Unfolding Light

             Now standing there were six stone water jars
             for the Jewish rites of purification….
                         —John 2.6


What if purification isn’t the removal of anything,
but transforming something into pure joy?

What if purification isn’t washing away part of you,
but revealing your deepest beauty?

What if you are already made pure,
but are not yet celebrating?

What if what came before was not impure,
but what may come next is as yet unimagined?

What if you are holy water,
even now being turned into wine?

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him,
             “They have no wine.”
             And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me?
             My hour has not yet come.”
             His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”
                         —John 2.3-5


Leadership is nudging someone into their next step
the moment before they know they’re ready.

Even Jesus had to be prompted by someone
who knew his gifts, and who saw the moment.

Sometimes we ourselves are pure water,
unaware we are about to be turned to wine.

God, help me be open to the moment
and the nudging of Mother Spirit, who sees.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Between a president who recently died
and one about to begin
we remember a man who was never president.

(We notice the harmonies, and the dissonances.)
See how our choices matter—
not our position, nor our power, but our character.

We remember Martin, who was famous,
and in his name thousands more who were not,
but just as brave and merciful and mighty.

We remember all those who were peacemakers,
the nonviolent seekers of justice who have gone before,
and those who are now among us, without office.

We give thanks for those who stood against injustice,
who faced violence, hatred and anger with gentle courage,
and we pray for that spirit as well,

that we will not walk with the haughty and the cruel,
that we will be truthful and kind,
that we confront the power to exclude with the power to love.

With blessed leaders showing us the way,
we pray that we will choose love over fear,
generosity over selfishness, service over supremacy.

We give thanks for the saints who have gone before,
link arms with the saints who risk even now,
and with their song in our throats, we carry on.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
                          I have called you by name, you are mine.
             When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
                          and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
             when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
                          and the flame shall not consume you. …
             because you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you.
                         —Isaiah 43.1-4


And when you walk through fire and you are are burned?
God is still with you.

The flames may destroy your goods,
but they can’t consume you, the you God loves.

The troubles you endure do not diminish your belovedness.
Even the greatest tragedy is the cross where Jesus meets you.

Sometimes, with nothing left, we stand beside the ruins
and say, shaking, “Well, at least we’re grateful we’re alive.”

This is God’s prayer every moment,
even at our joyous victories.

In a time of sorrow the loss is real. The grief is acute.
And at the core, gratitude for what can’t be taken.

The spouse beside the bed of the Alzheimer’s patient
knows this: faith in what can’t be taken.

Amid ashes, we hold one another, and promise
to live for the sake of what can’t be taken.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Last week I wrote a prayer welcoming God’s refining fire.
Then horrifying flames began devastating Los Angeles.

“When you walk through fire you shall not be burned,”
God says, and then some are.

The baptismal flood brings beauty and devastation.
Some drown in holy water.

Life is a mixed bag, and we grab it
because it’s our only bag.

It’s plush with knives and we pick it up,
and find in it sweets and nuts, and blood.

You eat the whole luscious fruit;
the seeds of calamity are too small to pick out.

Ruin has its joys, and triumph its sorrows.
To love God is to lose and receive everything.

Sometimes it is among ashes
we become most human.

After the fire they will clean up using power
generated by burning something.

Love walks among the tents in the camps of death,
a child singing her undying song.

We join the beautiful slow dance of the Beloved,
man of sorrows, acquainted with grief.

What does this mean? That nothing is absolute but God,
who is always present, and mostly paradox.

We touch each other. We trust grace,
and we take what comes.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             His winnowing fork is in his hand,
                   to clear his threshing floor
             and to gather the wheat into his granary;
                   but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.
                         —Luke 3.17


Beloved, winnow my heart;
strip away the chaff
of my fears and attachments.
My victories and failures are not me.

Burn the husks I hide behind,
my fear that my real self you will not love.
Burn the straw of my attempts
to be someone I’m not.

By your grace, I will be
the true person within,
not an imaginary self
but the one you create.

God of mercy,
I welcome your winnowing.
I give thanks for the fire of grace
in which I am made new.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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As Jesus goes down into the water
I go with him:
down in humility and trust,
deep into mystery and shadow,
surrendered in powerlessness and willingness,
immersed in your presence and grace,
washed of the past and all expectations,
bathed in the flowing of all,
sunk to the center of all,
held in your mercy and love,
drowned in the water of death,
waiting in the womb of your life,
ready to be raised by your Spirit.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             When you pass through the waters,
                          I will be with you;
             and through the rivers,
                          they shall not overwhelm you.
                                      —Isaiah 43.2

For twelve days we pondered the mystery
that the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
Christ chooses to be with us.

Now another mystery, but the same grace:
Christ is baptized with us,
immersed in holy with-ness.

So when you go through the waters,
Christ is already there.
Breathing life. Enduring. With you.

There is no struggle Christ does not enter,
no suffering Christ does not share.
The Beloved will never forsake you.

In even the worst sin, the most awful depression,
the deepest loneliness, the foulest derangement,
the most shameful death, God is with you.

Every moment of your life
is the stream Jesus was baptized into,
immersed in you, soaked with you.

When you pass through the waters,
and feel no companion, trust:
the Beloved is the water itself, bearing you on.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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A spring offers forth,
earth’s generosity.

A stream flows on,
water’s patience.

Jesus comes down,
true humility.

The Word made flesh
is flesh and water.

Christ enters the water;
all water is holy.

That water is the water you drink,
the mercy you bathe in,

the mystery you are,
the holiness that is yours.

Because the Beloved is here,
immersed with us,

all birth, water and flesh,
is baptism into that grace:

“My child, my beloved,
with you I am well pleased.”

the water flows on,
ocean to mist, to sky, to rain,

to you,
never ceasing.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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           Ahead of them, went the star
           that they had seen at its rising.
                               —Matthew 2.9

Morning star, lead me.
Awaken me to your calling,
to the Spirit’s subtle showing.

I let go of my attachment
to knowing the way
and my fear of not knowing.

I listen for your whisper,
I wait for your nudging,
ready for my going.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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