bearers of Christ, sharing his love and power, his purpose and passion.
I look into the mirror each morning and see a face that looks more like my blessed father’s with each passing month. No one need convince me that I am his son, bearing his genes and something of his spirit. It is perfectly clear as I shave my face each new day. The face in the mirror makes it impossible for me to forget who I am.
But I do forget my deepest and truest identity. Amid the difficulties of life, I lapse into negativities that make me diminish myself, my importance, the power that I have to give life … even as Christ is life-giver.
For beneath the face in the mirror, in the depth of my soul, breathes the Soul of Christ, a soul seeking to express life and grace into each moment, a soul eager to know and be love so that hungry hearts may be fed with joy and hope.
This is who I am, the identity of which the Spirit of God seeks to convince my heart so that I have no doubt of the beauty, the wonder, the love and, yes, the power that I bear.
Knowing this, convinced again, I go to may daily tasks not with anxiety or hesitation but boldly, knowing who I am and the inner strength who is the Christ dwelling within.
Pr. David L. Miller
Ephesians 3:14-17a
This, then, is what I pray, kneeling before the Father, from whom every fatherhood, in heaven or on earth, takes its name. In the abundance of his glory may he, through his Spirit, enable you to grow firm in power with regard to your inner self, so that Christ may live in your hearts through faith … .
Reflection
The life to which we are called is not one of weakness or passive pieties but of strength, the strength that appears in Christ. His strength lives in us.
We don’t typically don’t believe that … or feel it. But the living Christ lives in us--and in every heart that is open to goodness and grace, beauty and wonder. For, Christ is all that is good and the good that is in all.
When we see and know goodness and grace in ourselves … or others … we encounter the living Christ, gracing life and giving us the power to grow into the expression of his life we each are intended to be.
We each are intended to be convinced of who we are, of what we are: bearers of Christ, sharing his love and power, his purpose and passion.
I look into the mirror each morning and see a face that looks more like my blessed father’s with each passing month. No one need convince me that I am his son, bearing his genes and something of his spirit. It is perfectly clear as I shave my face each new day. The face in the mirror makes it impossible for me to forget who I am.
But I do forget my deepest and truest identity. Amid the difficulties of life, I lapse into negativities that make me diminish myself, my importance, the power that I have to give life … even as Christ is life-giver.
For beneath the face in the mirror, in the depth of my soul, breathes the Soul of Christ, a soul seeking to express life and grace into each moment, a soul eager to know and be love so that hungry hearts may be fed with joy and hope.
This is who I am, the identity of which the Spirit of God seeks to convince my heart so that I have no doubt of the beauty, the wonder, the love and, yes, the power that I bear.
Knowing this, convinced again, I go to may daily tasks not with anxiety or hesitation but boldly, knowing who I am and the inner strength who is the Christ dwelling within.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 6:22-27
When the daughter of this same Herodias came in and danced, she delighted Herod and his guests; so the king said to the girl, 'Ask me anything you like and I will give it you.' And he swore her an oath, 'I will give you anything you ask, even half my kingdom.' She went out and said to her mother, 'What shall I ask for?' She replied, 'The head of John the Baptist.' The king was deeply distressed but, thinking of the oaths he had sworn and of his guests, he was reluctant to break his word to her. At once the king sent one of the bodyguard with orders to bring John's head.
Reflection
There are two basic ways to read any story from the Bible.
You can read with a keen eye for what human beings are doing … or should do, or you can look for God’s gracious presence. You can read hoping to find what is wrong with us so you can castigate yourself or others, or you can read looking for how God shares divine life and beauty.
What you find is often determined by your initial focus, whether on God’s grace and goodness or on human failure. Just so, your reading will bring comfort and hope, or it will yield guilt, accusation, self-righteousness and a heavy spirit.
I prefer to read looking for the wonder and beauty of God.
I find it even in the grisly story of John the Baptist’s death at the head of the henchman’s ax, a story as contemporary as today’s news.
Mark’s Gospel inserts this story in the middle of Jesus’ sending his 12 closest friends, two by two, into the villages ahead of him. They go out to bless and heal, to call people to prepare and believe the gospel of God’s kingdom. He sends them out with no extra clothing or supplies, depending upon the hospitality of those who would receive them.
Each time they were welcomed the kingdom, the community of God’s loving presence, became as real as the food on their plates and the smiles across the table.
They go out and immediately we come to the story of John the Baptist’s execution at the hands of King Herod, who drank too much at a dinner party at the palace and made a promise even he didn’t want to keep.
Right after John’s death Mark tells us about the return of Jesus 12 followers from their mission. Jesus takes them away to a quiet place that isn’t so quiet. Hungry crowds follow, wanting words of God’s kingdom, words of hope to lift their lives into the living experience of God’s loving kingdom, moving them to life and joy.
The power of God’s living grace is everywhere, it seems. It stirs the imagination of the 12 so that they went on their mission with hope instead of worried whining about where their next meal was coming from.
It made John strong and passionate about the justice of God so that he should call for God’s justice even when kings and conspiracies threatened--then took--his life in a most ugly manner.
God’s living grace stirred the heart of the crowd, too. They followed their inner hungers to seek Jesus, hoping for blessings they could barely name, knowing it was better to be near him than to be separate from his presence, which is why I come to this place as often as I do.
Stories of human sin and failure are easy to find, and it is easy to read the Bible and history ever looking for what is wrong.
It’s more rewarding--and joyful, however, to set your eye on beauty and grace, knowing God’s love and power will show up, even in the worst situations you can imagine.
People of faith throughout history have found God’s beauty and grace in such places. That’s why I continue to look, trusting that the beauty of grace … is everywhere.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 6:22-27
When the daughter of this same Herodias came in and danced, she delighted Herod and his guests; so the king said to the girl, 'Ask me anything you like and I will give it you.' And he swore her an oath, 'I will give you anything you ask, even half my kingdom.' She went out and said to her mother, 'What shall I ask for?' She replied, 'The head of John the Baptist.' The king was deeply distressed but, thinking of the oaths he had sworn and of his guests, he was reluctant to break his word to her. At once the king sent one of the bodyguard with orders to bring John's head.
Reflection
There are two basic ways to read any story from the Bible.
You can read with a keen eye for what human beings are doing … or should do, or you can look for God’s gracious presence. You can read hoping to find what is wrong with us so you can castigate yourself or others, or you can read looking for how God shares divine life and beauty.
What you find is often determined by your initial focus, whether on God’s grace and goodness or on human failure. Just so, your reading will bring comfort and hope, or it will yield guilt, accusation, self-righteousness and a heavy spirit.
I prefer to read looking for the wonder and beauty of God.
I find it even in the grisly story of John the Baptist’s death at the head of the henchman’s ax, a story as contemporary as today’s news.
Mark’s Gospel inserts this story in the middle of Jesus’ sending his 12 closest friends, two by two, into the villages ahead of him. They go out to bless and heal, to call people to prepare and believe the gospel of God’s kingdom. He sends them out with no extra clothing or supplies, depending upon the hospitality of those who would receive them.
Each time they were welcomed the kingdom, the community of God’s loving presence, became as real as the food on their plates and the smiles across the table.
They go out and immediately we come to the story of John the Baptist’s execution at the hands of King Herod, who drank too much at a dinner party at the palace and made a promise even he didn’t want to keep.
Right after John’s death Mark tells us about the return of Jesus 12 followers from their mission. Jesus takes them away to a quiet place that isn’t so quiet. Hungry crowds follow, wanting words of God’s kingdom, words of hope to lift their lives into the living experience of God’s loving kingdom, moving them to life and joy.
The power of God’s living grace is everywhere, it seems. It stirs the imagination of the 12 so that they went on their mission with hope instead of worried whining about where their next meal was coming from.
It made John strong and passionate about the justice of God so that he should call for God’s justice even when kings and conspiracies threatened--then took--his life in a most ugly manner.
God’s living grace stirred the heart of the crowd, too. They followed their inner hungers to seek Jesus, hoping for blessings they could barely name, knowing it was better to be near him than to be separate from his presence, which is why I come to this place as often as I do.
Stories of human sin and failure are easy to find, and it is easy to read the Bible and history ever looking for what is wrong.
It’s more rewarding--and joyful, however, to set your eye on beauty and grace, knowing God’s love and power will show up, even in the worst situations you can imagine.
People of faith throughout history have found God’s beauty and grace in such places. That’s why I continue to look, trusting that the beauty of grace … is everywhere.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 6:22-27
When the daughter of this same Herodias came in and danced, she delighted Herod and his guests; so the king said to the girl, 'Ask me anything you like and I will give it you.' And he swore her an oath, 'I will give you anything you ask, even half my kingdom.' She went out and said to her mother, 'What shall I ask for?' She replied, 'The head of John the Baptist.' The king was deeply distressed but, thinking of the oaths he had sworn and of his guests, he was reluctant to break his word to her. At once the king sent one of the bodyguard with orders to bring John's head.
Reflection
Mark’s Gospel is terse and to the point. His favorite word is ‘and,’ although ‘immediately’ appears frequently, too.
There are no long speeches from Jesus or anybody else in his little book about Jesus’ ministry. Mark … or whoever wrote this Gospel … moves quickly from one event to the next with no pause to catch your breath.
But he pauses … for 17 verses … to tell in detail the story about how John the Baptist was killed by King Herod, who thought Jesus was John come back from the dead. Herod had John executed as a favor to his wife and daughter, who beguiled him with her dance.
It seems his wife, Herodias, didn’t like what John said about their illicit marriage. Neither did Herod, but he was also fascinated by John and kept him around (in prison) to listen to his rants. I suspect Herod believed John was speaking important truth to him, but not one he was prepared to act upon.
The saga ends when, after too much wine, Herod makes a promised he loathes but knows he must keep.
I wonder why Mark spills so much ink on this tawdry incident.
There were those in the first century who thought John might be the Promised One, the anointed Messiah of Israel. His execution gets him conveniently out of the way so the rest of Mark’s narrative can focus on Jesus, making it clear that Jesus is the One, not John.
I doubt this is the reason Mark spends an unusual time on this story, although I can’t read the author’s mind any better than you can.
What I find in Herod is a common division in the human heart. We know what is good and may be fascinated by what we should do, but we fail to do it. The Apostle Paul, whose letters comprise much of the New Testament, talks about this same struggle. He wrote personally of his struggle, saying that the good I would do, I don’t; while that which I should not do … that I do.
Being a king or a person with power doesn’t exempt anyone from this internal struggle. It is universally human. The difference between the powerful and others is that those with power exact greater hurt on others in the process of resisting what is best.
Perhaps, like Herod, there are powerful social pressures pushing us the other way. Maybe protecting our current way of life and living keeps us from acting on our deepest, truest convictions and the values of the Gospel of Christ.
Whatever Mark’s reason for giving this story so much space, it is clear that Herod was unwilling to give up life as he knew it in order to save it and live the life of God’s kingdom, and this is what Jesus calls us to do.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, July 06, 2012
Friday, July 6, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 6:1-5
With the coming of the Sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue, and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, 'Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him? This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?' And they would not accept him. And Jesus said to them, 'A prophet is despised only in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house'; and he could work no miracle there … .
Reflection
Pray for us Tommy. Pray that we might be human beings, like you.
Watching my middle grandson, Ben, fly off a waterslide transported me to hot Nebraska summers in the 1980s. Ben is six and recently became competent in the water. The diving board and the deep end of the pool have become his habitat.
He stands on the low board, winks his left eye at me and tears off the end. For an instant, he is suspended in space, a portrait of abandonment to the joy of splashing into the crystal water on a one-hundred degree day.
He reminds me of his mother, Rachel, … and Tommy, whom I have to thank for this moment.
Tommy was a swim teacher in our tiny Nebraska town in the early 1980s. I remember him at the pool when he was still in high school, returning to serve as lifeguard during college summers.
Handsome, gentle, patient Tommy. I should have guessed his secret, but I was oblivious at that time of my life. We all were.
One day, while my wife and I were at the county fair, Tommy got our half-pint five-year old to climb the steps of the high board and blithely step off into the deep end of the pool. Then Rachel did it again and again and again. She was fearless, and I was proud.
Each time, Rachel shot a sly grin in our direction and casually stepped off the board, floating in space before disappearing in the deep. The sight of this tiny girl at the end of the board made heads turn, also making my mother gasp during her next visit.
I always enjoyed making my mother nervous, so Rachel was a child after my own heart.
I have Tommy to thank. He loved Rachel. He loved all the children that gathered about his legs when he walked the apron of the pool twirling his whistle, and they knew it.
I don’t think any of us recognized what a gift he was to dozens of kids in that dusty prairie town. He was a caring, gentle gift to our community, a community I left several years later, as did Tommy when his time came to move on.
A few years later we heard that Tommy got sick … and died, a very young man. We heard it was an AIDS death. I have no reason to disbelieve the reports.
I suspect few, if any, in that town had an inkling that Tommy was gay. My story begins in the early 1980s, and none of us were as tuned in as we are now.
I doubt Tommy could share his secret there. He lived in a time and place where masculinity was defined by the local football team, not by a clutch of children clinging to your ankles.
I suspect he knew he wouldn’t find much acceptance from those with whom he’d shared elementary classrooms all those years. They didn’t know any better, and people like me just didn’t know--and if we had, I don’t know if we would have been helpful.
We knew only that he was a gentle soul, who loved children, taught them to swim and won their hearts, including the heart of a small girl named Rachel, whose joyful abandonment I now see on the face of a dark-haired boy named Ben. He gets it from his mother
I have you to thank for this, Tommy. It all started with you.
And I wonder … I wonder how many times we miss the sweet goodness of souls near us, the ones among whom we live day-to-day, taking for granted the grace we receive from them, little knowing how far it will reach.
It makes me wonder, too, … what will Ben’s children do?
Pray for them, too, Tommy, your goodness goes with them
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 6:1-5
With the coming of the Sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue, and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, 'Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him? This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?' And they would not accept him. And Jesus said to them, 'A prophet is despised only in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house'; and he could work no miracle there … .
Reflection
Pray for us Tommy. Pray that we might be human beings, like you.
Watching my middle grandson, Ben, fly off a waterslide transported me to hot Nebraska summers in the 1980s. Ben is six and recently became competent in the water. The diving board and the deep end of the pool have become his habitat.
He stands on the low board, winks his left eye at me and tears off the end. For an instant, he is suspended in space, a portrait of abandonment to the joy of splashing into the crystal water on a one-hundred degree day.
He reminds me of his mother, Rachel, … and Tommy, whom I have to thank for this moment.
Tommy was a swim teacher in our tiny Nebraska town in the early 1980s. I remember him at the pool when he was still in high school, returning to serve as lifeguard during college summers.
Handsome, gentle, patient Tommy. I should have guessed his secret, but I was oblivious at that time of my life. We all were.
One day, while my wife and I were at the county fair, Tommy got our half-pint five-year old to climb the steps of the high board and blithely step off into the deep end of the pool. Then Rachel did it again and again and again. She was fearless, and I was proud.
Each time, Rachel shot a sly grin in our direction and casually stepped off the board, floating in space before disappearing in the deep. The sight of this tiny girl at the end of the board made heads turn, also making my mother gasp during her next visit.
I always enjoyed making my mother nervous, so Rachel was a child after my own heart.
I have Tommy to thank. He loved Rachel. He loved all the children that gathered about his legs when he walked the apron of the pool twirling his whistle, and they knew it.
I don’t think any of us recognized what a gift he was to dozens of kids in that dusty prairie town. He was a caring, gentle gift to our community, a community I left several years later, as did Tommy when his time came to move on.
A few years later we heard that Tommy got sick … and died, a very young man. We heard it was an AIDS death. I have no reason to disbelieve the reports.
I suspect few, if any, in that town had an inkling that Tommy was gay. My story begins in the early 1980s, and none of us were as tuned in as we are now.
I doubt Tommy could share his secret there. He lived in a time and place where masculinity was defined by the local football team, not by a clutch of children clinging to your ankles.
I suspect he knew he wouldn’t find much acceptance from those with whom he’d shared elementary classrooms all those years. They didn’t know any better, and people like me just didn’t know--and if we had, I don’t know if we would have been helpful.
We knew only that he was a gentle soul, who loved children, taught them to swim and won their hearts, including the heart of a small girl named Rachel, whose joyful abandonment I now see on the face of a dark-haired boy named Ben. He gets it from his mother
I have you to thank for this, Tommy. It all started with you.
And I wonder … I wonder how many times we miss the sweet goodness of souls near us, the ones among whom we live day-to-day, taking for granted the grace we receive from them, little knowing how far it will reach.
It makes me wonder, too, … what will Ben’s children do?
Pray for them, too, Tommy, your goodness goes with them
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, July 03, 2012
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 6:1-5
With the coming of the Sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue, and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, 'Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him? This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?' And they would not accept him. And Jesus said to them, 'A prophet is despised only in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house'; and he could work no miracle there … .
Reflection
Ordinary days and faces fill our moments.
The phone rings, and we hear a familiar voice. Our mind activates a category, a box that stores our knowledge of the person we hear. Quickly, we know--or think we know--who they are, what’s most likely on their mind and what they want.
Something similar happens when we go to the common places of our lives--work, our street, a store, a friend’s home, the back patio. We know what to expect, what’s likely to happen.
Our familiarity breeds contentment with what we think we know.
We enjoy a sense of knowing comfort that slows listening and prevents us from receiving information that doesn’t fit our comfortable categories. Perhaps our minds need this lest they become overheated dealing with millions of stimuli each moment.
But this keeps us skimming across the surface of life, content with what we think we know. And we miss the depth of moments and the beauty of souls by deftly ignoring insights and information that doesn’t fit our vision of the world.
There are few better examples of this than the current woeful state of our nation’s political discourse, in which ideological divides prevent people from truly hearing and seeing each other.
Just like Jesus’ townspeople couldn’t really see and hear him. They knew him too well … or so they thought. They knew his family and had him fixed in a category of understanding that told them who he was and what they could expect of him.
They didn’t expect depth or insight, holiness or wisdom, and they certainly didn’t expect his life to be transparent to God.
It didn’t fit their “knowledge” and fell outside what they thought was possible.
They didn’t know: His face was the face of eternity, the image of the unseen Wonder, the Source of every beauty, a sacrament of the Love who has no limit.
He didn’t fit the box in which they had put him. But, then, there is no box in which we can trap Jesus.
The gracious kindness and wisdom that fills him explodes the walls of every box in which we might confine him. His is a mercy and grace that cannot be contained.
And that’s good news.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 6:1-5
With the coming of the Sabbath he began teaching in the synagogue, and most of them were astonished when they heard him. They said, 'Where did the man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been granted him, and these miracles that are worked through him? This is the carpenter, surely, the son of Mary, the brother of James and Joset and Jude Jude and Simon? His sisters, too, are they not here with us?' And they would not accept him. And Jesus said to them, 'A prophet is despised only in his own country, among his own relations and in his own house'; and he could work no miracle there … .
Reflection
Ordinary days and faces fill our moments.
The phone rings, and we hear a familiar voice. Our mind activates a category, a box that stores our knowledge of the person we hear. Quickly, we know--or think we know--who they are, what’s most likely on their mind and what they want.
Something similar happens when we go to the common places of our lives--work, our street, a store, a friend’s home, the back patio. We know what to expect, what’s likely to happen.
Our familiarity breeds contentment with what we think we know.
We enjoy a sense of knowing comfort that slows listening and prevents us from receiving information that doesn’t fit our comfortable categories. Perhaps our minds need this lest they become overheated dealing with millions of stimuli each moment.
But this keeps us skimming across the surface of life, content with what we think we know. And we miss the depth of moments and the beauty of souls by deftly ignoring insights and information that doesn’t fit our vision of the world.
There are few better examples of this than the current woeful state of our nation’s political discourse, in which ideological divides prevent people from truly hearing and seeing each other.
Just like Jesus’ townspeople couldn’t really see and hear him. They knew him too well … or so they thought. They knew his family and had him fixed in a category of understanding that told them who he was and what they could expect of him.
They didn’t expect depth or insight, holiness or wisdom, and they certainly didn’t expect his life to be transparent to God.
It didn’t fit their “knowledge” and fell outside what they thought was possible.
They didn’t know: His face was the face of eternity, the image of the unseen Wonder, the Source of every beauty, a sacrament of the Love who has no limit.
He didn’t fit the box in which they had put him. But, then, there is no box in which we can trap Jesus.
The gracious kindness and wisdom that fills him explodes the walls of every box in which we might confine him. His is a mercy and grace that cannot be contained.
And that’s good news.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, June 22, 2012
Friday, June 22, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 4:37-40
Then it began to blow a great gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, 'Master, do you not care? We are lost!' And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Quiet now! Be calm!' And the wind dropped, and there followed a great calm. Then he said to them, 'Why are you so frightened? Have you still no faith?'
Reflection
Jesus saw what no eye could see when he stood and looked into the night. He woke from sleep into awareness of the face of the darkness.
I see that face even now, the curve of the cheek, the dark eyes that always see, the countenance unchanged when winds blow and human souls tremble.
Before and just above the bow of the boat hovers the dark face of eternal presence and constant compassion, hovering over the stormy waters, eyes gazing upon the fearful disciples … and me, never turning away.
I see, and the soul grows quiet and calm. Tears come, for I know all I need to know. I, too, see the face of the darkness, the One ever there.
Jesus lived in constant awareness of an eternal face turned ever toward him. He called that face “Father,” for he knew it as gentle and caring, strong and unwavering.
When he laid down in the rocking boat this awareness was the cushion on which he laid his head. He rested in peace, his heart calm because he knew the face does not turn away when he closed his eyes to sleep.
He knew that when he awoke he would open his eyes and look into the face of Eternal Compassion, the Constant Presence who was there waiting for him to begin his day. Each day he gazed into the eyes of Infinite Mercy, eyes that always gazed upon him with unspeakable tenderness.
On this bright and promising morning, I look into those eyes and glimpse the contours of that great and gracious face. It’s invisible to the physical eye. But the imagination of faith has eyes to see the face of the darkness even in impenetrable night when fierce winds blow and human souls tremble.
And in seeing we hear a voice, “Peace, be still,” and we know what we need to know.
Pr. David L. Miller
Mark 4:37-40
Then it began to blow a great gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, 'Master, do you not care? We are lost!' And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Quiet now! Be calm!' And the wind dropped, and there followed a great calm. Then he said to them, 'Why are you so frightened? Have you still no faith?'
Reflection
Jesus saw what no eye could see when he stood and looked into the night. He woke from sleep into awareness of the face of the darkness.
I see that face even now, the curve of the cheek, the dark eyes that always see, the countenance unchanged when winds blow and human souls tremble.
Before and just above the bow of the boat hovers the dark face of eternal presence and constant compassion, hovering over the stormy waters, eyes gazing upon the fearful disciples … and me, never turning away.
I see, and the soul grows quiet and calm. Tears come, for I know all I need to know. I, too, see the face of the darkness, the One ever there.
Jesus lived in constant awareness of an eternal face turned ever toward him. He called that face “Father,” for he knew it as gentle and caring, strong and unwavering.
When he laid down in the rocking boat this awareness was the cushion on which he laid his head. He rested in peace, his heart calm because he knew the face does not turn away when he closed his eyes to sleep.
He knew that when he awoke he would open his eyes and look into the face of Eternal Compassion, the Constant Presence who was there waiting for him to begin his day. Each day he gazed into the eyes of Infinite Mercy, eyes that always gazed upon him with unspeakable tenderness.
On this bright and promising morning, I look into those eyes and glimpse the contours of that great and gracious face. It’s invisible to the physical eye. But the imagination of faith has eyes to see the face of the darkness even in impenetrable night when fierce winds blow and human souls tremble.
And in seeing we hear a voice, “Peace, be still,” and we know what we need to know.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 4:37-40
Then it began to blow a great gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, 'Master, do you not care? We are lost!' And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Quiet now! Be calm!' And the wind dropped, and there followed a great calm. Then he said to them, 'Why are you so frightened? Have you still no faith?'
Reflection
An elderly person I know tells me, “Whether I live or whether I die there is someone waiting for me.”
Hers’ are eyes of faith. She looks beyond what is happening in the moment to what the moment will bring.
Illness or death, healing or renewed life: there’s someone waiting no matter what comes. I know she is speaking of friends in this life and a husband and friends who have passed into eternity.
But her words carry a double meaning. They echo with the Presence of One who says, “Peace, be still. I wait for you in every new moment, in every fresh morning, in every storm that comes your way.”
Whatever else the day brings, Holy One, it holds you. The tempest of the hour, the challenge of the day, the work and faces we meet, all of it … holds you.
But it also hides you. The surface noise of the now distracts our anxious vision from the Presence of the Love who abides, who waits for us in every future.
Jesus rests in this awareness and invites us to lay our worried heads, our anxious minds, our troubled hearts on the cushion of this certainty. He does not say, “Look at me.”
He says, “See what I see. Hear what I hear. Live where I live.”
He sees and hears the Love who always whispers, “Do not fear. Ever. Love waits for you in every time, every place.”
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 4:37-40
Then it began to blow a great gale and the waves were breaking into the boat so that it was almost swamped. But he was in the stern, his head on the cushion, asleep. They woke him and said to him, 'Master, do you not care? We are lost!' And he woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, 'Quiet now! Be calm!' And the wind dropped, and there followed a great calm. Then he said to them, 'Why are you so frightened? Have you still no faith?'
Reflection
Jesus’ command was not really spoken to the wind and the waves. It is spoken to us. He invites us into the awareness in which he rests amid the storm.
“Peace, be still,” he says, but stillness cannot come when our hearts have two eyes.
We live with one eye focused on the tumult of living and the anxieties of the day, while our other eye looks warily at God, wondering, “Are you there? Do you care? Can you help?’
Only a single eye, a singular focus brings peace, an eye open to God, steadily gazing into the heart of Love who made us for love and in love holds each moment.
Storms come; winds blow, and we fear. We fear losing that which is most essential to our life and happiness. We fear what the future might bring, what it will inevitably bring and what we cannot control.
But the storms are temporary; the love is eternal. Storms operate on the surface of consciousness; the Love abides deep in the heart.
So we descend into the depths. We sink beneath the surface of noise of the now into awareness of an abiding, creative, ever-present love who breathes us into existence each moment, though we do not ask and cannot control its breathing.
Love abides beneath the noise and anxieties of the day. It breathes, “Peace, be still.”
Jesus dwells in this awareness. It is the cushion on which he lays his head. He is the living embodiment of the life to which we are called but which escapes us because we do not see with a single eye focused on the One unchanging amid the storm, the Love who always … is, and always will be.
May we see with one eye … and find peace … this day.
Pr. David L. Miller
Friday, June 15, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 4:26-29
He also said, 'This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land produces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, at once he starts to reap because the harvest has come.'
Reflection
It is hard to wait. I am not sure human beings are built for waiting, and growing up in the U.S. doesn’t do much to teach you the art of patient waiting.
Twice yesterday I heard the word ‘impatient’ from people who are not at all antsy. They know about waiting. They know what it is to live with uncertainty and threat, watching and wondering what will come to them, their health, their family … their lives.
They want to see and know what the future will bring. While they wait they distract themselves from the worst of their fears as well as possible, and they live their lives.
I hope they can continue to live with hope, just knowing … that beneath the surface of their lives --and of all life--there is unseen dynamic constantly at work that will yield a great harvest of loving presence in their lives, no matter what comes.
You are there, Holy One. Always. The parable is not about seeds, but about you. And you are the hidden dynamic of love secretly growing in the soil of our lives, green shoots pushing through the hard crust of doubt and fear, our uncertainty and our struggle to trust that whatever the future holds … your love holds the future.
The sower in Jesus story acts strangely. He plants but doesn’t not weed or till, water or care for the growing seed. He does nothing to assist its growth. He waits, knowing all will be well because something good and beautiful will grow and cover the earth with fresh green life.
No farmer worthy of the name, even in Jesus time, would be as passive as this man. But passivity is not the point; patient confidence is.
Living in relationship with the Loving Mystery, who is everywhere and active in everything, we are invited to take a deep breath and live, simply knowing that a harvest of divine goodness and grace, love and blessing will come.
This hardly means we get everything we want or think that we need. Life with God is not existence in a candy store.
But we will bask in the light of and love of God. For in ourselves three grows a harvest of loving presence that will fill our souls and unite our hearts with all who know this love … and with the One who is that Love.
Pr. David L. Miller
Today’s text
Mark 4:26-29
He also said, 'This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land produces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, at once he starts to reap because the harvest has come.'
Reflection
It is hard to wait. I am not sure human beings are built for waiting, and growing up in the U.S. doesn’t do much to teach you the art of patient waiting.
Twice yesterday I heard the word ‘impatient’ from people who are not at all antsy. They know about waiting. They know what it is to live with uncertainty and threat, watching and wondering what will come to them, their health, their family … their lives.
They want to see and know what the future will bring. While they wait they distract themselves from the worst of their fears as well as possible, and they live their lives.
I hope they can continue to live with hope, just knowing … that beneath the surface of their lives --and of all life--there is unseen dynamic constantly at work that will yield a great harvest of loving presence in their lives, no matter what comes.
You are there, Holy One. Always. The parable is not about seeds, but about you. And you are the hidden dynamic of love secretly growing in the soil of our lives, green shoots pushing through the hard crust of doubt and fear, our uncertainty and our struggle to trust that whatever the future holds … your love holds the future.
The sower in Jesus story acts strangely. He plants but doesn’t not weed or till, water or care for the growing seed. He does nothing to assist its growth. He waits, knowing all will be well because something good and beautiful will grow and cover the earth with fresh green life.
No farmer worthy of the name, even in Jesus time, would be as passive as this man. But passivity is not the point; patient confidence is.
Living in relationship with the Loving Mystery, who is everywhere and active in everything, we are invited to take a deep breath and live, simply knowing that a harvest of divine goodness and grace, love and blessing will come.
This hardly means we get everything we want or think that we need. Life with God is not existence in a candy store.
But we will bask in the light of and love of God. For in ourselves three grows a harvest of loving presence that will fill our souls and unite our hearts with all who know this love … and with the One who is that Love.
Pr. David L. Miller
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Today’s text
Mark 4:26-29
He also said, 'This is what the kingdom of God
Reflection
Some of Jesus stories are opaque to me. I can’t see through them. Perhaps they are a bit like Zen koans, dense, obscure sayings that make little sense to common ways of seeing. Only in living with them and allowing them to unsettle us do other dimensions of meaning appear.
Perhaps it is not even correct to speak of ‘meaning.’ Perhaps his sayings provoke us, agitate us through our lack of awareness until common ways of seeing iare dislodged and a new conscious emerges.
None of his stories can be reduced to a single point of meaning, but each resonates anew each time we dare look at them and watch what they awaken in us.
Today, I see the farmer … the one who scatters the seed, and I am moved to quietness, perhaps even to patience, a contrary move for me and many in our society who are socialized to work harder and with greater diligence to make good things happen.
We are a driven people for the most part, and we honor those most driven to be successful among us. Only later seeing how badly unbridled ambition can disfigure lives and relationships.
I am impressed that the sower in Jesus story does his part … sows seed. Then he watches and does little, if anything.
He does not understand the processes by which growth and maturation occur. He knows his part is to plant and watch, being ready when harvest time comes, recognizing that life and growth are a mystery he does not control.
He knows his part and patiently awaits the mystery of growth to appear, with little apparent anxiety of what he cannot understand and with no attempt to ‘push the river’ to make something happen.
He can only do what has been given him to do … and to trust the mystery: an inner, hidden dynamic of goodness and grace will work its magic. Beauty and fullness will come … as a gift, a given, a grace, and he will have what he needs.
His is a life of knowing his part and waiting for mystery of goodness and grace to unfold, patiently trusting that it will because God will have it no other way.
Not such a bad way to live.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Today’s text
2 Corinthians 5:6-7
We are always full of confidence, then, realizing that as long as we are at home in the body we are exiled from the Lord, guided by faith and not yet by sight … .
Reflection
With apologies to Yogi Berra, “It’s hard to make predictions, especially when they’re about the future.”
And yet, there is a future we know, a future where surprising grace and the reality of love awaits our arrival, a future hidden in the heart of the One who is Love and nothing but.
As long as this awareness is before our eyes and lives in our heart, the days are never too hard, the challenges never too great. For we know what is most needful.
Paul sometimes thought of being ‘in the body’ as exile. It is, I suppose, for our flesh is weak. Our bodies grow tired, and our hearts begin to doubt whether the unseen future holds any of the goodness and grace we need to live, to breathe, to feel filled with vitality and purpose.
We experience separation, distance--sometimes great and impassable distance--between ourselves and the Heart our heart most needs to know. The feeling of being exiled from the Lord who is Love’s Holy Source is all too known in human hearts, believers and those who cannot find an inkling of faith within.
But moments of grace occur, gracious smiles appear, hope stirs in hearts that were barren but moments before, and the soul awakens to the reality of our lives.
We live in an ocean of unseen Presence. We move through a liquid grace that finds cracks and corners of soul through which it seeps in, awakening awareness that we are not exiles at all.
And we know: the future is predictable after all. We know nothing of what will come, but we know you, Dearest One, will be there … waiting.
Pr. David L. Miller
2 Corinthians 5:6-7
We are always full of confidence, then, realizing that as long as we are at home in the body we are exiled from the Lord, guided by faith and not yet by sight … .
Reflection
With apologies to Yogi Berra, “It’s hard to make predictions, especially when they’re about the future.”
And yet, there is a future we know, a future where surprising grace and the reality of love awaits our arrival, a future hidden in the heart of the One who is Love and nothing but.
As long as this awareness is before our eyes and lives in our heart, the days are never too hard, the challenges never too great. For we know what is most needful.
Paul sometimes thought of being ‘in the body’ as exile. It is, I suppose, for our flesh is weak. Our bodies grow tired, and our hearts begin to doubt whether the unseen future holds any of the goodness and grace we need to live, to breathe, to feel filled with vitality and purpose.
We experience separation, distance--sometimes great and impassable distance--between ourselves and the Heart our heart most needs to know. The feeling of being exiled from the Lord who is Love’s Holy Source is all too known in human hearts, believers and those who cannot find an inkling of faith within.
But moments of grace occur, gracious smiles appear, hope stirs in hearts that were barren but moments before, and the soul awakens to the reality of our lives.
We live in an ocean of unseen Presence. We move through a liquid grace that finds cracks and corners of soul through which it seeps in, awakening awareness that we are not exiles at all.
And we know: the future is predictable after all. We know nothing of what will come, but we know you, Dearest One, will be there … waiting.
Pr. David L. Miller
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Today’s text
2 Corinthians 4:16
That is why we do not waver; indeed, though this outer human nature of ours may be falling into decay, at the same time our inner human nature is renewed day by day.
Reflection
We do not know, and that is what is most distressing for our souls.
Life happens, challenges come, victories and wounds, love and loss. Each moment is a tiny piece of a great drama whose ending we do not see, the story of what the Spirit of God is doing to renew our inner nature … and all creation.
Most often we cannot see what the Spirit is doing, what gift or strength, what courage or joy might appear in the midst of difficult times … or our many average days ruled by the regularity of routine.
The Spirit is not governed by our anxiousness to know how things will turn out, to see what renewal or restoration may appear.
Our task is to live, a day at a time, waiting and watching … or perhaps not.
Perhaps the greatest wisdom is simply to live, to love, to give yourself to the work and souls that surround us, not getting too disturbed … or elated … by the moment at hand … or any moment.
Perhaps it is best not to worry about seeing what renewal God’s Spirit will bring, for that distracts our vision from the present moment which is all we really have.
We can take the long view, trusting that God is working, knowing that the Spirit will do what the Spirit does … give life. Waiting for that fresh breath, we attend to the daily, the now, the need of the moment, knowing … just knowing that grace will come. Blessing will fill us.
The Spirit will breathe renewing life and hope, love and vigor into our souls even when troubles bring sadness and deadening routine wears us low.
Nothing is lost or wasted. Nothing. All that has been, all that is and will be is swept into the great drama of what Love is doing in our little souls.
Our eyes may see nothing at any given moment, nothing but years and yearning, loss and decay. But the Spirit lives and breathes … into us … the renewing breath of life so that we might breathe free and sing songs of life, trusting that renewal and life will come to our souls … day by day.
May we see your life today, dear One? If it is all the same to you, might we not feel, if only for a precious moment, the breath of new life blowing through our souls … that we may know?
Pr. David L. Miller
2 Corinthians 4:16
That is why we do not waver; indeed, though this outer human nature of ours may be falling into decay, at the same time our inner human nature is renewed day by day.
Reflection
We do not know, and that is what is most distressing for our souls.
Life happens, challenges come, victories and wounds, love and loss. Each moment is a tiny piece of a great drama whose ending we do not see, the story of what the Spirit of God is doing to renew our inner nature … and all creation.
Most often we cannot see what the Spirit is doing, what gift or strength, what courage or joy might appear in the midst of difficult times … or our many average days ruled by the regularity of routine.
The Spirit is not governed by our anxiousness to know how things will turn out, to see what renewal or restoration may appear.
Our task is to live, a day at a time, waiting and watching … or perhaps not.
Perhaps the greatest wisdom is simply to live, to love, to give yourself to the work and souls that surround us, not getting too disturbed … or elated … by the moment at hand … or any moment.
Perhaps it is best not to worry about seeing what renewal God’s Spirit will bring, for that distracts our vision from the present moment which is all we really have.
We can take the long view, trusting that God is working, knowing that the Spirit will do what the Spirit does … give life. Waiting for that fresh breath, we attend to the daily, the now, the need of the moment, knowing … just knowing that grace will come. Blessing will fill us.
The Spirit will breathe renewing life and hope, love and vigor into our souls even when troubles bring sadness and deadening routine wears us low.
Nothing is lost or wasted. Nothing. All that has been, all that is and will be is swept into the great drama of what Love is doing in our little souls.
Our eyes may see nothing at any given moment, nothing but years and yearning, loss and decay. But the Spirit lives and breathes … into us … the renewing breath of life so that we might breathe free and sing songs of life, trusting that renewal and life will come to our souls … day by day.
May we see your life today, dear One? If it is all the same to you, might we not feel, if only for a precious moment, the breath of new life blowing through our souls … that we may know?
Pr. David L. Miller
Saturday, June 09, 2012
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Today’s text
2 Corinthians 4:16-18
That is why we do not waver; indeed, though this outer human nature of ours may be falling into decay, at the same time our inner human nature is renewed day by day. The temporary, light burden of our hardships is earning us for ever an utterly incomparable, eternal weight of glory, since what we aim for is not visible but invisible. Visible things are transitory, but invisible things eternal.
Reflection
And what is this that we do not see? For what do we wait?
The stripping away, the losses and disappointments of our life, sorrows, troubles and unfulfilled hopes … these we see, and we feel them with acute intensity, wondering if they signal that the hole in our heart will never find healing, never experience completion.
But that for which we hope … must it remain ever a hope, a dream we can barely name?
Do we ever see and know, experience and feel that incomparable weight of glory entering our little lives? Does it ever come and wipe away our yearning ache for completion amid the giddy laughter of fulfilled hope?
It will come, I hear you say. The weight of this time will pass, and you will laugh. The Love I am will wash away every sadness, salve each wound.
There is a weight of glory that is no weight of all. It is lighter than air, more powerful than the sun. It fills human spirits and lifts them like so many brightly-colored Fourth of July balloons.
Slowly they rise from all that tethers their souls to earth, lifting to soar and display the colors of life and love, of beauty and hope that each is.
The world smiles at their presence because they beautify and lift the spirits of all with eyes to see them, even though the inner secret of their life remains unknown to most who witness their beauty. The secret is me … that’s what you tell me, Blessed One.
The secret is the filling of the soul with a love that is eternal and boundless.
The eternal weight of glory is the Love that surprises us that comes when we are not looking for it, that lifts your soul when you think you will never feel or know it, when you falsely imagine that the difficulties and losses are the final word over your and all life.
It comes, … you come, Blessed and Holy Lord, … when in sweetest moments we know union with you, when we feel one with that Source who is beyond us and beyond everything, when that awareness fills us, and we just know that we and everything we see and touch springs from love eternal.
May we know such a rare moment of knowing … today. Everyday.
Pr. David L. Miller
2 Corinthians 4:16-18
That is why we do not waver; indeed, though this outer human nature of ours may be falling into decay, at the same time our inner human nature is renewed day by day. The temporary, light burden of our hardships is earning us for ever an utterly incomparable, eternal weight of glory, since what we aim for is not visible but invisible. Visible things are transitory, but invisible things eternal.
Reflection
And what is this that we do not see? For what do we wait?
The stripping away, the losses and disappointments of our life, sorrows, troubles and unfulfilled hopes … these we see, and we feel them with acute intensity, wondering if they signal that the hole in our heart will never find healing, never experience completion.
But that for which we hope … must it remain ever a hope, a dream we can barely name?
Do we ever see and know, experience and feel that incomparable weight of glory entering our little lives? Does it ever come and wipe away our yearning ache for completion amid the giddy laughter of fulfilled hope?
It will come, I hear you say. The weight of this time will pass, and you will laugh. The Love I am will wash away every sadness, salve each wound.
There is a weight of glory that is no weight of all. It is lighter than air, more powerful than the sun. It fills human spirits and lifts them like so many brightly-colored Fourth of July balloons.
Slowly they rise from all that tethers their souls to earth, lifting to soar and display the colors of life and love, of beauty and hope that each is.
The world smiles at their presence because they beautify and lift the spirits of all with eyes to see them, even though the inner secret of their life remains unknown to most who witness their beauty. The secret is me … that’s what you tell me, Blessed One.
The secret is the filling of the soul with a love that is eternal and boundless.
The eternal weight of glory is the Love that surprises us that comes when we are not looking for it, that lifts your soul when you think you will never feel or know it, when you falsely imagine that the difficulties and losses are the final word over your and all life.
It comes, … you come, Blessed and Holy Lord, … when in sweetest moments we know union with you, when we feel one with that Source who is beyond us and beyond everything, when that awareness fills us, and we just know that we and everything we see and touch springs from love eternal.
May we know such a rare moment of knowing … today. Everyday.
Pr. David L. Miller
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Today’s text
John 3:3-4
Jesus answered: In all truth I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above. Nicodemus said, 'How can anyone who is already old be born? Is it possible to go back into the womb again and be born?'
Reflection
The answer, of course, is ‘yes.’ We can return to the womb and be born again.
Each day we can retreat to the places of rebirth and wait as we did in the womb for birth to come to us … again.
Nicodemus’ absurd question points directly to what we need to find newness and grace, revival and peace each day. We return to the womb of ultimate compassion and know ourselves once more as beloved and, well, special--held, nourished, our uniqueness treasured and brought to life.
This place is everyplace the love of God in Christ envelops us whole and holds us near, the place … the places of knowing.
One biblical word for compassion is, quite literally, womb.
In the womb of divine compassion, of ultimate grace and safety, we are born from above, knowing a life that is new, freed from the barnacles of past that cling to our hearts and minds, tying us down.
These barnacles cling, ever re-attaching themselves to our hearts, stealing the newness Christ brings.
Still, there are precious moments, sometimes longer periods of time, even whole days when every cell of the body sings in newness, knowing freedom from every past sin and failure, from every wound and want, because we are surrounded and filled by the Love we have always wanted.
Praise of God is not forced or effortful in such times. Joy and gratitude become the essence of our being as we are made new, born from above, once more, in the womb of ultimate grace, unlimited love and perfect compassion.
Pr. David L. Miller
John 3:3-4
Jesus answered: In all truth I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above. Nicodemus said, 'How can anyone who is already old be born? Is it possible to go back into the womb again and be born?'
Reflection
The answer, of course, is ‘yes.’ We can return to the womb and be born again.
Each day we can retreat to the places of rebirth and wait as we did in the womb for birth to come to us … again.
Nicodemus’ absurd question points directly to what we need to find newness and grace, revival and peace each day. We return to the womb of ultimate compassion and know ourselves once more as beloved and, well, special--held, nourished, our uniqueness treasured and brought to life.
This place is everyplace the love of God in Christ envelops us whole and holds us near, the place … the places of knowing.
One biblical word for compassion is, quite literally, womb.
In the womb of divine compassion, of ultimate grace and safety, we are born from above, knowing a life that is new, freed from the barnacles of past that cling to our hearts and minds, tying us down.
These barnacles cling, ever re-attaching themselves to our hearts, stealing the newness Christ brings.
Still, there are precious moments, sometimes longer periods of time, even whole days when every cell of the body sings in newness, knowing freedom from every past sin and failure, from every wound and want, because we are surrounded and filled by the Love we have always wanted.
Praise of God is not forced or effortful in such times. Joy and gratitude become the essence of our being as we are made new, born from above, once more, in the womb of ultimate grace, unlimited love and perfect compassion.
Pr. David L. Miller
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