Friday afternoon, I was riding down one of those long, busy, over-developed streets with all the big box stores, fast food chains, pawn shops, several banks and a church or two thrown in for good measure. I was day dreaming, trying to reconstruct my ‘to-buy’ list in my head, since I’d left it laying on the kitchen table when I rushed out of the house.

While my mind was otherwise engaged, my eyes focused on a bus stop as I drove along . Sitting on the bench, waiting for the bus, was…….. a clown. Long bell-bottom red pants with wide white stripes, big, bright yellow shoes, an over sized yellow bow tie, and a hot pink curly wig. White face and bright red lips completed the picture. A clown….waiting for a bus. I laughed out loud. It was just what I needed to jar me out of the mundane, errand running day.A clown riding the bus!

I began to wonder…..did the clown’s car break down and they had a show to do, a parade to be in so they ran to the nearest bus stop? Or is this a clown that always takes the bus? Then I wondered….what did the people on the bus do when a clown boarded the bus? Did they laugh….turn the other way…try not to stare? Were the children on the bus looking around to see if there was about to be a party in their honor? I wanted to follow the bus to watch their reactions.

I felt blessed seeing that clown. It reminded me that every day extraordinary things happen. Every day we can see and experience amazing things we never expected……..on an ordinary, errand running day, on a busy street like so many others. The trick is to stay awake and wait for the surprise.

Keep your eyes open today…..clowns could be waiting just around the corner…waiting for the bus.

"All guests who present themselves are to be welcomed as Christ, for he himself will say: "I was a stranger and you welcomed me."    The Rule of St. Benedict

I’ve been involved in many conversations lately that center around the concept of hospitality, of being a host. As a church staff we are exploring the notion of what it means to offer ‘radical hospitality’….a hospitality with arms stretched even wider than ‘welcome’, with a heart that offers itself to all…no holds barred. It is a fascinating idea to consider….what does hospitality really mean? What does it mean to say we welcome to our home….everyone…without exception? It is a conversation that has only just begun so I’ll keep you posted.

The conversation however did jog my imagination to times when I have been hosted well. I recall a time after a very cold and rainy camping and canoe trip on the Mississippi River. As we dragged our canoes out of the water near a farm that overlooked the Mississippi, the couple that lived nearby invited our soggy foursome into their home, offering us raspberries, freshly picked, swimming in a bowl of rich, white cream. They didn’t know us, we didn’t know them. They simply opened their home and offered what seemed like nectar from the gods. Radical hospitality.

I remember visiting my Aunt Enie at her farm. She was not wealthy in material things but she had a kitchen table that was always laden with the freshest things from the garden, plenty of coffee and sugary ‘sweet tea’ and always an empty chair….for whoever stopped by. If she didn’t already have a pie or cake resting under white cotton dishtowels,waiting to be sliced, she would go to her freezer and pull out ‘ice box cookies’ , cut into the roll and soon the kitchen, no, the whole house, would be filled with the aroma of freshly baking cookies. Radical hospitality.

And then there was my father’s funeral. As we gathered, filled with grief and loss, food began to show up at our door. Platters of coldcuts, loaves of bread, paper plates and cups…so we wouldn’t have to think about doing dishes…..even toilet paper. After the funeral, as we gathered in the church basement, this small church of less than a  hundred members, served everyone lunch…two long tables of hearty food and another of desserts…..each person had offered their ‘specialty’, their best dish out of their own kitchen, prepared by loving hands. Radical hospitality.

Hospitality remembered often centers around food. Whether literal food is involved or not, hospitality is an offering of nourishment….a being fed….of quenching thirst….of our ‘best’…out of our deep knowing that we have enough, more than enough through the grace of the Holy in our midst.

"The he took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. When they were satisfied, he told the disciples,"Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost." So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets."  John 6

This weekend….may you be hosted well….and may you also host well……..out of your abundance. Blessings to you……………..

Yesterday I followed a green minivan with a license plate that simply read "ANSWERS". It seemed to me a very bold statement to display on your car. Since I was following it for quite some time, I began to imagine what kind of answers the owner of this car might have. Was the driver a palm reader, fortune teller, a reader of tea leaves? Was the car being driven by a mathematician or scientist or maybe a Sudoku enthusiast? Or perhaps the person behind the wheel was religious professional of some sort-like myself- one who was certainly clearer about what they know than I am. Whatever the "answers" this person claims to have must be important….important enough to pay the extra cash for specialized license plates.

Are you a person more comfortable with answers or with questions? I’ve always been more a "question" person myself. I love questions. I love entering into the ebb and flow of questions, the process of thinking through all the possibilities that a questions poses. For me, questions and mystery go hand in hand and most often I find the sacred within the mystery.

One of my favorite quotes, which I come back to again and again comes from Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet. "Be patient toward all that is unresolved in your heart….Try to love the questions themselves….Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given because you would not be able to live them-and the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answers."

These words always remind me of the times I have tried to force the answers to the questions I am carrying….trying to make answers fit, rather than relaxing into the search, allowing a deeper truth to flow out of the Mystery. All the energy,the struggling, the pushing and pulling, trying to beat the answer out of the question, so I can "get on with my life"  Rather than just holding the question gently, trusting Spirit to walk with me into some greater experience of understanding,some deeper knowledge, I end up frustrated and exhausted with my own impatience.

Answers? Questions? Questions? Answers? The point, after all, is to live everything.

"For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part;then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. I Corinthians 13:12

"Seek the beginnings, learn from whence you came, and know the various earth of which you are made."
                                        Edwin Muir, Scottish poet from ‘The Journey’

Is there a place you long for, a literal place where you seem more at home than any other? Have you ever arrived in a new town or a place in the country and had that feeling of having come ‘home’? Is there a lake or a mountain that floats into your consciousness during the day, at the oddest of times, and brings you deep connection, deep peace?

There is an older movie, "A Trip to Bountiful", in which a woman longs so for her childhood farm that rests near the town of Bountiful that she makes a pilgrimage there. She takes off, without the knowledge of her doting children, and makes her way back to Bountiful and the land that was permanently imprinted in her memory, in her body, in her cells. She moves about the house and the land with a deep reverence, touching with gratitude all that is around her.In her waning years, she knew she must make a reconnection with the ground where she was shaped, the ground that held her life.

If we allow ourselves, we can become aware of those places that call to us….those that connect in deeper ways than others…to the very heart of our being. Sometimes these places are literally the home where we were born, our birthplace, and sometimes it is the land of our ancestors. If we have the privilege to travel we can often see how our ancestors that came to this country settled in areas that looked a great deal like those they left behind. The first time I traveled to Wales I was struck with how much the countryside in southern Ohio, my birthplace, looked like the Welsh hills. When I traveled to Norway, I was aware of the similarities between northern Minnesota and the lush, yet rugged, land of that Scandinavian country.

Where is your Bountiful? Where is the place that calls to your heart over and over? Where is your true Earth Home? Perhaps these places call to us in the way they do because we most fully experience the Holy there. Perhaps these places are our memory of Eden…..that place where we knew the true blessings of our home with God.

May this day bring you the experience of your true Earth Home…if not literally….then in  rich memory.

"Yet still from Eden springs the root, as clean as on the starting day."  Edwin Muir

Green is my favorite color. I’ve never particularly liked the color purple….the actual color…..I loved the book by the same name. But purple is all around me these days. The coneflowers are popping in our garden and the morning glories, with dedication each morning, welcome the day with their showy,brilliant,royal color….purple. This hue, derived from the combination of blood red and the blue of the sky has always been the symbol of royalty. It is the color used during the season of Lent which has always seemed a little odd to me, given that Jesus never wanted to be thought of as a king, as royalty. But those who make such decisions assigned this important season,meant to connect us with his life, death and resurrection, the color purple, the color of kings.

In ancient days, weavers of cloth, could make quite a living for themselves creating purple cloth. We read in Acts……"A certain woman, named Lydia, a worshiper of God, a dealer in purple cloth."….became one of the few female disciples to actually be named in the scriptures. Weaving purple cloth gained her ‘named status’ in accounts that often simply said ‘the women.’

There was book making its round in certain circles several years ago called When I Am An Old Woman, I Shall Wear Purple. Its message was not lost on me. As women age, they can become invisible to the world, so wearing purple says "Look at me! Here I am! Notice!"

But I would not wear purple to be noticed, not by humans anyway. I would wear purple so the butterflies would fly around me,as they are around the purple coneflowers in our garden. I would wear purple so they would gently land on my arms and my head and slowly open and close their wings, displaying for all the world to see, the grandeur of the intricate patterns that give them flight. I would wear purple and provide the safe, stopping off point for their graceful,illusive dance that brings even more beauty to an already exquisite summer day. I would wear purple so I could stand very still and allow these magificent symbols of resurrection a resting place…… they who have lived in the darkness of coccoons and have been born into the beautiful reality of the world deserve a royal landing.

"We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop."  Mother Teresa

This past Sunday’s scripture story was the Good Samaritan….a familiar story, even if you haven’t attended church much. We often see the term "good Samaritan" used in newspaper stories of people who help strangers in dangerous situations, sometimes to their own peril, other times to great reward. Someone’s car is stalled by the side of the road and a stranger stops to help them. A simple enough act. Another human being sees someone in distress and their reaction is to come to their aid….for a variety of reasons.

It is a story that has been heard at church for so long that it is easy to not fully listen, to daydream through hearing the familiar words. It goes like this….. A man is attacked by robbers, beaten and left for dead. Two people pass by and don’t want to get involved…..for a variety of reasons. Another person happens by and the text says "his heart goes out to him" and he bandages the wounds and takes the injured man to an inn and pays for his care and lodging. As far as we can tell from the story, the Samaritan has no desire for reward or recognition….he simply follows his heart.

Jesus tells this story in response to two questions: "What must we do to have life, eternally?" and "Who is my neighbor?" The question we might ask is, who was most transformed by what happened….the injured person or the Samaritan? Through the events of this story, whose life was changed the most….the injured person or the Samaritan…….who was really ‘saved’ here?

We can go through our daily lives being injured, being rescued, being left by the side of the road, being robbed. We can also be aware of those who need us to come to their aid…. with our words, our kindness, our presence, our rescue. The reality of life is that we will, at various times, be each of these characters. We never know then those times will come or how we will be invited to respond.

But if we live with open hearts, we can be ready to answer with confidence….this is my neighbor. And if we allow our open hearts to be filled with compassion, love and hope, we can also live…eternally.

"This is why we do it all again every year. It’s the visible daily growth, the marvelous and unaccountable accumulation of biomass that makes for the hallelujah of a July garden.                                                                             Barbara Kingsolver – Animal, Vegetable, Miracle:A Year of Food Life

This summer we purchased a share in a community sustainable agriculture farm. Through a friend who knows the farmers we plopped down some cash,’seed money’, excuse the pun, to be a part of group of people who receive fresh, organic vegetables on a weekly basis. Every Thursday evening we drive into a parking lot, pull up to a little blue station wagon that is loaded with coolers. Out of the back of the car, a friendly face calls out our names and we step forward to receive a bag of surprises. I have often wondered what passers-by think as they see us. What are those people doing? Is it legal?

Farming is tricky business. You plant and so many variables play into what you   
harvest…..sun,rain,heat,wind,storms,drought. It is a wonderful metaphor for so much of life. Since late May we have received mostly bags of leafy vegetables….spinach,dill and other herbs, lamb’s ear, clover,greens, and lots and lots of lettuce. While we tend to eat lots of salads, it is almost impossible to get through all the lettuce in one week and then, alas, more lettuce! The bounty can be staggering.

Last night, however, as I held my hand out with humility, I noticed the weight of the bag….heavy. Green leafiness protruded from the bag but there had to be something else with all that weight. I could hardly wait to get home to see what was inside. As I unloaded the bag onto the kitchen table, pushing aside still more lettuce, I found a gleaming white onion,a clump of brilliant red onions, bright red beets still fresh with earth, tiny, perfect cherry tomatoes and fragrant basil. The heaviest vegetables had, of course, fallen to the bottom of the bag…..zucchini…… both yellow and green. Knowing the prolific nature of this versatile squash, my mind projected ahead to what the next weeks will bring.

This collaboration with the farmers and others is about so much more than receiving the vegetables each week. It is about knowing the people who grow the food we put on the table and being thankful for their work.. It is about knowing that the lettuce I love did not take thousands of gallons of fossil fuel to get to our table. It is about the conversation and camaraderie that happens in the parking lot. And it is about the surprise, about receiving the offering of what the earth,through the labor and love of those who plannted and harvested, had to offer this week, in this season.

And so as July continues to unfold, I know there will be more and more zucchini and we will be challenged and blessed with finding new and different ways to prepare it. Barring a drastic shift in the weather, the bounty will continue to grow because that is the nature of July in Minnesota. Well into August we will continue to  drive into the parking lot and be handed our bag of  nutritious surprises. And then it will begin to trickle off once again just as it began and it will be time to put on warmer clothes, prepare our houses for winter, and close our doors to the bounty we have known.

The good news is that behind those closed doors, people will be poring over seed catalogues, planning for next summer, next July…..and more lettuce.

"For everything there is a season and a time for every matter under heaven….a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what it planted."  Ecclesiastes 3

Enjoy this beautiful weekend……………..

Do you have a ‘summer list’? Those things, activities, projects you want to accomplish this summer? Many students have a summer reading list. Do you have one? Is this the summer to tackle War and Peace, Mists of Avalon or the most recent Harry Potter, those incredibly thick books that would be too daunting, too overwhelming when snow and cold surround us? If you have a list, hopefully it is not completely filled up with things like..paint the garage…..rotate the tires….organize the linen closet…unless, of course, that gives you great pleasure.

Summer has always been, for me, the time of possibility, imagination, activities that lead to sheer pleasure. I was reminded of it yesterday as I listened to the young girls who are our backyard neighbors play. The one said:"Now we are in South Dakota." Somehow their swing set had been transformed into a wagon carrying them to the Great Plains……from the conversations I’ve heard flowing over the fence, it is clear this is the summer to read Laura Ingalls Wilder books. 

In front of our house another neighbor has had a large pile of black dirt delivered. It has not yet been distributed to its new home, so yesterday two of the younger boys claimed it as their own "mountain". They climbed, tried to ride their bikes on it and finally the smallest one simply crawled to the top and sat there….King of the Mountain! I wondered what was going through his mind….I hope they were summer thoughts…freedom,dreaming,thinking of what will be the next great thing to do.

Recently there have been many reports about how Americans don’t really take vacations, and when they do they take all the trappings of work with them. We have great difficulty disconnecting from our need to work and our technology allows us to blur the lines between recreation and work. It can be very easy to work all the time and not even realize it. There is, at least in my opinion, a certain amount of idolatry in living this way.

As a child, on summer days, I often went from my pajamas to my bathing suit and back again at the end of the day. It was a great change from the intensity of school work and the schedules of the rest of the year. In those days, I was able to read, play, rest, make things, spend time with family and friends, and simply be bored…not at all a bad thing. Out of that boredom I was moved to creative thinking.

In a file I have called "Words to Keep" I ran across a list of exercises mostly meant for nudging a writer out of writer’s block. The exercises included some ideas that may help engage you in some summer list making. Even if your vacation is long past, or will not happen this summer, here’s an invitation to capture the mind expanding joy of summer. Try a list of: 100 things I’m thankful for….100 things I would like to do in my life that I’ve not tried yet….100 places I’ve never traveled to but would like to…If I could fly I could(list)….If I were Superman/woman I could(list)…I wish I were a butterfly because(list)…The greatest joys in my life are(list them).

Go ahead, get something cool to drink, a pencil and paper and begin your list. Who knows….South Dakota could be calling….or you may get to be King- or Queen – of the Mountain!

"The Sufi tell about a spiritual elder who asked the disciples to name what was most important in life: wisdom or action? The disciples were unanimous in their opinions: "It’s action, of course," they said. "After all, of what use is wisdom that does not show itself in action?" "Well, perhaps," the master said, "but of what use is action that proceeds from an unenlightened heart?"
              – taken from How Shall We Live? by Joan Chittister, OSB

Wisdom or action? It is a compelling question. I believe, almost always, in our culture we choose action over wisdom. We are a "do" society….it is almost always better to do something…..anything….than to be in a place of inaction. This is true in work settings, in our daily lives, in our relationships, in our faith communities. To be perceived as "doing nothing" is seen as a weakness.

Yet we have all seen the repercussions of what happens when action ‘proceeds from an unenlightened heart.’ There is almost always back pedaling and  massive, painful cleanup involved.  From world politics and global conflicts to the encounters we have with difficult people and difficult job situations, how might the outcome be different if we took the time….and that’s what it takes…to discern and be open to an enlightened heart?

We do after all have a perfect role model for this: "Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness…..When Jesus had come down from the mountain.…That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea….After Jesus had left that place, he passed along the Sea of Galilee and he went up the mountain, where he sat down..……The Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane and he said to his disciples:"Sit here while I go over there and pray." Jesus always preceded action with the time and space to seek after wisdom.

Summer days can be all filled up with action, lots and lots of action. But they can also be a time when we can take moments  to be open to the movement of the Holy that lead us to the wisdom of the enlightened heart. The beautiful flowers and plants blooming around us in this season come to us, not through action of the immediate but from the slow, methodical process of growing and reaching toward the Source of All.

Wisdom or action? What do you think?

On July 3rd my tear off calendar carried these words: Proverbs are short sentences drawn from long experience. Those words caused me to remember the summer my worshiping community spent exploring the Book of Proverbs through our worship. We found these ancient words insightful and helpful, sometimes confusing, sometimes even humorous. But one of the over arching sentiments was the feeling that at some point in time these words "drawn from long experience" had informed the lives of real people, had spoken to their real-life experience and had given them instruction and wisdom for living.

Here are just a few: Honor God with your substance and with the first fruits of all your produce, then your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will be bursting with wine……..The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom and whatever else you get, get insight………Do not enter the path of the wicked, and do not walk in the way of evildoers………….My child, keep your father’s commandment and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. Bind them upon your heart always, tie them around your neck…….Whoever belittles another lacks sense, but an intelligent person remains silent…....A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger……..One who forgives an affront fosters friendship, but one who dwells on disputes will alienate a friend……..A gossip reveals secrets-therefore do not associate with a babbler..….A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver…..Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.

Proverbs is a fascinating book to read through. It is rare that we read it in the course of worship or scripture study. I commend it to you. Most of the pithy statements are timeless. As we explored these ancient words, it led us to think about what proverbs guide our 21st century lives. What are our present day proverbs? What legacy of wisdom will we leave for future generations? How will we record the lessons we’ve learned ‘from long experience’?

Give it some thought…..write them down and tuck them someplace that in days to come, someone you know may find them. They might appreciate your wisdom and the fruit of your experience.