Living Lent - Barbara Cawthorne Crafton

This challenged me this morning, so I wanted to post it somewhere I would have it available.

Living Lent - Barbara Cawthorne Crafton

We didn't even know what moderation was. What it felt like. We didn't just work: we inhaled our jobs, sucked them in, became them. Stayed late, brought work home – it was never enough, though, no matter how much time we put in.

We didn't just smoke: we lit up a cigarette, only to realize that we already had one going in the ashtray.

We ordered things we didn't need from the shiny catalogs that came to our houses: we ordered three times as much as we could use, and then we ordered three times as much as our children could use.

We didn't just eat: we stuffed ourselves. We had gained only three pounds since the previous year, we told ourselves. Three pounds is not a lot. We had gained about that much in each of the twenty-five years since high school. We did not do the math.

We redid living rooms in which the furniture was not worn out. We threw away clothing that was merely out of style. We drank wine when the label on our prescription said it was dangerous to use alcohol while taking this medication. "They always put that on the label," we told our children when they asked about this. We saw that they were worried. We knew it was because they loved us and needed us. How innocent they were. We hastened to reassure them: "It doesn't really hurt if you're careful."

We felt that it was important to be good to ourselves, and that this meant that it was dangerous to tell ourselves no. About anything, ever. Repression of one's desires was an unhealthy thing. I work hard, we told ourselves. I deserve a little treat. We treated ourselves every day.

And if it was dangerous for us to want and not have, it was even more so for our children. They must never know what it is to want something and not have it immediately. It will make them bitter, we told ourselves. So we anticipated their needs and desires. We got them both the doll and the bike. If their grades were good, we got them their own telephones.

There were times, coming into the house from work or waking early when all was quiet, when we felt uneasy about the sense of entitlement that characterized all our days. When we wondered if fevered overwork and excess of appetite were not two sides of the same coin – or rather, two poles between which we madly slalomed. Probably yes, we decided at these times. Suddenly we saw it all clearly: I am driven by my creatures – my schedule, my work, my possessions, my hungers. I do not drive them; they drive me. Probably yes. Certainly yes. This is how it is. We arose and did twenty sit-ups. The next day the moment had passed; we did none.

After moments like that, we were awash in self-contempt. You are weak. Self-indulgent. You are spineless about work and about everything else. You set no limits. You will become ineffective. We bridled at that last bit, drew ourselves up to our full heights, insisted defensively on our competence, on the respect we were due because of all our hard work. We looked for others whose lives were similarly overstuffed; we found them. 

"This is just the way it is," we said to one another on the train, in the restaurant. "This is modern life. Maybe some people have time to measure things out by teaspoonfuls." Our voices dripped contempt for those people who had such time. We felt oddly defensive, though no one had accused us of anything. But not me. Not anyone who has a life. I have a life. I work hard. I play hard.

When did the collision between our appetites and the needs of our souls happen? Was there a heart attack? Did we get laid off from work, one of the thousands certified as extraneous? Did a beloved child become a bored stranger, a marriage fall silent and cold? Or, by some exquisite working of God's grace, did we just find the courage to look the truth in the eye and, for once, not blink? How did we come to know that we were dying a slow and unacknowledged death? And that the only way back to life was to set all our packages down and begin again, carrying with us only what we really needed?

We travail. We are heavy laden. Refresh us, O homeless, jobless, possession-less Savior. You came naked, and naked you go. And so it is for us. So it is for all of us

Exploring the Bike Paths of my Soul

(Random thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service)

4 years ago I decided to do something about my weight. Over the course of the next few years, I joined a gym, dieted and exercised regularly, and lost about 50 lbs. I gave away all my large clothes and bought a new wardrobe.

Then I got an injury.

Then 'life' happened.

I love to cook and bake, and I'm also an emotional eater. I managed to find lots of reasons to justify not going to the gym and eating another cookie. Slowly my weight crept up again. I justified the weight gain by claiming it wasn't interfering with my life. My wardrobe slowly became too tight and I had to purchase 'fat' clothes again. I knew I needed to do something, but I wasn't ready, there was always a reason why exercise and eating right would begin again next week.

This summer I was on vacation with my family in Germany and one day they decided that we would all bike around this lake. Everyone rented bikes except me. I rented an electric bike instead, I still had to pedal, but it gave me a motorized assist when I went up hills. It was fun to glide past the rest of my family, but I must confess I felt some guilt that my older brother (who used to struggle with his weight) could bike around the lake when I could not.

And so just over a month ago, I walked back in my gym and signed up for the same diet and weight loss competition that I entered 4 years ago. Last time going to the gym was all new, even the restrictions of the diet didn't bother me that much, but I didn't do much interior work around my relationship with food.

This time I've tried to do things differently. I've tried to examine why I eat the way I do. I've tried to be more contemplative about diet and exercise.....and I've been out on my bike.

In the Heights there are miles of bike paths that I have never explored. Some lead into parts of Houston that I must confess have made me a bit nervous. I've seen piles of garbage and abandoned junk, and I've watched squirrels dance across my path. I've cycled my way through construction zones under freeways, and I've encountered beautiful views of Houston that I never knew existed. I've gotten frustrated by paths that dead end into culverts that block my way home, and I've seen new bridges that I never new existed.

And I've enjoyed myself in a way I never anticipated.

I'm also trying to navigate the bike paths of my soul. Learning that just because my body is claiming that it has not had enough to eat that it isn't actually hungry, it's just complaining that it is not eating to excess like it used to. That the hungry feeling is good because it means my body is consuming stored fat. I'm learning that there is no such thing as bad food, just bad portion control, and that emotions can be felt rather than eaten. The bike trails in my soul have led me to piles of garbage and abandoned junk. Through construction zones and dead ends I'm wandering, and uncovering beauty in parts of myself where I rarely venture. I"m learning that sometimes what feels like God leaving, is in reality God leading. That hunger and fatigue are opportunities to encounter God differently. That old familiar paths and problems can be approached in new ways, and I might surprise myself in ways I never anticipated.

Waiting and Walking

The Christmas story seems to feature a lot of journeying. Mary travels to Elizabeth's house. Mary and Joseph journey to Bethlehem to register for the census, they go to Jerusalem to present Jesus at the Temple, They relocate to Nazareth before finally fleeing to Egypt. Wise Men journey from far off places, and then take a different route home. Shepherds journey down dangerous hillsides.....

.....and Simeon makes a short journey to the Temple Courts.

There is a lot of waiting as well. The Jews wait for their liberation from Roman occupation, God waits for the right time to send his Son. Mary waits nine months to see the face of her Savior. Simeon waits to see the Messiah.

When Simeon encounters Jesus and takes him in his arms I wonder if he is elated or disappointed. God's promise that he has waited on all these years has been fulfilled. He finally gets to see the Messiah, and yet Messiah is a baby, not yet a Warrior or a Leader. God's promise has come true for Simeon, but the promise of liberation for God's people is going to take longer.

Simeon praises God and then hands Jesus back to Mary and Joseph, and then he walks away. He leaves his expectations of how Messiah should be and journeys home....where the waiting will begin again.

Journeying and Waiting seem to some up a lot of my experiences of the spiritual life. I wait patiently, reluctantly, defiantly. Waiting encourages me to surrender control, to give up what I think I know to be open to what God has in store for me. Like Simeon, I think I know how God's promises are going to look like when they come true, and, like Simeon I have to be open to being surprised.

Journeying does the same. Sometimes the hardest part is the decision to step away from what I think I know and journey into the unknown. There are so many things that I used to believe with absolute certainty that now I just shrug and admit 'I don't know'. Travel broadens the mind. Pilgrimage broadens the heart. Stepping deeper into the heart of God is a journey into the unknown, into uncertainty and mystery.

Journeying and Waiting seems to have been themes in my life since Thanksgiving. I haven't left Houston, but God's Spirit has invited me to wait in places that I wanted to run from kicking and streaming. People I love have patiently listened, encouraged me, and held my hand as I have journeyed into some dark places, and like Simeon in the temple, the end result of the journey is so different from what I would have imagined.

Are you in a season of Waiting our Journeying right now? 
Are you a willing or reluctant participant in that season? 
How can you step more fully into that season?

All Good Gifts Around Us....

I did not grow up celebrating Thanksgiving (obviously). All I knew about Thanksgiving I learned from Tom and Jerry Cartoons, and the occasional showing of A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving - which was an odd cartoon to broadcast in the U.K. I never really understood why Peppermint Patty got so angry at being offered buttered toast, pretzel sticks, popcorn, and jelly beans. I did wonder if whether Woodstock eating Turkey at the end of the cartoon was actually cannibalism :)

Part of the joy of Thanksgiving for me has been the opportunity to embrace traditions and make them my own. My first ever Thanksgiving was spent just outside New York City. Snow was gently falling, and I was sitting at a large table with more foreigners than U.S. citizens and it felt like a wonderful reflection of the world coming together giving thanks to God for His blessings. I remember my first Thanksgiving after I became a U.S. citizen my self, it felt like my adoption into America was complete and I no longer felt like the outsider at the feast.

I have a personality that can easily stew on the negative, so Thanksgiving is a great reminder for me of the positive.

I am blessed. I have an abundance. I don't worry about what I'm going to eat (expect for chasing exciting new recipes), I have no fear about where I'm going to sleep tonight. I can afford what I need and what I want. Just having an abundance in the areas of food and shelter puts me way above many thousands in this world.

A few years ago I was leading a small group reflecting on Parables and Poetry and the parable that was randomly assigned for Thanksgiving was Luke 12:16-21

 Then he told them this story: “The farm of a certain rich man produced a terrific crop. He talked to himself: ‘What can I do? My barn isn’t big enough for this harvest.’ Then he said, ‘Here’s what I’ll do: I’ll tear down my barns and build bigger ones. Then I’ll gather in all my grain and goods, and I’ll say to myself, Self, you’ve done well! You’ve got it made and can now retire. Take it easy and have the time of your life!’ “Just then God showed up and said, ‘Fool! Tonight you die. And your barnful of goods—who gets it?’ “That’s what happens when you fill your barn with Self and not with God.”

That passage created some tension for me over Thanksgiving. My expressions of what I was thankful for had me sounding suspiciously like the rich man in the passage. As I reflected more however I found myself drawn to the phrase "The farm of a certain rich man produced a terrific crop". If consider myself as the Rich Man and my life as the 'farm' what crops am I producing?

My life seems to move through various seasons. Attitudes, relationships, abilities, all grow, blossom and die. Positive and Negative crops all grow together. I can be judgemental and petty, I can create music that helps people encounter God.  I can hold a terrific grudge and an abundance of unforgiveness. I can create spaces that are welcoming and hospitable. I can be stubborn and rude. Loving and gracious, jealous and suspicious.

My barn is very full!

It surprises me how tightly I want to hold onto my bad crops. Giving up a grudge or a prejudice can be difficult A closed fist seems to offer more protection than an open hand.

It surprises me how tightly I want to hold onto my good crops. If I give away my abundance I become fearful that I may get trapped in poverty, that I might spread myself too thinly.

There is a Staff Member at Chapelwood UMC Kathy Jo, who used to be homeless. She has a white board in her office, and she changes what it says weekly. This week it caught my attention because it says "It's not what we say about our blessing, but how we use them that is the true measure of our Thanksgiving."

The crops in my life  are opportunities for God to transform me more into the image of Jesus. They reveal where I am falling short of being the unique best 'me' that God has created.

The crops in my life are an opportunities for God to use me to transform the world.

I'm slowly learning to not put the crops in my life in categories of Good and Bad, but to simply ask God to show me what opportunities He is presenting to me through them.

What is growing in your life right now and how can you encounter God through it?

Checklist Spirituality

Thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service

St Theresa of Avila writes about prayer using the metaphor of watering the garden of the soul. She writes about different ways water can get to the garden. From a well, from an irrigation channel, or from the garden being located next to the river. (And from the rain...which we're not mentioning this week ion the service.)

Digging wells, and irrigation ditches both feel like a lot of effort. Carrying buckets of water is back breaking work. Theresa's third illustration is of the garden being next to the river. No work needs to be involved because the roots of the plants can grow deep down into the soil and receive water that way.

The only effort involved is the natural process of growing roots.

This can be an encouragement and a challenge.

An encouragement because there are times when spiritual disciplines can be exhausting. I want to nurture my soul, but prayer feels unobtainable and my bible seems to be welded shut. Knowing that at some place in the depths of my life, I have roots that still draw from the water of life, gives me strength to make it though those times that feel 'dry'.

A challenge because being rooted to the source means I no longer can have a Checklist Spirituality. The hard work of digging wells and irrigation ditches, the drudgery of carrying daily buckets of water, all give me a to do list and a sense of achievement when I'm done. Praying for other people can feel a lot easier than simply allowing myself to rest in God's presence - resting feels like I'm not doing anything.

Inside each of us there is a place where our roots go deep into the living water of God. Our work is trusting that our roots will draw the nurture we need.

The Well and the Water

Thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service

When I was a child I was remember watching an Episode of Arthur C. Clarke's Mysterious World that was all about water dowsing. It fascinated me so much that I made my own dowsing rods out of a spare wire coat hanger and walked around the back garden for hours. I never dug any holes by Mom's rose bushes, but I was captivated by the idea that somebody could walk around and tell you where to dig for water.

Much of my early spiritual life feels like that. I would listen to Experts telling me where I should 'dig' for Living Water. Whether it was retreats, books, revivals, preachers, denominations, particular practices, I would listen to the expert tell me how they had encountered God and then rush out and try and duplicate the experience in my life.

Most of the time I failed, or if I didn't fail, the results didn't last.

Of course when I didn't find water, I blamed myself, the 'expert' couldn't possibly be wrong. I misinterpreted what they said, I didn't pray hard enough, I had un-confessed sin that God was punishing me for etc.

I remember a Charlie Brown cartoon from when I was a kid. Linus was praying and trying to work out how to hold his hands like an antenna to get the best 'reception' from God. It seems funny to me now, but that is very much what I was doing.

I've come to realize that my interior landscape is as unique as my fingerprints. Other people can give me guidelines about where to dig wells to find living water, but they cannot speak with any certainty. I need to learn to trust my own spiritual intuition.

Digging wells is exhausting work. When it doesn't lead to water it is disheartening it causes me to doubt my own ability to hear God's voice. And there are other subtle traps I've noticed as well.

Somehow I've gotten it into my head that if I am digging in the correct spot it should be easy to connect to God. That living water will just flow naturally and effortlessly into my life. Digging wells doesn't work like that...and neither does my relationship with God. Sometimes it is back breaking work for me to connect with God. Every fiber of my being wants to stop digging, and it's only as I persist that I push through the ground to connect to living water again.

And sometimes, wells dry up.

I can get very attached to the location of a well. Particular practices that pour living water into me do not work for ever. I remember revisiting a book that was very meaningful to me at one time in my life. When I reread it 10 years later I couldn't work out what I saw in it.

Certain prayer practices work for me for a while and then they go dry.

Not all wells last forever.

The temptation for me here is I confuse the Well with the Water. I think because the well is gone, that the water is gone too.  The Well is not the Source, it is just how I access the source.

I'm learning to develop a nomadic spirituality. One that isn't afraid to trust that God will lead me to new sources of water.



For Reflection:

What wells do you currently have in your life? Where do you access living water?
Where might you be being called to dig somewhere new?

The shape of my soul.

This week I was asked 'What does your soul look like? What is an image for that place of connection between you and God?'

The image that came unbidden into my mind surprised me.

A jigsaw.

As I've sat with it over the past few days I've felt a connection to it. I remember solving jigsaws in my youth. Find the corners first, then build up the edges. Next sort the interior pieces by color and then match to the box image and slowly complete the puzzle.

In my teens and early twenties I had a fairly good idea not only of the dimensions of the jigsaw of my soul, but also of the image on it. And then, when I started building it, I discovered that the shape was not a simple rectangle like I expected. I found extra corners and edge pieces that didn't meet my expectations. I found corners that were not 90 degrees. I found small pieces that were beautiful unique shapes in themselves and I would pause to reflect on them. The picture was more different and varied than I could have ever imagined, and at times I've begun to wonder if this jigsaw is double sided or even 3 dimensional.

There is something beautiful to me about encountering God in the midst of something incomplete.Of knowing that I am partnering with God building something that is a beautiful mystery, that I will always be surprised by colors, and corners. Knowing that I will not have the jigsaw finished this side of Heaven adds a sense of relief and a release of pressure....

.....and every encounter has an opportunity to reveal a new piece of the puzzle.

Openness and Authenticity

(notes for this Sunday's Contemplative Service)

Two weeks ago in the Contemplative Service we handed out cards with names on them. The names were drawn randomly from various sources, all the names were real people from  around the world. We were encouraged to pray for these people. We did not know them, did not know how to pray for them, and would not ever know how our prayers were answered.

Why did we do this? So many of us pray our own agendas when we pray. We tell God exactly what He should do and how He should do it. This exercise removed that possibility. All I could do was hold my two people out to God and pray that He would be with them in some way.

So Tom and Tam became my companions for a while, and I learned about openness and mystery in prayer. I surrendered my agendas and even allowed the way I pray for them to change how I pray for myself.

That same week my friend's five year old son Arthur had open heart surgery.

I tried to pray in the same way, to be open to the mystery of prayer and pray without expectations and agendas....and I couldn't do it. I got angry with the whole exercise. I told God in no uncertain terms exactly how I wanted Him to be with Arthur and how I wanted Him to make sure that Arthur's surgery was a success. Anything else felt like lying, I couldn't, wouldn't surrender the outcome of the surgery to God.

Arthur came through the surgery wonderfully well and is already back home.

I'm so grateful to God for that.....and I still find myself getting angry even imagining any other outcome.
I'm still wrestling with this issue of authenticity and openness.

How do I pray honestly for what I feel and still be open to the mystery of God and not become attached to the outcome? How do I pray in a way that feels honest about who I am and what I want, and acknowledges that ultimately I have to hold things loosely?

I've heard talks on the benefits of praying specifically. How articulating what you want to God helps you process and reflect on it. Be authentic to God, He knows when you are not anyway.
I've heard talks on the benefits of praying generally. How you should simply surrender the other person to God and be open to God doing whatever God wants.

In the midst of all this advice and suggestions, I find comfort from Jesus in the Garden.

"....Let this cup pass me by" is specific and authentic
"...not my will but yours be done" is a prayer of openness and surrender.

So this week I've tried to hold onto the tension of Openness and Authenticity. To ask God to help me find the place where they intersect, and when I get angry at the thought of what could have happened to Arthur, I try and place my anger in God's hands as well.

Whispers and Shouts

(Random thoughts for Easter Sunday's Contemplative Service)

When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead he called out in a loud voice 'Lazarus, come forth' - John 11:43 Jesus raises his voice and calls out in a shout that reaches all the way beyond the grave. A shout that leaves no question about who holds the keys of death and hell.

When Jesus raised Jairus' daughter from the dead, he simply took her hand and said 'Little girl get up' - Mark 5:41 Jesus tells the mourners and musicians who were weeping and wailing to go away, and in a scene of quiet intimacy he whispers life back into the girl.

Resurrections happen in our lives in shouts and whispers.

There are parts of my life that need to loudly raise my voice and proclaim the ancient Easter greeting 'Christ is risen. He is risen indeed.' I need to shout resurrection at a volume louder than my fears. I need to shout out in a voice that reaches into the dead places in my life and declares their resurrection through the power of God. I need a shout that resounds in my ears when faith fades away, a shout that keeps echoing through the gaping canyons of my soul.

Other parts of me need to whisper the resurrection. A loud shout sends me scurrying away in fear like wild deer. I need to whisper as a gentle invitation that I will not be met with condemnation. I need to whisper so I know I will be greeted with understanding. I need to whisper because at times that is all I I can do, and therefore if resurrection can only be shouted I am excluded. I need to whisper because parts of me are so fragile that a shout would destroy them and I would crumble like the walls of Jericho. I need to whisper because God is a God who speaks in whispers as well as shouts.

An honest whispered 'Help me' can contain more resurrection than a fake shouted 'Hallelujah!'There is loud exuberant praise in Heaven, and there is also intimate silence.

When you reflect on your life right now, do you need to whisper or shout?

I Am a Platypus

I've posted on this theme before (see this post on ice cream) but I found myself reflecting again this week.

In 1799 the naturalist George Shaw, Keeper of the Department of Natural History at the British Museum, received a truly bizarre animal specimen from Captain John Hunter in Australia. It appeared to be the bill of a duck attached to the skin of a mole. Shaw dutifully examined the specimen and wrote up a description of it in a scientific journal known as the Naturalist's Miscellany, but he couldn't help confessing that it was "impossible not to entertain some doubts as to the genuine nature of the animal, and to surmise that there might have been practiced some arts of deception in its structure."

Despite Shaw's doubts about the reality of the animal, he gave it a name: Platypus anatinus, or flatfoot duck. The scientific name was later changed to Ornithorhynchus anatinus, but it popularly remained known as the Duckbilled Platypus.

Other naturalists were equally suspicious that the creature was just a hoax. The surgeon Robert Knox later explained that because the specimens arrived in England via the Indian Ocean, naturalists suspected that Chinese sailors, who were well known for their skill at stitching together hybrid creatures, might have been playing some kind of joke upon them. "Aware of the monstrous impostures which the artful Chinese had so frequently practiced on European adventurers," Knox noted, "the scientific felt inclined to class this rare production of nature with eastern mermaids and other works of art."

It was only when more platypus specimens arrived in England that naturalists finally, grudgingly, granted that the creature was real. This made the platypus one of the more famous instances of a hoax that proved not to be a hoax after all.

(taken from the website Museum of Hoaxes)

George Shaw did not want to believe the Platypus was real, even when presented with the evidence in front of him. His belief system of what a mammal should be, combined with his scepticism born of fear of falling for a hoax made him unable to see the evidence before him. I could imagine him saying "They don't fit my paradigm of what an animal should look like, therefore I refuse to believe they exist."

The Christianity of my youth was very narrow and rigid. I had a tightly controlled set of beliefs and practices and if you didn't fit into them you weren't a 'true christian'...which to be honest was a coded way of saying you weren't a christian at all.

I remember the first time I encountered a practicing catholic - Mike. Up until that point Catholics had existed in my life only as a category - a group of people who (in my thinking at the time) belonged to the false church as mentioned in the Book of Revelation. Mike didn't fit in my box labeled 'Catholic'. He had a thick Brummie accent (in my mind all Catholics were Irish or foreign), and an obvious deep abiding spiritual life. He and I were touring in a musical together, he played Jesus and I played St. John the Divine. So here I was onstage most nights having to act like he was part of the Godhead while wrestling with having been taught that Catholics were only one step up from satanists.

My interaction with Mike caused me to throw out my definitions of Catholic.

Mike was a platypus.

The way we react to someone whose theology is different to ours is crucial. One denomination ordains women, another asks them to worship in silent submission....and both are doing so because they believe it is biblical. Calvinists, Arminianists, Creationists, Theistic Evolutionists. Those who affirm gay relationships, those who oppose - Everyone believes their way is biblical...and someone exists who believes being biblical means believing the opposite.

We are all a platypus to someone else.

(As a side note I find it strangely hilarious that their is no consensus on the plural form of Platypus. Options include Platypus, Platypuses and Platypodes. Apparently the only incorrect one is the one that is most common Platypi. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platypus#Taxonomy_and_etymology)

We all need to learn to respond to the platypuses we encounter with grace.

Naked in the House of God

"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society." ~Mark Twain

"Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,

But not expressed in fancy—rich, not gaudy,

For the apparel oft proclaims the man,

And they in France of the best rank and station

Are of a most select and generous chief in that". ~ Hamlet Act 1 Scene 3. Shakespeare

For the past few weeks in the Contemplative Service we've been considering clothes as metaphor. Here is Part 1 and Part 2 

This week I've been reflecting back on the first appearance of clothes in the bible.

In Genesis chapter 3, Adam and Eve eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. There first response after swallowing is to realize that they are naked and and sew fig leaves together to make coverings for themselves. They hide their naked selves from each other and then proceed to hide their nakedness from God. 

In their original state Adam and Eve had no concept of Right and Wrong, and no concept of naked or clothed. Every animal they were surrounded by was naked, and they saw themselves as no different. After eating the fruit they suddenly become self conscious about they way they present themselves to each other. Being vulnerable and naked is suddenly no longer an option because the wisdom gleaned from the fruit tells them it it wrong. Not only does it feel wrong to each other but it feels wrong to be that way before God.

Adam and Eve can no longer present themselves to each other or God as truly themselves. The knowledge of Good and Evil has removed that possibility. They craft an image of themselves that is not who they really are. Their real selves  are not acceptable to each other any more, and they believe they are not acceptable to God either. 

I find it interesting that God in his rebuke does not demand that Adam and Eve remove their clothes and become naked again. After God curses them He chooses to re-clothe them in animal skins. Once you become aware of Good and Evil it seems that you cannot forget it again.

And so we have dressed ourselves ever since.

Clothes; that began as a way of hiding our 'bad parts' from God and from each other have transformed into a way of presenting our 'best selves' to God. They become a way of crafting an image ourselves. They become a way of altering our mood. We dress to impress, to intimidate, to conceal weakness, to protect ourselves from harm. I have so many different versions of myself that I present. The Sunday Best, The Gym, The Hang Out with Friends, the Conference. I subtly dress different at these places and present myself different as well.

Naked I came from my Mother's womb,  and naked I will return - Job 1:21

All these thoughts of clothing and metaphor over the past few weeks can be paralyzing. I can spend so much time obsessing over what image I am presenting to the world that it becomes an excuse for inaction. I need to do the best I can and trust that God sees the intent behind the clothing.

The gospel writers say that Jesus was stripped of his clothing at the crucifixion. Most pictures of Jesus on the cross put some kind of loin cloth on him. It was Roman practice to strip the prisoner naked however. God, stripped of power and might, of majesty and glory hangs naked before the world. 

Where we could not become naked before God, God became naked before us

God invites us to him, clothes and all. God accepts not just our best selves, but our worst. Not just who we desperately want to be, but also who we are afraid that we might be. There is not a single part of ourselves that cannot be hidden in God.

And as God clothed Adam and Eve, he offers to clothe us in Christ. 

My work is not critique others of their Right and Wrong, I have too many beams in my own eye for that. My work is to slowly exchange my clothes - the many layers of my false self, for the life that God is building within me.

If Mark Twain and Shakespeare are correct that the 'clothes make the man', then I need God to be my Master Tailor.

'My life is no longer mine'....wait....what???!!!

(Random thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service)

Every Sunday I get home from Chapelwood and immediately go upstairs and put on something more comfortable. The clothes I wear to church on Sunday - my 'Sunday Best', represent a little of the ideal me that I want to present to the world. The stretched stained tee shirt and pajama flannel shorts that I wear around the house seem inappropriate in the house of God.

As Jerry said last week, along with dressing up our outsides, we feel the pressure to dress up our insides. We hide the stains and tears that mar our souls and try and make ourselves as spiritually presentable as possible. It is as if our wounds, jealousies, hurts and fears are as inappropriate in church as tee shirt and shorts.

There is the Ideal Me - the me of the Sunday Best, the me I aspire to be, and then their is the Real Me. On any given Sunday I am at various places on the continuum. The gift of Contemplative Worship has been allowing me to bring whatever me I am currently experiencing into the presence of God.

The very songs we sing reflect this tension, some of our songs express an ideal - All To Jesus I Surrender, All to Him I freely Give. That lyric expresses an attitude of surrender that I may never attain in this lifetime. Other songs express the reality of our comfortable clothes Take, O Take me as I am, summon out what I shall be.'

Over 15 years ago I wrote the song My Life Is No Longer Mine:

My life is no longer mine, to do with as I will

I gave all my rights away

When I gave myself to You

Surrender all I am, giving all I have to give

I'm trusting in You alone

To give all I need to live

When You gave Yourself for me

You gave all You had to give

When I give myself to You

I can give no less

Take my life now, take it all

Do with me as You desire

I surrender to Your love

I can do no less

Take my life, take my all

(To listen to it, click here)

It's proved to be one of my most popular praise and worship songs........and it bites me in the butt regularly.

It expresses a 'Sunday Best' ideal that at times I aspire to, but at other times I wish I hadn't written - if the composer cannot live up to his words and sing them honestly how can anyone else?

Gave all my rights away....Surrendering all I am....Trusting in You alone....When I give myself to you I can give no less

Well actually I can and frequently do give less than my all.

Do with me as You desire....

Err...not so much.

Sometimes this song expresses who I want to be, other times it feels that every line is an excuse to beat myself up for not being the kind of Christian I think I should be. My inner critic loves to berate me for not measuring up to some impossible christian ideal, and this song lyric becomes another yard stick that I can measure myself by and find myself wanting.

I would much rather sit with the lyrics to another song of mine.

Love, like a waterfall, falling on us
Flooding our hearts with grace and peace.
Healing waters flow, flowing on us,
Flooding our hearts with love.

Every moment of every day God is loving us,
Showers of mercy and waves of forgiveness are covering us

Love, like a waterfall.....

(For an explanation of how that song came to be written click here)

Some days I respond to the bold spiritual challenge, other days I feel so fragile that all I want is for God to hug me in silence....and I'm grateful that whether I'm reaching for ideals or wearing my wounds like an armor, I have a place I can just 'be' who I am in the presence of God.

What does your 'Ideal Me' look like? When do you feel at your most comfortable?

On the first day of Christmas.........

(Random thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service)

I spent much of Advent anxiously tracking parcels via UPS and Fed Ex. The temptation to pay a little extra to get the goods faster is always stronger around the holidays. I can continue to be last minute in my planning if I can pay more to compensate for my lack of forethought. None of us like to wait, I routinely check the traffic on my phone before heading out to look for the quickest route. If the wait at the restaurant is over 20 minutes chances are I will leave and eat elsewhere. I want what I want when I want it. If Amazon ever manages to successfully do delivery by flying robot drones I predict a number of people who will pay for their packages to arrive within 30 minutes.

I had some friends who took a very different approach with how their children opened their Christmas gifts this year. Instead of a frenzy of wrapping paper before breakfast they took a more measured approach. They had a clock that played music on the hour. Every hour when the music sounded each child was allowed to open one gift. They then played with that gift for the hour before opening another one. It made the unwrapping last all day, and it also helped the child to appreciate each individual gift and the giver. It made Christmas more thoughtful, more contemplative. It reminded me of the way some Jews celebrate Hanukkah - each night for 8 nights they would light the Hanukkah lights and exchange gifts.

The Liturgical calendar is set up to make us wait. Advent begins on the fourth Sunday before Christmas and ends on Christmas Eve night. I must confess I was a bit of an Advent snob this year. I found myself saying on many occasions 'we can't sing that song yet, that is a Christmas song and we are still in Advent'.

There is a desire in all of us to rush to the celebration of Christmas without the waiting of Advent. We sing -

Yea, Lord we greet thee,
 born this happy morning,
Jesus to thee be all glory given.
Word of the Father,
Now in flesh appearing.

on the second Sunday of Advent without caring about the disconnect to the Liturgical calendar. We want Christmas and we want it now.......and then we blink and it is over in a flurry of songs and wrapping paper. We are finished with Christmas and focused on New Years.

But Christmas isn't finished with us.

In the liturgical year the celebration of Christmas is not limited to one day. Christmas continues to Epiphany, Monday January 6th...the 12th day after Christmas and in some traditions continues until the first Sunday after Epiphany which is January 12th next year.

I imagine if we celebrated Christmas according to the Liturgical calendar all the way to the Sunday after Epiphany we would a) be content to not sing Christmas songs so early and b) be exhausted!

If we slowed Christmas down, opened our gifts more mindfully, spent time saying thank you, really enjoyed each gift we were given instead of rushing to the next, maybe Christmas would become a transformative experience instead of just a few days over indulgence.

In many Christmas sermons I heard in my youth, the preacher would rush Jesus from the manger to the Cross. 33 years covered in the breath of one sentence. Instead maybe we should let Jesus rest in the manger of our hearts a little longer, let him grow in strength and stature, let him speak to us, challenge us, love us, comfort us, heal us.

The Civil Rights Preacher Howard Thurman said:

When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky has withdrawn,

When the kings see their prophesy rightly fulfilled,

When the princes and shepherds have gone;

Then the true work of Christmas begins.

To find the lost,

To heal the broken hearts,

To feed the hungry,

To free the prisoner

To rebuild the nations,

To bring peace among all brothers,

To make music in the heart.

When the song of the angels is stilled,

Then the true work of Christmas begins.

Think back over the past few days. Over the joys of gifts given and received, over those small moments of great delight, of generosity and abundance.  Offer them with thanksgiving back to God, and ask him to show you how you can say along with Ebenezer Scrooge 'I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.'

God, Chess, Candyland and Scrabble

In a meeting last week I was asked the question 'What is a sign of hope for you?'. Most people thought of images from the natural world. I thought of my wall of board games.

All board games fall on a spectrum. At one end are games like Chess and Go that have no luck element at all. You win by entirely by your own efforts, by your own grasp of strategy. If you lose (or when in my case) you have nobody to blame but yourself.

At the other end of the spectrum are games like Chutes and Ladders, Candyland or LCR. You are entirely at the mercy of the dice or the cards, at no point in the game do you ever make any decision. I tend to view this style of a game less as a game and more as a fun social activity.

I prefer games that fall somewhere towards the middle of the spectrum. Games such as Backgammon or Risk both have an element of chance, but it is the combination of luck together with the meaningful choices that you have to make to capitalize on your good fortune or mitigate your bad that appeals to me.

Why does this feel like a sign of hope? It is because when playing a game that is in the middle of the spectrum I know that even if I fall behind there is always the hope that good fortune will turn my way and I have a chance of victory. Last place never feels hopeless.

My relationship with God seems to fall on a very similar spectrum. There are times when it feels all on my shoulders. Life is like a game of Chess and it is all about the decisions I make. I am the master of my fate I am the captain of my soul.

This makes me very prone to ego.

At other times I feel that nothing I do matters. Like a game of Chutes and Ladders I am entirely at the mercy of the universe with God as Puppeteer manipulating my life for his own designs.

This makes me very prone to fatalism and depression.

I like to live in the middle ground between these two extremes. I try and do the best I can with what I have and I trust that God will somehow meet me in the gap and make what I offer so much more than just what I can do alone.

This makes me very prone to hopefulness....and why I find God in my collection of board games.

I've Got Rhythm

(Random thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service)

Since my earliest days of music lessons I've thought a lot about rhythm. As a musician I"m taught to listen and match rhythm and tempo with other people. Playing violin in an orchestra meant that a good sense of beat and awareness of everyone around was vital. There is a certain level of embarrassment that comes from singing or playing in a group and unintentionally giving yourself a solo because you came in early, played to long, or were slightly slower than everyone else.

When I got to university I started messing around with cross rhythms, multiple time signatures and multiple simultaneous beats.....some people experimented with drugs, I experimented with Minimalism. Imagine counting 1,2,3, 1,2,3 and clapping on every 1 while someone else counts 1,2,3,4,1,2,3,4 and claps on 1 simultaneously to get a rough idea of what I"m talking about.

Life seems to move in rhythmic patterns. There is a pulse, a beat to different seasons of the year. It feels like the tempo of life is speeding up at the moment, making us move faster and faster until Christmas gets here. Along with the faster pace also comes an expectation of cheerfulness.

You'd better not pout, you'd better not cry, 
You'd better not shout I'm telling you why. 
Santa Claus is coming to town.

When I was 14 my grandmother passed away just before Christmas. While the rest of the world moved onward with lights, decorations and parties, my parents planned a funeral.

Good christian friends rejoice!
With heart and soul and voice.

While my friends joyfully wrapped presents, I was faced with the present I had purchased and wrapped for my Grandmother...and I didn't know what to do with it.

Come and worship,
Come and worship,
Worship Christ the newborn king!

That was the last thing I wanted to do.

When the rhythm of my life feels out of step with everyone else around me it adds to my discomfort. The Christmas my Grandmother passed away my parents tried to make Christmas happen 'as usual'. It felt hollow and disingenuous, lake a game of let's pretend that lasted over the holiday season.

I've learned over the years to honor my internal sense of rhythm. Most years I cook a large full English Christmas Dinner with all the trimmings for friends. This year I've chosen not too. I can't point to a particular event that has prompted this change, I'm just aware that my internal rhythm is dictating something different.

In Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus says:

Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

I love the way the Message translation says it:

Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.

Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. There is a rhythm that comes from God that is unique to each one of us...because each one of us is unique. Sometimes my rhythm will match the tempo of the world around, and sometimes it won't.

There are rhythms that come naturally to us and others that make us feel like we are always a beat behind.
There are rhythms that fit naturally with the world around and others that feel misplaced.

There are burdens that get placed upon us and others that we choose to carry.
There are burdens we are afraid to pick up and others that we afraid to release.

Into the midst of all this weight and noise Jesus offers us rest. His yoke is easy and his burden is light.

Whatever is going on in your life right now is o.k.

Joyful celebration.
Quiet mourning.
Crowded parties.
Solitude.

The strong rhythm of Ravel's Bolero is beautiful....and so is the random sound of a wind chime.

Where ever you are right now, Jesus offers you his rest. He offers the unforced rhythms of grace and invites you to dance.

What is the rhythm of your life right now?
Does it compliment or conflict with the rhythm of your external world?

If Church Signs Were Honest...

This meme has been going on for about 24 hours on twitter and has made me chuckle (and wince) so I thought I would post some of them here.

Welcome All. But if you are feeling depressed, come back when you are in a better mood.

Welcome to our worship. You hear us talk a lot about God here while we are really all obsessing about Doctor Who.

Come as you are! ......So you can hear sermons about how who you are is EVIL!

We aren't perfect and have doubts, but we expect you to be perfect and never question.

All Welcome - some restrictions apply; you know who you are.

Quaker Meeting. Refrain from talking about Jesus except as a metaphor or non-violent spiritual leader like MLK

Welcome! Service begins at 11:00. We take the offering at 11:40. Be prepared to be generous as we entertain you.

Welcome! Suck it up introverts!

All Welcome! It's an old historic church. We are not mandated or interested in making it handicap accessible.

Within these walls you will be expected to believe without question whatever you're told

You are welcome! Your sincere, thoughtful, complicated, and probing questions are not.

Open and Affirming Congregation. Just don't be too weird or political.

God's love welcomes all! But we are more picky.

Contemporary Worship at 10:00 a.m. Bet you can't sing as high as our Worship Leader!

Open and Affirming! Well to middle class, gender normative gays and lesbians who can decorate or do repairs.

All welcome. Be warned that we suck at community building. Many of us here feel lonely and isolated.

All welcome! O.k. that's our ideal. Honestly we can be selfish, privileged, frightened people. We want to change.

All are welcome here*
*Some exclusions apply. Please see Book of Discipline for details.

This is a house of worship. Please disregard all political in-fighting in our decision making process.

All are welcome. Now sit down, shut up, and listen.

Christmas in November

Working for a church spoils Christmas. So much of my focus and energy is in facilitating the 'Christmas Experience' for others that I barely have the energy for myself.

Christmas for me starts in the summer. I'm composing and arranging new anthems. Reflecting on new devotional material. Thinking of ways to make the old old story seem new.

When I was a child Christmas held out a promise of a break from the routine. School stopped. I slept in a different room to accommodate visiting relatives. Special foods (some good, some not so much) made an appearance. Bed time rules were relaxed. We delighted in 'the new'. New presents. New movies on TV. We reconnected with the old traditions while forging new ones.

Somewhere along the way that changed.

I embrace wholeheartedly the Christmas story, but so many years of Christmas Sermons and Pageants have done some damage. For the Christian the gift of Jesus is the pinnacle of the season, however I've heard many messages about the 'True Meaning of Christmas' that seem to carry a thin veneer of guilt rather than point me to the manger. The subtle message that if you are enjoying anything else rather than Jesus then you are celebrating Christmas wrong. 

Anyway, it's not even Thanksgiving yet, why am I blogging about Christmas?

Every year in November I attend a Board Game Convention in Dallas. It is one of the highlights of my year. I book the Convention and start making plans in March. Somebody asked me last week why I get so excited about attending.

For me BGG Con feels like Christmas felt when I was a child.

The wonder of seeing old friends. Staying up late. Eating differently. Discovering new games. Taking delight in play. Laughing way too much. 

I feel alive in a wonderful way at BGG Con. Play and Celebration lift me out of the Ordinary and I feel connected to the Numinous. I'm being where I'm meant to be doing what I am wired to do.

If you are not a board gamer then that may sound ridiculous, but I guarantee there is something in your life that when you do it you come alive. 

Maybe you paint. 

Maybe you run marathons. 

Maybe you create spreadsheets.

Maybe you perform in a folk dance group.

Maybe you knit clothes for dogs.

Whatever it is, when you find it, pursue it. 

When Christians celebrate Christmas they celebrate the Holy becoming incarnate in the Ordinary, God putting on skin and moving into the neighborhood. 

When you find your own piece of the Ordinary that seems to lift you up, that nurtures your spirit, then I think you are celebrating Christmas the right way. Forget about religious guilt or joyless piety, reconnect with Wonder and Delight....

....and that is why, for me, Christmas falls in November every year.

Time is ticking away.......

On Friday I had a lot of cleaning, tidying, and other odd jobs to do around the house. I'm the kind of person who can easily balk at the enormity of a task and instead go sit on the couch and eat chips while watching the Big Bang Theory so I needed a way to tackle the tasks. Borrowing an idea from the Liturgy of the Hours I broke up my day with the help of a stopwatch.

I worked for 50 minutes and then prayed for 10. No matter where I was in the task - half way through scrubbing a kitchen tile, mid-sentence in an important email, when the stopwatch beeped. I left the mop where it was and sat down on the couch to pray.

Sometimes the stopwatch beep was a blessing - I'm not the kind of person who enjoys cleaning.

Sometimes the stopwatch beep was a curse - It seemed to beep at the precise moment when I had almost crafted a perfect sentence. Stepping away from the keyboard to go pray felt an imposition.

Sometimes the stopwatch beep took an eternity to arrive.

Sometimes the stopwatch beep was a surprise.

There were times it felt I had only just settled into prayer when it was time to rise and work again.

At other times the 10 minutes of prayer felt longer than the 50 minutes of floor scrubbing.

I found myself wondering whether I was spending the day working with breaks for prayer, or spending the day praying with breaks for work.

By the middle of the afternoon I found myself settling into the rhythm of the day. My attitude to the tasks that needed to be done shifted and they began to become as prayerful as the times of prayer. The stopwatch was no longer a blessing or a curse, it was simply something I chose to surrender too. It was a beep that reminded me of the presence of God.

We save time and we waste time. We treat it as a resource that we need to manage.

On Friday the passing of time became a sacrament - an outward and visible sign of God's grace. Eventually I didn't need the stopwatch to remind me to pray, the simple awareness that time was passing all around me was a reminder that God was all around me.

God waits with us in the here and now.
Every second.....is a call to awareness.
Every minute..... an invitation to listen.
Every hour..... an outpouring of grace.
Every day.....
Every week.....
Every month.....
Every year.....
Every decade.....
Every lifetime.....

The clock and the calendar reveal God as surely as the bread and the cup.

Playing in the Presence of God

(Random thoughts for Sunday's Contemplative Service)

I still remember the first time I was shamed about play.

In middle school it was common for us to call our friends and see if they wanted to play. We'd get together and play board games, video games, and play with our computers together. When I went to High School I remember phoning a friend and asking him if he wanted to play.

"Play?", he responded. "How childish!"

We got together anyway and we played board games, video games and played with our computers together. The activity was the same as before but I quickly learned that the word 'play' always had to be quantified. We could 'play video games', but we couldn't just play.

As I grew older play was somehow viewed as a waste of time, time that could have been spent doing something more productive. Somehow this attitude all got wrapped up in Protestant Christianity -  the idea that you display your salvation through hard work, frugality, diligence and seriousness.

I remember when I started work at Mercy Street, I was in a meeting and was told that as a member of staff I was expected to 'Work hard and play hard'. At first I reveled in the freedom to be allowed to play, but implied in that statement is that play is something we are driven to do, that we approach play with the same seriousness that we approach work. We have a task to do and we are going to get through it with due haste.

In the late 1800's an English Anthropologist made the suggestion that games and play might prove very useful to his work studying indigenous tribes because people are truly themselves when they play games. Most children do not need permission to play. Many adults still feel it is wasteful. I even have a book called 'The Christian at Play'.....it's as if we are so averse to play in the church that we can only do it if we have theological justification.

God has wired us for play. We are to keep Sabbath for our re-creation and rest. Play connects us to each other, it's an antidote to loneliness and depression. It stimulates creativity. Play helps us work better.

Play is not a waste of time because play itself is productive. It nurtures and heals. It helps us step more fully into who God has created us to be.

Let's play.

A Dangerous Question

Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (which means “son of Timaeus”), was sitting by the roadside begging. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.”

So they called to the blind man, “Cheer up! On your feet! He’s calling you.”

Throwing his cloak aside, he jumped to his feet and came to Jesus. 

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked him. 

The blind man said, 

“Rabbi, I want to see.” 

“Go,” said Jesus, 

“your faith has healed you.” 

Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road.


Every weekend 2100+ people attend worship at Chapelwood. We are here for different reasons, some noble, some maybe not so. some of us come for specific reasons, help with a problem, seeking a healing, escape from other people. Others of us come with a vague sense of unease that being at church helps us manage. Some of us are here because it's what we've always done and is what is expected of us, others because the way we've been living life hasn't worked so we are trying something new.

Jesus' question to Bartimaeus is a question for us.

'What do you want me to do for you?' 

Like many of Jesus' questions, this is one that is harder to answer the longer you sit with it. When I am honest, the answers I give to Jesus' question reveal a lot more about me. When I hold out my answers to Jesus I find myself examining why I ask for what I ask for. Bias and selfishness show themselves hidden in my response. Ego and greed appear mixed in. I find myself playing mind games with Jesus, trying to guess the answer I think He wants to hear.

Eventually I don't want to answer the question at all because I judge all my responses as flawed or less than.....and then I realize that I spend too much time in my own head....

...and maybe that's why I come to worship. To step outside the storm of myself and try and get in touch with something larger and more beautiful.

So as you go to church this weekend how do you respond to Jesus question?

What do you want me to do for you?