Become Yourself

A friend and I were talking about the church and wondering how we can tell which churches are going to survive and which ones aren’t.  Surely God can’t be counting on financial means alone to determine who thrives and who doesn’t.  Surely the Spirit has more than one way and many ways to move amongst us.  Then I was reminded of something Peter Short said to us at the Sowing Seeds, Growing Leaders event last October.  He said that our job as leaders was to become ourselves.  Become your authentic self, the self that God created you to be.  Maybe that is the clue for our communities as well.  Maybe the ones most likely to survive are the ones who are working on becoming themselves, becoming the authentic community that can live out of and into God’s plan. 

That then begs the question, how do we collectively discover and become our authentic selves?  I think that participating in spiritual practice is one way to discover our authentic selves.   I wonder if the Christian tradition of Lenten practice, the three traditional practices of prayer, fasting and almsgiving might be of help if we practice them collectively and intentionally.  We are good at collective almsgiving and prayer, but what about fasting?  What would happen if we together, as a community fasted from that which keeps us from being who we are called to be?  We might fast from yearning for more people in the pews.  We might fast from talking about finances before we talk about ministry at our meetings.  I belonged to a community once who fasted from their Council meetings during Lent and instead met for prayer.  Google Dirty sexy ministry for other great ideas (this is a bonafide, witty website offered by two, albeit unorthodox, female priest- I promise).

Think about gathering your community together in a collective fast this Lent. In the Holy space that is created, find out more about who you are and God’s intention for you.  In this sacred space and time, move toward the Holy, move toward authenticity, become yourselves.   God be with you.

Lori Megley-Best

Healing Power

This week I am living into the opportunity to be with the Spiritual Care Network team on Bowen Island. We have gathered we have worshiped and we have prayed. We have acknowledged our joys and our exhaustions. And we have dug deep into spiritual practices.

And yet once more I have been struck by how much we in our lives of ministry are exhausted. This week I have been reminded of the words of Peter Short as we worked together “Never look down on a struggle for life.” I have come to believe that we all in our lives and ministry are often in a ‘struggle for life.’ How do we care for one another in this? I wonder do we need to root ourselves in a piece of our tradition that for many has been lost? Do we need healing as individuals, congregations and church?

This week we have be lead into a conversation about healing. We have found ourselves asking “What is healing?” “What is healing prayer?” “What is God’s part in our healing?” “What is our part in healing?”

So we invite you to ask these questions we have asked:

“What is your experience of healing prayer?”

“What do you believe happens in healing prayer?”

“What do you believe does not happen?”

“What is God’s role?”

“What is our role?”

We would love to hear your responses.

Some of us have found this very familiar prayer helpful this week. We spent time in worship this morning praying this for our congregation and church.

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Reinhold Niebuhr

Hear the voice of the Holy One whispering to you ...

Lately I’ve been feasting on the wisdom of Desmond Tutu and his daughter Mpho Tutu, as recorded in their book, made for goodness and why this makes all the difference.  Each chapter ends with a poem based on scripture, with reminders of God’s deep delight in us and invitation to us to live into this awesome reality. 

Hear the voice of the Holy One whispering to you ...

You are a child after my own heart.

Seek out your deepest joy and you will find me there.

Find that which makes you most perfectly yourself and know that I

     am at the heart of it.

Do what delights you

And you will be working with me,

Walking with me,

Finding your life

Hidden in me.

Ask me any question.

My answer is love.

When you want to hear my voice,

Listen for love.

How can you delight me?

I will tell you:

Love.

The tough, unbreakable, unshakable love.

Are you looking for me?

You will find me in love.

Would you know my secrets?

There is only one:

Love.

Do you want to know me?

Do you yearn to follow me?

Do you want to reach me?

Seek and serve love.

Sharon Copeman

Trusting in the melody of God

“It is not the nature of the task but the consecration that is the vital thing.”

 ~ Martin Buber

In a book from the 1940’s, The Reed of God, the author, Caryll Houselander, tells how painful it is to become a reed that carries the melody of God. The flute has to be carved and cut out, it has to have many openings for the breath to come through and for the music to be heard. So too in our lives. Our work will not always be pleasant and easy. There will be times of confusion  and frustration. We will not always want to do the things we are called to do. The pain and stress can be a means of hollowing out, of becoming more open to the music of God. These hollowing out experiences call for faith. Sometimes we simply have to trust in God’s melody and believe, in spite of few results and self doubt that we are each capable of being instruments of God’s dream.

Sometimes that is the wonder of it all. That we can carry the melody of God even  when we feel we cannot carry a tune. Thanks be to the spirit that continually creates harmony out of our lives.

TAKE HOME MESSAGE

A torrent of large and small mistakes and broken things have characterized these last ten weeks in our house.   Like the geothermal heat compressor and controls, the surge protectors, the smoke alarms: all destroyed as the result of a nasty power surge.  Like having to find a new house insurer.  Like the weather causing folks to cancel out, over and over.  Like the screen door lock and the back hall cabinet pull falling off in my hand.   Like the working relationship gone sideways, maybe upside down.  And this week, like the dog I was caring for running away and—in the midst of trying to find her—having a monster truck back into the car, ripping a hole in the hood.

I was whining about it all last night, and a friend said to me, “Well, what’s the message?”  I stared at her and said, “I don’t know!   That’s the problem!”

But on reflection I do know.  I just didn’t want to look too hard because frankly, I love the drama. 

In virtually every one of these situations, it’s all fine.  Things broken got repaired; there were warranties, there’s been generosity, there’s been help, there’s been insurance.  Even in the broken relationship, a chance to revisit priorities.  It seems like in the end, if we do the work, things generally come round right.

I get scared when things go wrong.  Some deep part of me, I think, is afraid that this means the end: I’ll starve, I’ll have no place to live, no one will love me, I’ll die.  But the chances of any of these except the last are remote.  And given that I’m professed to be a Christian, that last isn’t the end either, although I have to admit I’m a bit unclear on the details.

If there’s a take home message in the mess of the last months, I have to say that it is that everything really is fine.  If I do the work, toil like a real human being, take the irritations and sufferings as part of life rather than some insult or detour, then it all is really fine.  And so am I.

Therese desCamp