"O Beauty, ever ancient, ever new. Too late have I loved you. I was outside and you were within me, and I never found you until I found you within myself." St. Augustine

The last few days I have been reading the offerings people have made for our upcoming Advent devotional. This is always a very holy time for me. The process begins with a theme being chosen, a few words that invite people to reflection, prayer and then the writing. Many people write original work. Still others know that they have just the perfect poem or prayer tucked away in those places we tuck things we want to keep forever.

This year's theme is "Journey in the Heartbeat of God." In some ways it is more abstract than others we have chosen. The theme has prompted several phone calls asking:"Now let me see if I understand where you want us to go. Is this what you meant"? The conversation plays out and the caller heads off to write. I personally find the process overwhelmingly exciting. To put only a few words out there to which people can respond and then to receive such lovely and inspiring words is a gift. Though most people don't think of it this way, I see it as an an of spiritual formation. When people really respond to the words from their own faith perspective, their own experience of God, they come to know and articulate for others a glimpse into their spiritual selves. Writer and reader are transformed in the process.

This year our devotional will be graced by the lovely artwork of one of our members, Amanda Hunter. Amanda's art will mirror the very large banners that will hang in our sanctuary beginning the first Sunday of Advent. Her visual interpretation of incarnation, God with and within, is strikingly beautiful. It will challenge some to perhaps open their understanding of God's presence among us.

As for me, I have seen that God-within present in the stories people have told. I have seen the grace and transformation experienced in the poetry people have written. I have been blessed by the journey of this creative process which is, itself, infused with the Heartbeat of God.

The devotional will be available on-line so watch for it. In the meantime, you are invited to also reflect upon what "Journey In the Heartbeat of God" means to you. I suspect your spirit may be renewed in the reflection.

Have a blessed weekend…………………….

"……But here we are, working our way down the driveway,
one shovelful at a time.
We toss the light powder into the clear air.
We feel the cold mist on our faces.
And with every heave we disappear
and become lost to each other
in these sudden clouds of our own making,
these fountain-bursts of snow.

This is so much better than a sermon in church,
I say out loud, but Buddha keeps on shoveling.
This is the true religion, the religion of snow,
and sunlight and winter geese barking in the sky,
I say, but he is too busy to hear me……."
~Billy Collins

I hit the alarm and drifted back asleep only to wake up with the clear sense that something was different about this morning. As my eyes adjusted to wakefulness I realized that the usual morning light was tinged with blue. I sat up and looked out the window to see the rooftop covered with snow, the breaking morning reflecting off its whiteness causing that unnameable blue when sky and snowy ground meet. It was really only a couple of inches of snow, and it will be gone probably by the end of the day, but nevertheless it is the first snow of the season. A day to mark on the calendar which some will celebrate while others curse.

This excerpt of the poem Shoveling Snow with Buddha calls to mind, I think, one of the great gifts of snow and the winter months. Snow calls us to a contemplative place, allows us to see water and its gifts in a new way, as something solid, fluffy, malleable. What usually drips, floats, or evaporates, becomes visible and lasting…at least for awhile. Snow causes us to slow down, to stare into the middle distance. As I look out my window right now the flakes, clumped together in community, sit precariously on the now bare branches of the trees. Their whiteness provides dressing where leaves have let go. I somehow think it must be comforting to the trees.

We've just come through a very intense time. Elections are over for the most part. The economy still rests on a roller coaster. Thanksgiving will be here in a few days and the Christmas season is visible in malls everywhere. And so it seems the contemplative snow has arrived just in time. Just in time to slow us down, to encourage us to walk more gently because are footsteps can become so very visible. The snow has come just in time to remind us that water can wash us clean and can also blanket us with beauty. Like most things, it has many properties, some we can see and others that are only visible to us at very special times.It is good to be reminded.

Sometimes it take the poets and the Buddhists among us help us to remember to stay in the present moment long enough to learn the lesson.

"Life
will break you.  Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone
won't either, for solitude will also break you with it's yearning.  You
have to love.  You have to feel.  It is the reason you are here on
earth.  You are here to risk your heart.  You are here to be swallowed
up.  And when it happens that you are broken or betrayed, or left, or
hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and
listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their
sweetness.  Tell yourself that you tasted as many as you could."

~Louise Erdrich, The Painted Drum

A friend sent this quote to me after we mined the metaphor of story and its importance in our lives during our worship yesterday. They are beautiful words, ones to be read over and over, rolling them around in both mouth and mind. They speak to what it means to live, truly live and to come to those important moments of truth and to walk from them with little or no regret. How many of us cane say we do this? I know I have many times, at least in the small moments of my days, when I can dance the steps of regret. Oh, if only I had said this, done that, felt this way, thought this thought. It is a path of little joy.

These past days I have been in the ever moving process of saying goodbye to a friend and colleague who is moving away from Minnesota. At the least little word or memory, we can dissolve into tears…some of laughter and some of sadness. There is no way of out running the ways in which life will break us. But if our loving has been real and our feeling has been full, the breaking seems somehow worth it all. It brings meaning, real meaning, to our lives. It is not a sentimental meaning, like a well crafted Hallmark card poem framed in lace and meant to be preserved between the well kept pages of a heavy book.. It is the loving and feeling of risk….heart-risk….which is most often messy and leaves us ripped and our edges torn but feeling more alive than is believable. This kind of loving,this kind of risk means we've really given our selves to another, to the world, which is probably the true definition of living.

The trees in Minnesota have lost all their leaves now. They stand like naked sentinels connecting Earth with Heaven. Their leaves have fallen, been blown away and are beginning this very moment to nurture the soil beneath their trunks. I pray that I have been as present to the beauty of the spring, summer and fall of 2008 as I could. When spring arrives next year, my friend will not be here to see the buds open on the Minnesota birch and maples. As she goes on to new adventures in a place where spring comes much earlier and lasts much longer, it is the sweetness of friendship I will remember…..and feel blessed.

"Eternal God, lead me now out of the familiar setting of my doubts and fears, beyond my pride and and my need to be secure into a strange and graceful ease with my true proportions and with yours; that in boundless silence I may grow strong enough to endure and flexible enough to share your grace."  ~ Ted Loder

This week Eboo Patel spoke at our church. Mr. Patel is founder and executive director of the Interfaith Youth Core, a Chicago-based international nonprofit that promotes interfaith cooperation. Hundreds of young people and others of all ages streamed into our sanctuary on Wednesday evening to hear him speak. The space was buzzing with excitement.

On Thursday morning I heard Mr. Patel make this statement: "Hope is free. Fear is very expensive." I was listening to him in an interviewed on Minnesota Public Radio. He spoke quite eloquently about the need for interfaith dialogue and experiences for all people, youth especially, as they become the leaders of tomorrow.. But it was this statement that stayed with me, that caused me to dissect it and examine the truth in it.

Hope is free. Hope is primarily a function of imaginative faith.Hope causes us to open our arms, our minds and our hearts to something that is not yet realized. It costs us nothing but has the ability to produce amazing returns. Hope is something we rest in, something we long for, something we cannot buy but can give birth to. Hope expands us.

Fear on the other hand causes us to begin to accumulate an arsenal, to build fences, to close off the doors of who we are. In doing so, we lose our sensibilities and isolate ourselves. Fear leads us to be suspicious, to cut people out of our lives, to make our world smaller and smaller. Fear causes some to buy guns, others to medicate themselves in unhealthy ways, and still others to lash out with little understanding of those perceived to be 'different', 'dangerous'. It starts with one person and breeds but instead of causing growth it instead causes stagnation.  We have seen its effects in individual lives, in the lives of our country and the world. Fear is, indeed, expensive.

Perhaps the costly nature of fear is what led those who wrote the Bible to write these particular words more than any other: "Do not be afraid."  The angels say it, the psalmists, the prophets, the disciples and Jesus say it over and over again. "Do not be afraid." It is too great an expense in a life meant to be lived fully, with joy and thanksgiving, grace and compassion. "Do not be afraid. "

Winter seems to have made an entrance in Minnesota this morning…..enjoy the weekend.

"From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded." Luke 12:48

In the church, right before Thanksgiving and before Advent is the time known to most as stewardship season. It the time of year when churches go to their communities and ask for each household's financial pledge for the following year. Each church does this somewhat differently but with the same goal: to create a budget for the coming year that will match the dreams for ministry of the congregation. The church staff and those who are involved in the ministries of any given congregation are aware of the needs of their neighborhoods, the church members,and  those who seek solace within their sanctuaries.Most churches are also involved in ministries that take them far away from their own life experiences to places of great need in the world. Each community discerns this financial need through their understanding of God's call in the life of their church.

This year in particular could be a challenging time in the life of any church. As we see the great needs around us, we also see people in our community losing their jobs while others watch the money they had counted on dribble away. We simply don't know what the next year will hold from an economic standpoint. How might life be different this time next year, for instance?

The truth is we have never known the answer to that question. We can only speculate, act wisely and be prayerful in our living. As I have been thinking about these acts of stewardship which we make, I remembered my Mother's words to me which were actually the words of Jesus: "To whom much has been given, much will be required." She said it most often when I was complaining about something I didn't want to do, something I wanted to ignore. In saying it she always reminded me of the gifts of my life. Though those gifts were most often not monetary, she reminded me of the many gifts I had that others didn't….a loving home, adequate food, a good education, a faithful community. She reminded me that because of the blessings of my life I was asked to share myself with others, that I had a responsibility to share the resources of my life with the world.

In Eugene Peterson's interpretation of this scripture verse, he has Jesus sharing these words: "Great gifts mean great responsibilities; greater gifts, greater responsibilities! "  How we use what we have been given, some which we never worked to attain but were just passed on to us, is a huge responsibility. How we choose to share the bounty of our lives is also a gift.  A gift to be shared.

"Didn't you love the things that they stood for?
Didn't they try to find some good for you and me?"
          ~Dion

Today, in some ways, is a day of reflection. I grew up on the idealism of Martin Luther King Jr., Robert Kennedy, John Kennedy and the songwriters of the songs of the '60s. At a time when my view of the world was most malleable, these were the voices that inspired me. The words of these people, full of what a more peaceful, unified world might look like were planted deep in the rich soil of my evolving adulthood. Because I was also an odd adolescent, in love with the church, I interpreted the messages of these leaders in light of my faith, my understanding of this illusive community of God. Some of this happened consciously, most happened without my even knowing. I dreamed, along with Dr. King, of a world in which race would not be an issue, where all people would work together for a time of peace. From my faith perspective this was in line with what I understood to be the call of God on each of our lives.

Waking up this morning I found myself thinking about that young girl, wide eyes, open heart, ready to take giant steps in the world. I am not sure I ever thought about a day when the country I call home, the country I love, would take the steps to elect a person of color to the highest office in our land. As I watched the images of celebrations across the country last night, young, fresh, faces full of their future, I felt once again that sense of hope and possibility, the belief in being able to change the world, perhaps being able to realize a time when the things that divide us will become immaterial in the pursuit of the common good.

I thought of my high school friend, Marlene Cofer. Marlene was a tall, lanky light skinned African American who loved language. She moved through a room with grace and class, quietly being a presence in a room. I will not make any claims that we were 'best friends'. That was not a real possibility in a small town in southern Ohio during my teen years. It just wasn't done. But we shared a love of reading, of poetry. When I was with her I had the sense that I was a part of something fuller than when I was with only my white friends. At a high school reunion a few years ago Marlene arrived with a thick anthology of poetry in which her work had been included. There were no other published authors in our class. I was so proud of her for being persistent, for continuing to pursue what she loved while working as a bank teller.

Not long after that reunion, I learned that Marlene had died of a rare and fast moving cancer. Her beautiful voice, her graceful presence had been silenced. But not before it was preserved in the black and white writers chase their whole lives.

In Marlene's presence I knew a fuller picture of what it means to be the whole people of God. In my adult years I have known that experience many more times, I am happy to say. And now, perhaps as a country, we might also open our eyes and our hearts to what it means to be the fullness of the American people.

It seems the seeds those powerful voices planted in my soul continue to find ways to be reborn.

"I've always felt, in all my books, that there's a
deep decency in the American people and a native intelligence –
providing they have the facts, providing they have the information." ~Studs Terkel

I think I was in college when I read Studs Terkel's book Working, a series of interviews with people about their daily work. The stories of a teacher, construction worker, nurse, and newspaper boy, to name a few, captured my attention. Later when it was turned into a successful musical by the same name fueled the notion that the work we do is really the art of our living. With our work we paint the picture of what it means to be the people of the day and time of our time in history.

In the book, Mr. Terkel, through these interviews, paints some very real pictures of people's dreams and disappointments, their hopes for their future and those places of great joy. After reading this book, I will never see a construction worker using a jackhammer and not remember the account of the man who comes home from work, dirty and tired, to sit in his recliner and watch the much-needed respite of television. As he sits his body still drums with the rhythm of the hammer that shaped his day. His body, internally, never stops the incessant thumping.

And then there is the story of the young boy who delivered the morning newspaper in his neighborhood. Riding his bike, the freedom of the early morning pulsing in his veins, he winds up with the power of a major league pitcher, throwing the paper toward the doorstep of the houses. His joy? To hear the sound of "boing!" as the paper hits its landing.

Studs Terkel died this past week at the age of 96.He lived a good life in which he said his work was "listening to what people tell me." He documented the context in which people lived. In so doing he made their lives real to the rest of us, making them somehow more human, more understandable.

Tomorrow we head to the election polls. As we do, each of us carries with us the context of our lives, our work and those values, beliefs, hopes and dreams that have shaped us. This will guide how we vote and for whom. It can really be no other way. In some ways it is like the real estate adage, it is 'location, location, location." I had a seminary professor who said we shape our theology in much the same way. Our location, where we live, our work, our life experiences,shapes what we believe and what we don't, and guides our understanding of God.

The real task of being a citizen is to try as much as we can to see, not just our own lives, but the lives of others, the whole of what it means to be the most privileged country in the world, as we make our choices. The real task is to look toward what will be the good for all the people and not just our own particular context. It is a difficult thing to do. But if being a citizen of the United States of American means anything it must mean that we work in all the ways we can to be just that….united.

It is a privilege not to be taken lightly. Vote.

So here we are. We have a choice to make. ~Studs Terkel

In the musical "Mame", Auntie Mame calls her friends together and sings the song "We Need a little Christmas, right this very minute. Candles in the window, carols at the Spinet." In response to the gloom and doom of the Great Depression, Mame decorates her house with holly, colored lights and a Christmas tree to pull those around her out of the funk they are feeling. At the end of the song everyone is happier, feels closer and finds once again something worth celebrating.

As we've approached this day, October 31st – Halloween, I've been thinking that we need a little Halloween. It is wonderful that Halloween falls on a Friday this year. Children will not need to get up early for school tomorrow. They can fall asleep in their costumes if their parents will allow it. Most adults will not be going to work tomorrow and can stay up helping categorize the candy loot until the wee hours as they talk the young ones out of the more sophisticated chocolate that has landed in their bags. We need a little Halloween to give us a break from the political rhetoric and the economic roller coaster on which we find ourselves.Plainly put, we need a little diversion, a little fun.

Halloween provides that rare opportunity for children to rule. The adults who prepare costumes and dress these children inevitably remember the Halloweens of their past…that mummy costume that kept unraveling at the Girl Scout party while doing the "Monster Mash"…the plate of peeled grapes, passed around in the dark  while a scary story was told,meant to be eyeballs….the unbridled freedom felt as we ran from door to door in the dark, parents standing just in the shadows, protection but an arm's length away. It is a night of pure fun with no hidden agenda.

It is also a night when, for a few brief hours, the children and the child-like, can don costumes that allow them to get in touch with an inner desire or confront their deepest fears. Super heroes make their way through neighborhoods fighting crime along side vampires and angels. Peter Pan flies near the witches, both with the longing to 'never grow up.' Clowns hold the flashlight while their Princess friends lift skirts that are just a bit too long, both moving toward the next door which will provide another sweet treat. And those who greet them hold memories of similar costumes and a familiar joy that really only comes once a year.

It is a simple holiday, one that doesn't ask much of us. A mask, some well placed cloth, perhaps a little makeup. A few small pieces of candy. Tonight all this will add up to some much needed happiness.

Tomorrow we can get back to the important work of elections and stock markets. But tonight….let's fly!

Have a wonderful weekend…..remember to turn your clocks back and enjoy that extra hour of sleep….

“Blessed are those who know their need
for theirs is the grace of heaven.
Blessed are the humble
for they are close to the sacred earth.
Blessed are those who weep
for their tears will be wiped away.
Blessed are the forgiving
for they are free.
Blessed are those who hunger for earth’s oneness
for they will be satisfied.
Blessed are the clear in heart
for they see the Living Presence.
Blessed are those who suffer for what is right
for theirs is the strength of heaven.
Blessed are the peacemakers
for they are born of God.”

~ The Casa del Sol Blessings of Jesus

This Sunday is the celebration of All Saints in the protestant churches, the day when we name and mark those saints living and departed who have graced our lives. This particular Sunday the scripture reading from the Christian texts is what we commonly call The Beatitudes. These sayings of Jesus to the people gathered at the Sermon on the Mount are some of the most beloved words in the Bible. The reading above is certainly an adaptation by a group of people who looked long and hard at what Jesus’ words meant and what they mean. They are printed at the beginning of J. Philip Newell’s book Christ of the Celts: The Healing of Creation.

The poetry of the beatitudes is beautiful. But I think that one of the reasons we love this scripture so much is that in it we can find ourselves and we can be affirmed that Jesus is talking to us. He is talking to us, including us, in all our neediness, our brokenness, our strength, our passions, our dreams. He is talking to us, naming the deepest part of who we are right here, right now, and then blessing the steps we are taking, blessing our life’s journey. And depending on the day, we might see our path as one of peacemaker or one who needs our tears wiped away. It changes all the time with all the twists and turns of living…..but the blessing remains.

As I look out my window right now, the autumn day is breathtaking. As I walked into the building, people I passed remarked on the beauty of this day, how lucky we are. Lucky, maybe. Blessed, certainly. These are the days we mark and tuck away in our memory for those cold, gray, dark days of March when the bloom has worn off the winter wonder. It is easy on a day like today to know what it means to be blessed. Of course, this is not always the case and we need reminders…from ourselves, from friends, from family, from the words of the scriptures.

How are you being blessed today? What are the circumstances of your life that direct how you are walking in the world? When I was younger we used to sing a song:”Count your blessings, name them one by one.” It is a good exercise to take stock of how we are blessed. In taking stock we come to see ourselves as a part of those who seek to recognize the holy within our days, within our living. It is, perhaps, a good first step in walking the way of the saints.

This morning I heard singer-songwriter k.d.lang on Good Morning America. She made a statement that went something like:"Sometimes you just need to whisper." She was referring to her experience in a recording studio. Her claim is that 'whispering' creates an intimacy in singing that draws people in a way that full voice can't produce.

I liked this idea because I know it to be true. In fact, any good teacher, or parent for that matter, knows that whispering often gets greater attention that raising one's voice. Whispering causes people to lean in, to look you in the eye, to read your lips. Whispering causes the pulse to slow and the senses to be open. The wonderful thing is that it also causes the same reaction in the one who is listening. It seems to me that some of our fellow citizens who are running for office might take note of this and employ a whisper now and then.

While k.d. lang was singing her whispering tune, the camera panned out and I got a glimpse of her whole body. She was barefoot!  No one made mention of it. Maybe it is her common practice as a performer, I don't know. But I was drawn to the idea of this powerful singer, getting her stage persona on, her performing clothes all in place and then, like Moses beholding the burning bush, removing her shoes.

 I was drawn to it for a reason. You see, there are certain places, our church sanctuary for one, in which, when I preach, I have to remove my shoes. I can go into the service in shoes but when it comes time to preach, I walk to the pulpit, step up and remove my shoes. Only certain choir members are aware of it. Removing my shoes helps me to remember to stay grounded, to stand firm, to know that each moment places us on holy ground. It also helps me to not be swayed by the overwhelming beauty of the place, the stain glass windows, the soaring music, the immensity of space. Removing my shoes reminds me of my humanness, my small space in the vastness of it all. Clearly put, removing my shoes helps me to be humble in my words and intention, remembering that the gift of the words are a gift of the Spirit.

These are times, I believe, that call for more whispering. They are also times that might be improved with a few bare feet. It's just a thought.