Change and my favorite restaurant

Yesterday I was crushed to find out that my favorite restaurant for more than a decade has changed hands: new owner, new wait staff, new sushi chef.  We had dinner anyway and it was OK, but …. It just wasn’t the same.

I had a long day yesterday – lots of new stuff to integrate into existing systems, new tasks to do, new ways and processes.  Things can change rapidly.  I left our meeting and drove multiple miles through territory that I know well, but it’s been a while since I’ve been here. So many changes in the landscape.  Trees cut down, roads widened, new buildings put up in place of older ones.  I was looking forward to something that didn’t change –  my favorite restaurant and my old familiar standbys: salad with ginger dressing, miso soup, spicy fried rice and a sushi roll.  But it was not to be.  The ginger dressing was spicy not sweet, the spicy fried rice was just not spicy enough.  My yellow-tail tuna roll wasn’t constructed properly and fell apart in my soy sauce.

I really was upset. Kind of the “final straw” feeling. As we drove home through the pollen tinged rain last night, I asked myself if there was anything in life that felt like it didn’t change – that felt like security, that felt absolute.  And truthfully, in this world, the byword is “the only thing that doesn’t change is that things change.”

And so this morning I woke up with tremendous empathy for those who are fans of traditional, conservative worship.  I understand why at a funeral you insisted on the 23^rd Psalm in King James Version.  I really understand why you wanted the traditional Lord’s prayer instead of our contemporary one in the hymnal.  You wanted not just the message to change, you wanted the medium to remain the same as well.  I feel the same at times.  I like some of the older liturgy as well – I occasionally want to say that, “We be not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table.”  And then I finish the statement,  “But thou art the same Lord, whose property is always to have mercy.”

You are indeed the same Lord and your byword is grace and mercy.  Praise be!

Communion Bread Recipe

Candler Communion Bread Recipe (for those of us who have gone to two stores looking for pita bread and can't find any)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

In a bowl mix:

4 cups of whole wheat flour
4 tsp. of DOUBLE ACTING baking powder (or 8 tsp. of single acting baking powder)
2 tsp. of salt

Make sure ingredients are thoroughly mixed because it will affect the taste of the bread.

In a separate container mix thoroughly (I put them in a container with a lid and shake)

3/4 cup water
3/4 cup milk
3/4 cup honey
3/4 cup vegetable oil

Gradually add the wet mix to the mixed dry ingredients mixing them together with your hands (this will be very, very sticky). You're shooting for a ball of dough that's cohesive, but not too sticky; this may mean that you don't add all the wet ingredients or if your dough is just a sticky mess add a bit of flour. Knead the dough once you have a ball. Once you've kneaded, roll or pat the dough out and cut it into 6 inch rounds (I use a six inch bowl to cut them out). The recipe suggests the dough be about a 1/2 inch thick; you can make it thinner if you can do it without tearing; they will rise in the oven.


Place them on an ungreased cookie or pizza sheet (I use Teflon pie tins)
Then use a knife to cut a cross into each of them (don't go all the way through the dough!)
They will bake in 10-15 minutes, however they may need just a bit longer or shorter depending on your oven. 
They are finished when they no longer seem doughy. You don't want them super dark (burned) on the bottom.
This recipe makes 6-8 rounds 8 is usually plenty for the service.

Recipe from the Monastery of the Holy Spirit
Modified, Steve Reneau

Maundy Thursday with readings from John

Full script with Director's notes here.


Invocation
John 1:1-18
“Once upon a Tree” by Pepper Chopin -- Choir

John 12:1-4
“My Jesus I Love Thee” UMH 172 – Ist verse woman’s solo joined by choir rest of verses and congregation

John 12:4-8
Luke 22:7-14
“What Wonderous Love is This” UMH 292

John 13:2-17
Invitation to Footwashing
“Jesu, Jesu” UMH 432
“O Master, Let Me Walk with Thee” UMH 430

John 13:21-35
“Gift of love” UMH 408
Luke 22:15-20

Words of Invitation to Table and Consecration
Solo- “Remember Me” by Mark Schultz
“Be Thou My Vision” UMH 451

Matthew 26:30-44
Solo – “Into the Woods” lyrics by Sidney Lanier
Words of Dismissal
“A Wind Blew Over Calvary” by Greg Sewell – Choir

Reflections about Snakes and Evangelism

Yesterday my husband Bill and I entertained a local traveling evangelist from another (unnamed) denomination who came knocking on our door. Rather, Bill entertained and I sat and listened in the other room. I usually invite all who knock on my door into the house for a cup of coffee and conversation but I was in the midst of paperwork and that kind of stuff.  I usually invite them in because serves two purposes – it allows me to witness to my faith and it allows me listen to listen to as they witness to their faith.  I’m pretty non-discriminatory – I invite them all in: Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormon Missionaries, Baptists, non-denominational. Whatever they are, all are welcome.  It boosts me up to be able to talk to people about Jesus regardless of the circumstances.

Of course I know that not everybody feels this way.  Most of us consider these people to be annoying, even unwelcome.  After Bill had closed the door on our latest visitor he said, “I think next time I’ll get a snake.”

It’s an inside joke - he’s referring to an incident that occurred early in our marriage when I still worked at Fernbank Science Center.  I babysat two different snakes over two different summers.  The snakes had a definite purpose in life – we used them as teaching tools to show kids the difference between venomous snakes and non-venomous snakes.  Buzz was a Florida King Snake, mostly yellow with black stripes.  I kept him quite a while but my favorite was Scarlet who was a Georgia Corn Snake.  These snakes were not very docile and had to be handled everyday so that they wouldn’t forget to be “nice.” 

One summer afternoon, I had Scarlet up my sleeve and she had gone to sleep curled up around my elbow.  When the local traveling evangelist knocked on my door and I answered, Scarlet woke up and traveled down my sleeve to my hand.  I held out my hand to shake my visitor’s hand and …. the snake poked her head out of my sleeve and started to go toward my visitor.  She gave a shriek and left rapidly.  To be fair to her, most of the time corn snakes get killed because they are mistaken to be copperheads.  I’m sure she thought I was handling copper heads.  Nonetheless, that was the last time they came visiting while we lived in that house.

So when Bill said, “I think next time I’ll get a snake,” he was really meaning, “I don’t want them to come back.”  Yet I do.  I enjoy it and encourage it.  I find it a boost to my faith to hear their stories.  And I pray for them and with them, that their journeys from house to house might be fruitful and that God use them to increase the Kingdom.

I think evangelism is the number one place Methodists fail. We are really good with the fellowship components of Christian community. We excel at Christian Education and Formation.  We are superlative at Acts of Social Justice, be they right or just well intentioned.  But we are not adding to the Kingdom.

Old methods and models of evangelism are just that – old. Some of them have worked and some are just well intentioned.  I was trained in the late 1970’s (as a very very young child, I will have you know) in a method called Evangelism Explosion.  I either was not very good at it, or perhaps the methods had seen their day because I don’t think I ever really entered into a good, rich and deep conversation about faith with anyone I approached.

I think the oldest of the methods – Jesus’ method— might work the best.  If we look at how Jesus gathered people together we can start to see how we might gather them together.  He first approached them as people – individuals – and not “prospects.”  He made relationships with them.  He ate with them, He healed them.  He loved them.  He took care of their deepest need and then said, “Follow me.”

We need to approach individuals and see them as unique in God’s eyes, a beloved member of God’s great creation and realize that  each of them will come to Christ in their own way.  Let us seek out the un-churched, the least, the last and the lost and enter into relationship with them.  Invite them to dinner.  Eat with them.  Go to ballgames with them, shop with them, watch movies with them, get to know them and find out their deepest need.  Pray with them – and pray for them.  Love them as God would love them.  Ask them to church, share your faith with them and things will be transformed. 

And what’s amazing to me is that even if they never come to church – even if we never see the fruit from the seeds that we have planted, things will be transformed.  YOU will be transformed.  I will be transformed.  By echoing Jesus’ methods of evangelism, we will become more like Christ.  Our faith will become deeper, richer and more mature.  Our lives will be enriched, we will be transformed.

So it doesn’t require special training, y’all.  It doesn’t require extraordinary skill or special formulaic words.  And you don’t have to keep snakes.  Just a lot of love. 

 “Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.

            - 1 John 4:7-12 (NRSV)

There is a part of me that knows that life is a journey upon which we retrace roads over and over again. The road that I'm on right now is one I've been on before and I know that one day I'll retrace this bit of the journey again.  No thing of the road will be changed, but I will be changed.

That said, I think I've entered into a new bit of the territory that I've not been in in quite a while.  There are days that all I can say is, "I love Jesus."

I want to be quick to qualify that but, I won't so that the statement won't lose impact.  To qualify it would be to dismiss the visceral nature of that statement that "I love Jesus."

I love every single part of Jesus. I love the sheer beauty of this thing we call the "God's Plan of Salvation." I love the ebb and the flow of the story.  I love the person of Jesus who lived and breathed like me, who loved his mother, who loved his friends.  I love the teachings of Jesus.

I just love Jesus.

Yesterday I watched a webinar concerning "Healthy Church Leaders."  The leader presented 13 key factors for Clergy Health.  I reproduce it here from a screen shot I took during the presentation.  (You too can find this presentation here.  One of the categories is "The Existential Burdens of Ministry."  This is defined as the minister"—carrying the weight of others’ emotional and spiritual burdens; overwhelmed by others’ needs and the importance of ministerial issues; expected to solve unsolvable mysteries." (You can find more here.)

Yep.  There you go.  That's it for me today.  Two funerals I want to attend, friends who carry large physical burdens of horrible diseases (several now), depressed people (several again), anxious people (ditto) and so forth.  I feel it today.  I need to release that energy and replenish the creative within me.

I find it interesting they determine all this but offer no solutions.  I suppose the solution is up to me. SO - today I am off to find my own unique solution of how to deal with all my Existential Burden of Ministy.

And then tonight I'll watch another webinar - Working Together for Healthy Clergy.  Let's see if this helps.

A Grouse

I don't know if I'm getting old or what.  It's not like I prefer traditional over everything else, but I'm getting tired of being castigated for liking traditional.  I'm tired of having the name "fuddy duddy" and "staid" and "stuffy" being thrown at me like clumps of sticky mud.

So I'm going to say it - I LIKE traditional.  I like traditional stuff, I like traditional worship, I like traditional dinner parties, I like traditional PTA meetings.  I like contemporary/current trends in all sorts of things, but I'm not willing to throw the traditional out the window just because something new comes along.

I like antiques and I like Ikea.  I think a person can like both - even in the same space.

So there.

EDITED: I used a politically charged phrase in the original post. I changed it.  I will blog more about exactly what I mean by "traditional stuff" tomorrow.  I did not mean what some of you thought I meant!  Peace!

Silence

Silence is not a bad thing.  I find myself yearning for more of it. Not just turning off the TV/radio/internet but deeper silence than that.  The other day the power went off and I realized that we are surrounded by noise of our own creation all the time and we don't even hear it.

I want a reprieve of all those things that are below our conscious level of hearing but are still there.  I want a reprieve from the voices that tell me to do more, do less, do differently, be here, be there, butt out, pay up.  I want to revel in that silence. I want to sit in that for a while, steep in it like a weird reverse teabag until I and the Other are as one. Perhaps it's more like I need to steep in the dye until He and I are one.

Stuff

Long time between blog postings.  I don't know where my blog-energy has gone to ... between Facebook, Twitter and games, there just isn't much time for blogging.

Anyway, I have been on a new kick - I have decided that the best way to change habits is to do one small habit a month.  Month before last, I decided that the one habit I needed to practice was to remember to wear my pedometer every single day.  I've done OK with it - only missing one or two days in three months.  I am now trying to add 100 steps a day every week.  Eventually I'll be at the 7000 steps that will earn me more Virgin Health Miles.

 Last month, I decided to really take care of my rosacea - to do the 20 minutes of care every night to try to get it healed up.  It's looking better; not healed, but better.  It's a boost to my self-esteem.  I finally feel I can go out into the world without wearing a half inch of makeup.

This month I have tried to get on a better sleep schedule.  This will also help the rosacea and my energy level - so that I *can* get a few more steps in everyday.

One small step at a time.

Project Order from Chaos helped change habits.  By making it a habit to examine all the things in my life (coffee cups to doo-dads to worn-out clothing), I realized I've changed my attitude toward material possessions. I no longer put worthless things aside "for later" especially since later never seems to come.

Well, that's it!

Morning Prayer - Psalm 78 and a Prayer of St. Augustine

Psalm 78

• ²³ God gave orders to the skies above,
• opened heaven’s doors,
• ²⁴ and rained manna on them so they could eat.
• He gave them the very grain of heaven!
• ²⁵ Each person ate the bread of the powerful ones;
• God sent provisions to satisfy them.
• ²⁶ God set the east wind moving across the skies
• and drove the south wind by his strength.
• ²⁷ He rained meat on them as if it were dust in the air;
• he rained as many birds as the sand on the seashore!
• ²⁸ God brought the birds down in the center of their camp,
• all around their dwellings.
• ²⁹ So they ate and were completely satisfied;
• God gave them exactly what they had craved.
• ³⁰ But they didn’t stop craving—
• even with the food still in their mouths!
• 
  

     Lord Jesus, Let Me Know Myself (Domine Iesu, Noverim me)

Lord Jesus, let me know myself and know Thee,
And desire nothing save only Thee.
Let me hate myself and love Thee.
Let me do everything for the sake of Thee.
Let me humble myself and exalt Thee.
Let me think of nothing except Thee.
Let me die to myself and live in Thee.
Let me accept whatever happens as from Thee.
Let me banish self and follow Thee,
And ever desire to follow Thee.
Let me fly from myself and take refuge in Thee,
That I may deserve to be defended by Thee.
Let me fear for myself, let me fear Thee,
And let me be among those who are chosen by Thee.
Let me distrust myself and put my trust in Thee.
Let me be willing to obey for the sake of Thee.
Let me cling to nothing save only to Thee,
And let me be poor because of Thee.
Look upon me, that I may love Thee.
Call me that I may see Thee,
And for ever enjoy Thee. Amen.

Text for the week

Bread of life  -- John 6:26-40, Common English Bible

 26 Jesus replied, “ I assure you that you are looking for me not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate all the food you wanted. 27 Don’t work for the food that doesn’t last but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Human One will give you. God the Father has confirmed him as his agent to give life. ” 


 28 They asked, “ What must we do in order to accomplish what God requires? ” 29 Jesus replied, “ This is what God requires, that you believe in him whom God sent. ” 30 They asked, “ What miraculous sign will you do, that we can see and believe you? What will you do? 31 Our ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, just as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”


 32 Jesus told them, “ I assure you, it wasn’t Moses who gave the bread from heaven to you, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 The bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. ” 


 34 They said, “ Sir, give us this bread all the time! ” 35 Jesus replied, “ I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But I told you that you have seen me and still don’t believe. 37 Everyone whom the Father gives to me will come to me, and I won’t send away anyone who comes to me. 38 I have come down from heaven not to do my will, but the will of him who sent me. 39 This is the will of the one who sent me, that I won’t lose anything he has given me, but I will raise it up at the last day. 40 This is my Father’s will: that all who see the Son and believe in him will have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. ”


I have been thinking about this text for a couple of weeks now, seeing as it is a continuation of what I preached on last week.  I probably will preach about Jesus being the "Bread of Heaven" but that's not what is capturing my imagination today.

I struggle and wrestle with something a lot of people think is really simple - how much aid do I give a family in need?  I know of some people who would say "none" and then some who say "all."  My tendency is probably to give way more than most. I don't say this to show myself up in a good light or to flatter myself - my need to give probably arises more from my need to be liked and wanted than real agape love.

I have given away too much this year to one particular family.  It got to the point that I believe that I was enabling them to live in their lifestyle without having to take responsibility for their own actions.  I know that I have done this several times in the past and probably will do it again in the future.  I've thought about the Traveller on the road to Jericho who was attacked by thieves (maybe they were zealots, who knows?) and the Good Samaritain who stopped and gave aid.  However, what if the Traveller when healed just went back out and jumped in the ditch again?  What if the Traveller got so used to being rescued that's all that the Traveller knew?

This story this week has helped me.  Jesus fed the 5000.  He retreated across the water, the people chased him.  When they all convened on the other side, he rebuked them and did NOT feed them a second time.  Instead he told them to look for the food that endures for eternal life.  This story has been balm on my soreness. Thanks be to God!

Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy.
Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy.
Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I love but what is holy.
Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy.
Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy. Amen.
       A Prayer of St. Augustine

Morning Prayer from St. Augustine

Today's readings:

2 Kings 4
What I heard: Death in the Pot, "My head! My head!"  “What can these few cakes do towards feeding a hundred men? They forget that God can multiply them. Ye limit the Holy One of Israel. Do you think he needs our numbers? Do you think he is dependent upon human strength? I tell you, our weakness is a better weapon for God than our strength.” (Charles Spurgeon)


John 6:1-21
What I heard: "Make the people sit down" - Jesus sets the table, we are his guests.  Jesus is the source of life and nourishment.

Too late have I loved you,
O Beauty so ancient,
O Beauty so new.
Too late have I loved you!

You were within me but I was outside myself,
and there I sought you!
In my weakness I ran after the beauty
of the things you have made.
You were with me, and I was not with you.

The things you have made kept me from you -
the things which would have no being
unless they existed in you!

You have called, you have cried,
and you have pierced my deafness.

You have radiated forth,
you have shined out brightly,
 and you have dispelled my blindness.

You have sent forth your fragrance,
and I have breathed it in, and I long for you.
I have tasted you, and I hunger and thirst for you.
You have touched me, and I ardently desire your peace.
Amen.

Sitting with it

I've had to make a remarkably hard decision this week.  Actually, the decision was made by the circumstances involved, by lack of money and reluctance to give to someone who is an incurably, irrevocably, ungrateful, unrepentant recidivist.  Facebook asks, "What is on your mind?" What is on my mind is an incurable, irrevocable, ungrateful, unrepentant recidivist.  That is what is on my mind. Lord help us all. When does assistance go from assistance to enabling?  And in that case, what is the truly loving action?

Reflections on the Good Samaritan

Luke 10:29-37 (NIV)

29b ...so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii[a] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’ 


36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” 


 37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.” Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”


Sometimes I wish Jesus were still around so I could ask a few question.  Like - what happened to the wounded man?  Did he recover?  Did he thank the Good Samaritan? Did he go forth and never fall again into harm's way?


Or did he retrace his steps and fall back into the ditch?  Did he go down the same road and make the same mistakes that got him there in the first place?  Did he run into another group of robbers?  Did he jump back into his ditch because that was the life he knew?  How many denarii did the innkeeper end up with? At what point does the traveller have to take responsibility for his own path?


Just asking.

Morning Prayer - Augustine

Give Thyself unto me, O my God, restore Thyself unto me: behold I love, and if it be too little, I would love more strongly...

In Thy Gift we rest; there we enjoy Thee. Our rest is our place. Love lifts us up thither, and Thy good Spirit lifts up our lowliness from the gates of death. In Thy good pleasure is our peace.

The body by its own weight strives towards its own place. Weight makes not downward only, but to his own place. Fire tends upward, a stone downward. They are urged by their own weight, they seek their own places. Oil poured below water, is raised above the water; water poured upon oil, sinks below the oil. They are urged by their own weights to seek their own places. When out of their order, they are restless; restored to order, they are at rest.

My weight, is my love; thereby am I borne, whithersoever I am borne. We are inflamed, by Thy Gift we are kindled; and are carried upwards; we glow inwardly, and go forwards. We ascend Thy ways that be in our heart, and sing a song of degrees; we glow inwardly with Thy fire, with Thy good fire, and we go; because we go upwards to the peace of Jerusalem: for gladdened was I in those who said unto me, We will go up to the house of the Lord. There hath Thy good pleasure placed us, that we may desire nothing else, but to abide there for ever.

-- Augustine, from the "Confessions" (Chapter 8 to 11, excerpts)

I'm here for an argument

Man: Ah. I'd like to have an argument, please.
Receptionist: Certainly sir. Have you been here before?
Man: No, I haven't, this is my first time.
Receptionist: I see. Well, do you want to have just one argument, or were you thinking of taking a course?
(Monty Python's Argument Sketch)

I've been thinking quite a bit about all that happened in Tampa during General Conference 2012.  I don't really think anything new happened.  We just had a nice course of 10 arguments for 8 pounds.  The same course of 10 that we had 4 years ago and 4 years before that and 4 years before that and so on. It gets to be rather predictable. And of course, some of the arguments are just plain contradiction by contrary people.

I get tired of the same arguments over and over again.  It gets to the point where I feel we can just play a tape and not truly engage with one another.  They are going to say *this* and then I will say *that* and that will cause them to say *this other thing* and I will counter with *another that*.

I could list the arguments I get tired of, as I am sure you could as well. I even get tired of the "2 space after a period" argument or the "em dash" argument.  Arguing, of course, is a hallmark for Methodists - and well, maybe even Americans.  "Everyone is entitled to their opinion" is tossed away before people are hit with the discount button.

I've been reading the text for the week and preparing my sermon (John 17:6-19.)  It's Jesus' prayer for the people of this world.  (Of course now comes the argument if it's Jesus' or Jesus's.) I have entitled it "In the World, Not Of It" (how many times has *that* sermon title been used?) I was getting along swimmingly (really) until I get to that phrase "so that they may be one, as we are one" and I have to take a step back.  What would it mean if all of us Christians in the world (much less us Methodists) were ONE as Christ and the Father are ONE?

And it's not harmony I'm talking about - that we all be the same texture and consistency (that would be bland, IMHO.)  I'm talking about how Jesus prays that we are ONE as the Trinity is ONE.  And that kind of blows my mind.  To be of one substance, of one accord.  Real and honest unity.  I don't think we would ever give up the arguing, except maybe it would be transformed into discourse.  But I think it would mean that we would have to really and truly engage with one another and lend to one another dignity and respect.  I think we might have to listen more than we talk.

Of course, I'm an idealist.  But if Jesus prayed it for this world, maybe I can. May we all be ONE as Jesus and the Creator are ONE.  So be it. Amen.

Morning Prayer - A Prayer of St. Thomas Aquinas

Grant me, O Lord my God,
a mind to know you,
a heart to seek you,
wisdom to find you,
conduct pleasing to you,
faithful perseverance in waiting for you,
and a hope of finally embracing you. Amen.

Morning Prayer - Have a little patience - Soren Kierkegaard

Father in Heaven!
Show us a little patience
for we often intend in all sincerity to commune with You
and yet we speak in such a foolish fashion.

Sometimes,
when we judge that what has come to us is good,
we do not have enough words to thank You;
just as a mistaken child is thankful for having gotten his own way.

Sometimes
things go so badly that we call upon You;
just as an unreasoning child fears what would do him good.

Oh, but if we are so childish,
how far from being Your true children
You who are our true Father, ah, as if an animal
would pretend to have a man as a father.

How childish we are
and how little our proposals and our language resemble
the language which should not be this way and that we should be otherwise. Have then a little patience with us.


-- Soren Kierkegaard

Morning Prayer - Kierkegaard - You Have Loved Us First

Father in Heaven! 
You have loved us first, 
     help us never to forget that 
     You are love so that this sure conviction 
          might triumph in our hearts 
          over the seduction of the world, 
          over the inquietude of the soul, 
          over the anxiety for the future, 
          over the fright of the past, 
          over the distress of the moment. 


But grant also that this conviction 
     might discipline our soul so that our heart 
     might remain faithful and sincere 
            in the love which we bear 
            to all those whom You have commanded 
            us to love as we love ourselves.


You have loved us first, O God, alas! 
     We speak of it in terms of history 
     as if You have only loved us first but a single time, 
     rather than that without ceasing.


You have loved us first 
      many things and 
      every day and 
      our whole life through. 


When we wake up in the morning 
      and turn our soul toward You - 
          You are the first - 
          You have loved us first; 
if I rise at dawn and at the same second turn my soul toward
      You in prayer, 
      You are there ahead of me, 
      You have loved me first. 


When I withdraw from the distractions of the day 
      and turn my soul toward You, 
      You are the first and thus forever. 
      And yet we always speak ungratefully 
as if You have loved us first only once.


--Soren Kierkegaard

Morning Prayer - Soren Kierkegaard - You Who Are Unchangable

You who are unchangeable, 
        whom nothing changes! 
You who are unchangeable in love, 
        precisely for our welfare, 
        not submitting to any change: 


May we too will our welfare, 
        submitting ourselves to the discipline 
        of Your unchangeableness, 
So that we may in unconditional obedience 
        find our rest and remain at rest in Your unchangeableness. 


You are not like us;
       if we are to preserve only some degree of constancy, 
       we must not permit ourselves too much to be moved, 
       nor by too many things. 


You on the contrary are moved, 
       and moved in infinite love, 
       by all things. 
Even that which we humans beings 
       call an insignificant trifle, 
       and pass by unmoved, 
       the need of a sparrow, even this moved You; 
And what we so often scarcely notice, 
        a human sigh, this moves You, 
       You who are unchangeable! 


You who in infinite love do submit to be moved, 
       may this our prayer also move You to add Your blessing, 
       in order that there may be brought about such a change
       in us who pray as to bring us into conformity 
       with Your unchangeable will,


You who are unchangeable! 


-- Soren Kierkegaard

A prayer of St Anselm

Lord Jesus Christ; Let me seek you by desiring you,
and let me desire you by seeking you;
let me find you by loving you,
and love you in finding you.

I confess, Lord, with thanksgiving,
that you have made me in your image,
so that I can remember you, think of you, and love you.

But that image is so worn and blotted out by faults,
and darkened by the smoke of sin,
that it cannot do that for which it was made,
unless you renew and refashion it.

Lord, I am not trying to make my way to your height,
for my understanding is in no way equal to that,
but I do desire to understand a little of your truth
which my heart already believes and loves.

I do not seek to understand so that I can believe,
but I believe so that I may understand;
and what is more,
I believe that unless I do believe, I shall not understand.

from: The Oxford Book of Prayer, George Appleton ed., 2002.

Give my regards to Tampa.

Yesterday we the UMC General Conference voted to not divest themselves of companies doing business with Israel.  We've also voted in a "Plan UMC" that has now gone to Judicial Council to judge its constitutionality.  Today is a big day in that they will be discussion issues of human sexuality.  Westboro Baptist may be there, just to add some spice into the mix.

I haven't been following like I would want because I have to attend to all the other details of life: hospital visits, nursing home visits, bulletins, phone calls, writing liturgy among others - and then the details of life like laundry and dinner.

In some ways, what is happening in Tampa seems so far removed from "real life" yet I know that what is decided will be a factor in the way that ministry will be done in the future.  What's happening in Tampa is exciting and interesting and seems so urgent, until real life pulls me back in and its urgency and importance fades away.

We've had General Conferences before - we will have them in the future.  But babies will continue to be born and people will continue to die.  And somewhere in the middle they will live their lives.  The Methodist church will continue on regardless, somehow in the midst.  It may morph and change a bit over time.  We may or may not get new hymnals - eventually.  We may or may not be associated with certain churches in Sweden.  We may or may not affirm certain type of ministry by certain types of people (I do believe it will happen sooner than later.)  We will continue on.  We will change.

But one think I do know will not change: God's love for us will continue.  Of that I have complete faith.  God's will WILL be done, even if we manage to get in God's way.  This is something I know. God is already here regardless if we asked for God's presence or not.  And God will continue to show up.

So give my regards to Tampa today.  I'm praying for the delegates, the pages, the monitors, the Bishops, the observers - for them all.