Month: September 2015

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         

He said, “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” Then he took a little child and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”
                  —Mark 9.35-37

God won’t come into my life on heavenly beams
with angel choruses singing softly.
God will come hidden in plain sight
in the least and lowest of people.

This is not a trick. God’s poverty and powerlessness
is not a disguise. It’s the way God really is.
Our power and status is the disguise.
God comes with a gentle invitation to come clean.

I welcome the vulnerable, I house the refugee,
I honor the criminal, because I too am small and weak,
I have lived on what was not mine,
I am searching for my truest home.

I am a child playing dress up
with my dress and heels, my suit and tie,
my crown too big for my head, my scepter.
Ah! the release, to lay them all down.

Like the child I am dependent, a minor,
and I am beloved and tenderly cherished.
Who knows which comes first, giving or receiving
such divine love?

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.
         
        “Whoever is not against us is for us.”
                  —Mark 8.40

People have this odd idea
that religions are in competition,
mutually exclusive, as if at war.
But religion is the opposite of war.
If you are one with God
you are one with all,
including your enemies,
or you religion is a sham.

Do we not already follow the prophets
of two different faiths?
If you like the way Jesus sees the world,
can you not learn from the Buddha?
If you read Emily Dickinson
must you denounce Robert Frost?

Let your religion be this,
to tend to the unloved,
to heal the world
with kindness
as you have been given unearned kindness,
to be present to the grace
that flows in and around you.

And those who are against you—
tend to them, for they are unloved,
heal them with kindness they can’t expect,
be present to the grace hidden even in them;
or you have already abandoned your faith.

“There are a thousand ways
to kneel and kiss the ground.”
If you fight
for anything more complicated than that
you are pretending to know more than you do.
Kneel and kiss the ground.

  
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.
      
         
                  
The man with no arms or legs
smiled at me.
“How can you be happy,”
I asked, when you can’t even
butter your toast?”

He closed his eyes and sang
the most beautiful song
I’d ever heard.

I smiled at him.
“How can you be happy”
he asked,
“when you can’t even
unlock your heart?”

         
         
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.
         
         If any want to become my followers,
         let them deny themselves
         and take up their cross and follow me.
                  —Mark 8.34

This is more gentle than it sounds. To deny yourself is not to punish yourself, and not to live in denial, to turn your back on who you are, but the opposite.

We falsely see ourselves as finite, discreet individuals, separate from the world, and in danger at any moment of disappearing back into the abyss. It’s a “self” that the ego makes up out of nothing, but it’s convincing. We spend our lives—mostly unconsciously— protecting that little “self,” and in particular its power, security and esteem. (Hence Jesus’ temptations in the desert.) It’s what St. Paul calls “the flesh.” He doesn’t mean our body; he means something even smaller, contained within our body, limited by our fears and appetites.

But we aren’t such little “selves.” By the life of Holy Spirit in us we are members of the infinite Body of God, who dwells in us and we in God. We are sustained not by our own protection of our little lives but by the life-giving fountain of grace welling up within us to eternal life, flowing with perfect, infinite compassion.

To “deny ourselves” is to say no the illusion, to transcend our ego, to abandon our little skull-caged, death-leashed bit of fear and desire and instead become the infinitely alive and loving children of God we truly are. As those who embody God’s love we give of our lives for love; we are not afraid even of death, because we trust that by God’s grace in us life is infinitely replenished. So we follow Jesus out of our selves and into infinite life: without fear we take up our cross and join Jesus in loving the world into its newness.
         
         
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

         
         “Take up your cross and follow me.”
                  —Mark 8.34

Jesus, you suffered for the sake of love;
         help me to love at all cost.

Though we wronged you, you offered forgiveness;
         give me your heart of forgiveness.

You met hate and untruth with gentleness;
         give me humility and patience.

You suffered without retaliation or bitterness;
         lead me in the way of nonviolence.

You were rejected and condemned;
         help me find my place among the outcast.

You bore God’s presence into our darkest places;
         fill me with your Spirit that I amy do the same.

You were imprisoned and beaten;
         help me to love those who are so treated.

You bought grace and even paradise to a fellow victim;
         help me to join the communion of those who suffer.

You entered the deep wound of the world with healing;
         help me bear your Spirit of peace into the world.

You judged power, violence and empire with love;
         help me to live and work for justice.

You made a weapon of oppression an occasion for grace;
         help me work with you for the redemption of the world.

You entrusted yourself to the grace of God;
         give me faith.

You entered your death with hope;
         give me peace.

Help me, Beloved,
         take up my cross and follow you.
         

         
         

__________________
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 do you cling to when the waves roll over
your little boat of life?

When the sound drains out of your days,
what still echoes long into the night?

When you cross over the river
what do you still have in your pockets—

a key to something broken, foreign coins,
a medal on a ribbon, inscribed with silence?

What does it profit you— this world,
its flash and sparkle, to weigh yourself

with its precious coals,
and lose the light you are?

If you are God’s love song,
what is there to your life but singing?

         
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.
         
         Wisdom cries out in the street;
                  at the busiest corner she raises her voice:
         “I will pour out my thoughts to you.”
                  —Proverbs 1.20, 21, 23

I listen.
Amid the clatter and chatter
of my fears and fantasies,
the rattle and traffic of this world
the trip wire pitch, the push,
the drive for the deal
to buy me and sell me—

I listen to your soft voice
humming beneath worry and duty,
steady, its ocean of silence,
its moon of light,

the nearest murmur,
no argument, no decree,
no foreign words, no hard words,
no words,
but wind in grass,
saying all I need to know,

flowing water,
a river poured out in me
to drink, to bathe,
to lie in and float
to your sea.

         
         
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

For all my labors, that they be fruitful for your sake,
I pray, O God.

For those who labor daily, may their work reward them
and give them dignity and joy.

For those who seek work without finding,
give them hope and dignity, and sustain them.

For those who cannot work, for incapacity or injustice,
help them to know that they too
are part of your great work in healing the world.

For those who toil unrewarded,
who are underpaid, exploited, enslaved or abused,
give them blessing and life and bring about justice.

For all oppression of those who labor
give me courage, O God, to work for justice,
to set free your children from the slavery of Egypt.

Keep me mindful, Holy One, that my worth
is not in my labor but in my being,
in my rest as well as my toil, by your grace.
Give me faith to practice sabbath and rest
in your great Belonging that is given, not earned.
Amen.

         
         

__________________
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.
         
         But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs
         under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
                  —Mark 7.28

She lived outside the circle
of what he thought was holy.
         But within the circle of her heart
         her Beloved waited.

The blessing he knew of
was wrapped and small,
         but the grace she trusted
         was boundless.

He knew of a table neatly kept
for the chosen alone,
         but she found feast
         in the merest crumbs, uncontained.

He lived in his people’s fear
of outsiders until
         she showed him
         none are outside.

He was the one paralyzed,
unbelieving;
         she, trusting infinite goodness,
         who set him free.

Her love unfolding
before his eyes
         opened his,
         and unfolded his love.

He, the Lord and savior
needed her to bless his blindness:
         “Be opened!” so that he was ready
         for all that was asked of him.

The gates she opened,
grace for the outcast,
         can never be moved now,
         never be shut.
         
         
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.
         
         
My morning walk in the woods glows with early sun and the warmth of God. But soon I’ll go to my study in the church basement and its papers and phone calls and a meeting at 9:30. Sometimes things sparkle with glory, sometimes we tingle with the feeling of God’s nearness. And sometimes it’s dull. But we’re not called to experience any particular feelings, but to do the work of love, even when it’s hard, or confusing, or even boring. Because it’s not about us. The point is that the world gets loved, whether or not we are rewarded in the loving. We reach our for God even when all we feel is Absence. We praise even when we’re discouraged. We love even when it’s not satisfying.

The problem is not that God is absent, or glory has withdrawn, or meaning has shriveled up inside itself and left us. It’s not that the world is dull: it’s that our senses are dull. And sometimes we’d rather feel loving than actually act loving. But in faith we love anyway, beyond our senses, beyond our knowing, with or without any thrill or understanding. The good news is, it’s really God’s great love, not our own, flowing through us. Sometimes we are simply clay vessels who neither taste nor appreciate the miraculous wine we bear. But we bear it, and even if we are not caught up in ecstasy, even if we have no way to know, God is pleased, and unknown to us, our lives do shine with glory.

____________________
Weather Report

Dull,
overcast and obscured,
though beyond the clouds
glory still swirls about us,
and within us,
as a vast front of grace
passes through our very lives
unseen.

         
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