Turning Despair Around

"The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or

confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, 

who can tolerate not knowing... not healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares."

(Henri Nouwen)

Have you ever thought, "I don't know how much more I can take?"

There is an "at my wit's end" flavor to such thoughts, and it is a dangerous place to be. There are times in life when the stresses we experience threaten to overwhelm us, pressures and expectations swamping the boat of our being. The demands of our job, our commitments (or over-commitments) to community endeavors, the needs of our family and other relationships - add all of this up and there is a very real possibility that we may feel that we are unable to cope.

Sad thing is, when this happens we often think that we are the only person on earth experiencing it. Everyone else is walking around looking like they are holding it all together, and we're falling to pieces. So we don't talk about it, we paint on the "I'm fine" face and we continue to crumble on the inside where nobody can see.

If you, or someone you know, is experiencing this kind of stress then I want to give you some encouragement. Find someone to talk with - a friend, a counselor, a pastor, and tell them how you feel. Even if you are embarrassed or ashamed, dig deep and find the courage to open up - simply sharing our feelings with someone we trust can bring a world of healing to us. 

And then cut back - carve a little space into your life so that you can breathe and have some rest. Let go of, or take a leave of absence from committees or other volunteer work, cut back on work hours for a while if you are able, ask a friend or relative to provide some relief from parenting... wherever or however, create some healing space in your life and do those things that rejuvenate you.

You see, you are worth it because there is only one "you" on this earth, and nobody can replace you. And seeing as how God took such tremendous care to create you with all of your gifts and wisdom and love - we don't want to lose you.

"What we call our despair is often only the painful eagerness of unfed hope. '

(George Eliot)

There is no loss, no stress, no expectation that is so significant that you cannot survive, and even thrive in the face of it; but you will need love and support to do so. Reach out and find that support so that you may be the best you that you can be. At the very least, if you don't know where to turn, call me and we'll work together to find your road to renewal.

I leave the last word to the Psalmist:

Is anyone crying for help?

God is listening, ready to rescue you.

If your heart is broken, you’ll find God right there;

if you’re kicked in the gut, he’ll help you catch your breath.

Disciples so often get into trouble;

still, God is there every time.

He’s your bodyguard, shielding every bone;

not even a finger gets broken.

(Psalm 34.17-20, The Message)

Pax,

Pastor Bill

[First published October 17, 2012]

No Difference

“The only difference between man and man all the world over

 is one of degree, and not of kind, 

even as there is between trees of the same species.

Where in is the cause for anger, envy or discrimination?” 

(Mahatma Gandhi)

I have grown up in a culture pregnant with prejudice. As a child I learned (not from my parents, mind you) some rather distasteful ideas about our First-Nations brothers and sisters and those "East Indian" immigrants. On the surface I did not accept these perceptions and attitudes and I have always considered myself open to the beauty of all colors and flavors of the human race. Nonetheless, planted below the surface of my thoughts are some insidious racist seeds. I know they are there, lying dormant because sometimes when I cross paths with someone who is visually distinctive as a First-Nations person something in me reacts. A tiny voice whispers, "Indian, less, other, danger." I hear that voice and I acknowledge it even as I move past it. Still, it is there.

Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.

(1 John 2:9, ESV)

How incredibly sad that such a voice exists at all. I cannot imagine what it is in humanity that causes us to hate each other so thoroughly. We are one species, all created in the image of God, all loved by Christ. And still, racial discrimination flourishes world-wide. What is wrong with us?

“Hating people because of their color is wrong. 

And it doesn't matter which color does the hating.

It's just plain wrong.”

(Cassius Clay - Muhammad Ali)

As one committed to the path of Love I find myself in conflict with this discrimination. Racial based jokes are not funny (though I have too often laughed along with the crowd) and I no longer want to laugh to withhold offending the teller. I feel sad for all of us when we think that we can wound one part of humanity, laugh at the wounding, and not know that we have just wounded ourselves.

To be healers of our world will involve removing the warped lenses of bigotry and racism. It will require a commitment to seeing each other beyond color, race, creed or any other discriminator. The minute differences that arise from race or nationality are meaningless next to our common humanness. Look at that woman, at that man - they bleed, they yearn, they grieve, they hope, they laugh, they cry, they fail, they succeed... just like me. Just like you. Is it really so much to ask that we simply be open to the experience of someone else's life? To hear their story, to offer compassion? 

Those committed to the path of Love and healing have hard work ahead of them - not the work of changing the world, but that of changing ourselves. Perhaps it is time to remove our blinders, to see the gift of humanity's diversity, to know our unity beyond that diversity.

I leave the last word to Jesus:

“So whatever you wish that others would do to you,

do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

(Matthew 7:12, ESV)

 Pax

Pastor Bill

Be

Be still

Be still and know

that God

is

Love

And so

Are

You

Be true

to you

Breathe

[First published October 10, 2012]

Now is the Time

“The value of a moment is immeasurable.

The power of just ONE moment can propel you to success and happiness or chain you to failure and misery.” 

(Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free)

I remember it with surprising clarity - an October morning five years ago.

I had recently left the Armena parish to pursue the rather nebulous idea of facilitating retreats on the theme of "what makes life meaningful"; to that end I was busying myself writing presentation material. I recall sitting at our kitchen table, sipping tea and glancing idly out the window (trying to avoid the writers block I was experiencing). That great female green ash tree of ours was dancing with the fall breezes, and in the wake of her steps she showered golden leaves. For a moment, or perhaps a lifetime, I was caught by the simple beauty of those falling leaves, painted upon the canvas of a brilliant blue sky. 

Time stood still and I was lost in that gentle dance of gilded leaves and autumn sunshine. Even now, thinking back on it, I lose myself in the memory. 

Have you ever experienced a perfect moment? A spot in time that was completely filled with peace, where for just a heartbeat the world slowed down; where you were bathed with the knowledge that all was well, love surrounded you and everything was unfolding just right? I know of only two words, though even they are inadequate (as human language always is regarding the sublime) to describe the stillness I felt - Joy and Peace; utter joy and peace.

In the midst of life racing by at ultrasonic speeds, memories slipping past the window of my mind in a day-to-day blur, I long for the train of my being to slow down again like it did that October morning. I am hungry for stillness, for the sheer innocence of loosing myself in sunlight and autumn leaves; like a baby watching a mobile swaying gently above it's head, no cares, no thoughts, just being there and taking in the colors and sounds and wonder of life.

"But make sure that you don’t get so absorbed and exhausted in taking care of all your day-by-day obligations

that you lose track of the time and doze off, oblivious to God.

The night is about over, dawn is about to break. Be up and awake to what God is doing!"

(Romans 13.11 - "The Message")

I don't know that I can create such perfect moments - making time slow down, eternity erupting into reality. Still, I can seek to be present to the gift of this moment, this now. For if I am to experience God it will not be in yesterday's receding memories or tomorrow's uncertain fantasies. Perfect love, perfect comfort, perfect grace reaches for us through the breath of right now. Typing a devotion, eating breakfast, racing to get the child to the sitters, navigating traffic, confronting someone angry, grieving over unwanted news of a diagnosis, facing a day of pleasure, of pain -  any of it and all that life unfolds before us in the ordinary of our lives... these ARE our perfect moments. Love suffuses right now. Peace surrounds right now. Christ is standing beside us- right now. 

I glance out the office window; the weeping birch sways in the chill morning wind and a leaf falls...

I leave the last word to Jesus, the Master of now:

“Be dressed, ready for service and keep your lamps burning, like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him.”

(Luke 12.35 - NIV)

Pax,

Pastor Bill

NOW

[Originally published October 3, 2012]

Do You Hear What I Hear?

"Stay where you're to, 'til I come where you're at.

(East-coast saying quoted in recent CBC news article)

Pardon?!

Could you say that again please? While on a trip to Newfoundland I had an experience in which I heard someone speaking English, but I did not have a clue as to what they were saying. I was in a little cafe having pie and coffee and had just asked my waiter for directions to a nearby home for sale. The fellow politely answered... but I had no idea what he'd said. "Pardon me," I said, "could you say that again please?" He actually repeated himself two more times before I simply said thank you and acknowledged defeat. My friend sharing pie and coffee with me was as clueless as I regarding any useful translation of the "Newfie-isms" we'd just heard. The waiter knew what he was saying, but we could not penetrate the fog of his accent.

"Whoever has ears, let them hear"

(Matthew 11.15)

Perhaps it is sometimes this way with Jesus' words. He speaks but I don't always hear what he is saying and I say, "pardon?" and He says it again, and I still don't understand. You see, the culture in which I'm embedded does not really comprehend "love your enemy" and "this is my commandment that you love one another" and "forgive." Consequently my ears have difficulty with the compassion-accent and the faith-in-God accent that colors Jesus' voice. He is saying things that have the potential to radically change how I live my life, but what He says is in contradiction to the language that I have learned from our media, our social conventions and the norms of our North American lifestyle.

If I was to truly hear Jesus' most basic message of faith in God, kindness to our neighbor, and love to those who have forgotten that they were created as a gift of love - if I really heard this and lived it out, and we all lived it out - something crazy would happen on this earth. We might just begin to see that we are beautifully sculpted in God's image; we might discover the potential woven into us at Creation by our Creator. If we could only HEAR Jesus perhaps we would be able to address the poverty and war and violence of our deaf world. 

Alas for our un-hearing ears. 

Yet, sometimes our ears do hear, albeit a muffled sound, the sweet ringing of the Christ's voice. Kindness breaks out unexpectedly; racism is overcome; healing and forgiveness blossom; the hungry eat. There is hope for us, and that hope is grounded in God's patience and Christ's Spirit of gentleness. Jesus will keep speaking so that we can listen again and again saying, "pardon, I didn't quite catch that."

I leave the last word to the Master speaker:

"Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine 

and puts them into practice

is like a wise man who built his house on the rock."

(Matthew 7.24)

Pax

Pastor Bill

Listen

Be still

a voice

whispers

love

and

be loved

Breathe

deeply

and

hear

Love's

voice

[First published September 26, 2012]

Body to Live, Body to Love

"It is in moments of illness that we are compelled to recognize that we live not alone but chained to a creature of a different kingdom, whole worlds apart, who has no knowledge of us and by whom it is impossible to make ourselves understood:  our body."

 (Marcel Proust)

Have you ever felt shame or embarrassment about your body? Have you looked in the mirror and been disappointed by the reflection?

 

Somewhere along the road I was told that I was too skinny. From a family of thick-boned people I am an abnormality with unusually light bones, something for which I learned shame at an early age. I distinctly remember an older boy referring to me as a runt - a technically appropriate and emotionally disabling label as runt animals are considered undesirable. Through the years subtle reminders of my unacceptably scrawny status were reinforced by comments and the "last chosen" position on sports teams in gym.

 

Skinny was bad enough; add scaly. My genetic makeup gifted the males in my family with a condition called ichthyosis, in which our skin cells grow and multiply at an accelerated rate. Where the average person sheds their epidermis about once a month I get to do it once every two days. A rigorous scrub in the shower and some specialized lotion keep my skin in check so that I do not spend my life flaking and itching. As a child and youth, however, the rigorous scrub and lotion routine were unknown. Consequently, I wore long-sleeved shirts as much as possible and rarely wore shorts in an effort to hide the body for which I was embarrassed. Children and youth, like chickens, have a tendency to peck and pick at perceived weaknesses. I grew up afraid that someone would notice my dry skin, resulting in a very-much-anticipated ostracism.

 

It's an odd thing, the body. We do not (as far as I know) get to pick the body into which we incarnate, and yet we judge each other for perceived limitations, for physical aspects that stand out and are not the norm. "Physically challenged" means we get stared at, and heaven help us if we have a blotch on our face - it might be contagious. We forget that all of us are in these bodies for a very short time, and that what they look like, how they operate, and whatever features they have or lack do not in any way reflect our heart and soul. They are bodies - beautiful, smelly, hairy, wrinkly, muscled, diseased... just bodies. 

After thirty, a body has a mind of its own.

(Bette Midler)

I am slowly coming to terms with this cracked vessel that my soul has rented. It certainly does not fit the artificially imposed North American ideal, but it serves me well enough so that I can smile at a stranger, cry tears, laugh, run, shovel, sing and yes, even preach :-) It's a bit itchier than I'd like at times, and in middle age it has betrayed me by adding a few pounds in the waist and the warranty on my vision is starting to go. But all-in-all it's a pretty good rental. 

Sometimes now, when I look in the mirror at my thin-boned bod I smile and give thanks for the miles it has taken me and the experience this soul has gained by being en-fleshed. And sometimes the mirror's reflection reveals a boy ashamed by not being good enough - fearful that he will be noticed and dismissed. Life's like that eh? Good days and hard days and one day at a time. 

"Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?"

 (1 Corinthians 3.16)

At the end of the day I am grateful for the reminders from Scripture that my body is not my identity, that neither cultural beauty nor infirmity determine who I am. Rather, it is God's love that made and defines me, and you, and consequently, at the core you and I are a gift of love to this world; we have these bodies for a while so that we may enact that love.

I will leave the last word to Jesus:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink;

or about your body, what you will wear. 

Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?” 

Matthew 6.25

Pastor Bill

Hug

you

smile

you

are

beautiful

Thank

God

for gifts

and

challenges

Breathe

Amen

[First published August 29, 2012]

Shame, Shame

"There's shames a man can never reason away, though he looks back and piles up reasons over them forty dozen deep. 

And maybe those are the shames a man never should reason away."

(Ken Kesey, Sometimes a Great Notion)

Have you ever felt ashamed of your actions? Have you wished that you could take back words carelessly thrown at someone? This last week I lambasted my brother in a most uncharacteristic and vulgar fashion. Reacting in a surprising way to elements of the conversation, I lashed out with such anger that it entirely caught me off guard. It was like the sudden appearance of a prairie storm, sunny skies turning grey and ominous, a crack of thunder preceding wind and rain. 

I don't know where it came from, and like a thunder storm, it left as quickly as it blew in. The wind and hail did some damage though. A wind-fallen tree cannot be righted; one can only plant new trees and hope that they grow.

I felt shamed by my actions and as I drove home I wished with all my might that I could turn back time. That evening I watched a movie called "Next" about a man who could see two minutes into the future. It allowed him to observe the consequences of his actions before they happened. Wow. Do I wish that I had seen the storm coming - I'd have diverted its wrath.

So, the next day I phoned my brother and apologized. I love my brother with all my heart and his gracious response is a potent reminder of the power of forgiveness. We will plant new trees, he and I - and we will likely continue to poke each other's buttons, and to grow in love. Other storms will come and go, prairie winds that ravage the trees of our being. The storms pass and in their wake the sun cuts brilliantly through the clouds and in the stillness a song bird dares to sing. If there is any hope for humanity it lies entirely in forgiveness.

Now I need only forgive me, and that may take a bit of time.

To you that have ever felt shame - you have my compassion. May the wounds of our words be healed and our inner light shine as brightly as Love intends :-)

We will err and we will wound - to do so is human perhaps. More human yet - to venture boldly beyond our wounds, and our woundings to be the love that lies at the core of our being.

I leave the last word to Reinhold Niebuhr:

"Forgiveness is the final form of love."

Pastor Bill

Breathe in

grace

gentle

renewing

releasing

Breathe out

and

just

be

[First published July 4, 2012]

Alive

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive,and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

(Howard Thurman)

After you have read this week's devotion I invite you to go outside for a moment. Regardless of the weather - just step outside and let your senses take in all that life is doing.

Listen...
Touch...
Inhale...
See...

Taste...

You are alive - do you have any idea how amazing that is? 

Feel the wind and sun on your face. Let rain drops caress you. Smell a flower, feel grass under your feet. Listen to bird-song, wind chimes, dogs barking... just be out in life for a moment.

Just one life - that's all we get and today is it.

What a wonder - to be alive and to know it. 

I wish for you today - that you experience life fully, richly, powerfully, passionately; for as you experience life so will it flow out of you to kindle the flame in others.

Go on now - go outside for a moment, and let the breeze of life stir the embers of your heart, that they may burst into flame.

You are alive and you are truly amazing.

 I leave the last word to Jesus:

"I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly." 

(John 10.10)

Pastor Bill

                                  Smile
                                This is our prayer
                                 God
                                    it is good 

for our heart

to
beat
today

Ahh...
life

it is delicious
Amen

[First published June 20, 2012]