Month: March 2015

      
         Who can discern their errors?
                  Free me from my hidden faults.
                           —Psalm 19.2

God, I do not even know
the ways I distance myself from you,
the wonder I pass by without notice,
the glory I sleep through.
I can’t suspect the ways I hurt you,
fall short of your desire for me,
fail to be who you lead me to be.
I believe the little lies I tell myself;
I bow to my secret fears.
I don’t even know what it would be
to love as I have been loved.
I miss the hurt I cause
more often than I notice.
I share in people’s wounding and unfreedom
in ways I can’t see.
How often think I’m doing the right thing!
Forgive me, for I do not know what I am doing.
Forgive me for not knowing.
Forgive my hidden sins,
and if they can’t be removed at least
bring them out of hiding.
Wake me up.
Don’t let me think I have such a small inheritance:
let me see—let it overwhelm me—
just how immense
is the forgiveness I need,
and you offer.
O God, your love I receive
without even knowing why.

         
         

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

To receive Unfolding Light as a daily e-mail,
write to me at unfoldinglight(at)gmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
      
         
This is about prayer.
When you’ve tramped down a path
over and over through deep snow
you create a little trough of packed snow
that you can walk easily on
though the powder on either side
is deep. It appears to be a trench
but really you’re walking on the top
of a narrow wall. Step off either side
and you plunge in up to your hips.

So what is the prayer part:
walking on the unseen?
Paying close attention, not stepping off,
not being fooled by drifted snow,
following the narrow way?
Yes, perhaps. But prayer is not so hard, is it?
I’m thinking of when you miss and
step off into the deep, stuck even a little—
that’s prayer. When you feel
the snow pressing against your legs.
When you really are where you are.
When you touch a boundary.
When you’re wondering what’s next.
When you stop.
When you laugh at yourself.
When you know you are an animal,
but not a fox.

Then you step back up onto the path
and get on with going places.

         
         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To receive Unfolding Light as a daily e-mail,
write to me at unfoldinglight(at)gmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
      
         What will it profit you to gain the whole world
                  and forfeit your life?
         Indeed, what can you give
                  in return for your life?
                           —Mark 8.6-37

To be truly alive
is to be fully, freely, lovingly present
in this moment,
drinking in the grace of God
and pouring myself out in love
for God and for all beings.

What do I gain
by abandoning this
to be right,
to get my way,
to be comfortable,
to manage how people think of me?

When I win the argument,
protect my beliefs, defend myself,
when I judge another
and put them in their place,
when I separate myself from those
who suffer pain or injustice,
when I buy another trinket
for my heart’s little room
and close the door,
what have I lost?

I am not a body or a reputation
but a soul.
God of love,
open my door.
Let life spill in
and spill out.
Let me suffer and love,
truly alive.

         
         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To receive Unfolding Light as a daily e-mail,
write to me at unfoldinglight(at)gmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
      
         Those who would save their life will lose it.
         Those who will lose their life for my sake
         and for the gospel will save it.
                  —Mark 8.35

If you fear your life is your flesh
         you will die.
If you trust your life is love
         you will be given life.

Life small enough to cling to
          is small indeed.
Life given away in love
         is infinite.

To be truly alive
         is to love.
All else is death.
         Why even try
         for anything else?

         
         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To receive Unfolding Light as a daily e-mail,
write to me at unfoldinglight(at)gmail.com