Manna

Oh, we had a terrible time of it, there’s no doubt about it.
They were the worst years of our lives.
Never mind the tales of heroics in the desert.
It was hell and we all just barely made it.
One day or another, every one of us lost our way,
our self-assurance, our hope— and also our parents.
Don’t you believe a word you hear from the cocky ones
about self-reliance. They withered with the rest of us.

No, here’s the truth, that we could hardly comprehend
then, and can scarcely believe now: there wasn’t one of us
in that wilderness that didn’t survive on manna.
Every day, out of the blue, there it was. We lived on
mystery. We never did get used to leaving
each place where we’d found it, nor seeing it again
wherever we ended up. Troubles came and went,
but what was constant was the gift.

Divisions between strong and weak,
deserving and undeserving,— these are lies, made up
by minds too small and hearts too fearful to grasp
that everything is a gift.

Look around you, child:
your house, your work, your struggles,
your dreams, the air you breathe. It doesn’t matter
how hard you worked for them. You don’t really know
where they came from, do you?
It’s easy to miss now, because it looks like other things.
But it’s all manna, I’m telling you.
It’s all manna.

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The fly

As I sat for morning prayers a fly lay still
upon the windowsill, a little buddha,
hands folded reverently on his chest,

not careening frantically in mindless loops
like the executive chasing his millions,
or the TV buzzing in our heads,

not swatted and dodging, the constant refugee,
living off the crumbs from the master’s table,
like the tattered man under the bridge—

no, completely, in his death, himself,
and cleansed of all success or failure,
unjudged, and uninterpreted, and still.

In our piety we may receive him as an icon
or dispose of him, without his least concern.
How lightly he rests, his labors ended,

beckoning us to the perfect place where
he has always lived, where no one asks,
“Who do you think you are?

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Seventy times seven

           “How often should I forgive?
           As many as seven times?”
           “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy times seven.”

                           —Matthew 18. 21-22

Resentment seeps back in
like water into the boat.
You have to keep bailing.

Regret returns
with its lingering hunger.
You have to keep feeding it grace.

Grief comes back,
asking again.
You have to hold it till it’s OK.

Love is continually renewed.
It doesn’t just stand there like a rock.
It flows like a river.

This is how we live.
Every breath, every heart beat
is God forgiving you.

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

Loving One,
in deep trust of your grace
I rest in your mercy.

Trusting your goodness,
I call to mind how I have needed your forgiveness,
and how greatly, how deeply and completely,
how continuously you have forgiven me,
and I give thanks.
Love, have mercy. …

Shine the light of your love
where I have shaded my guilt from your grace,
where I have not allowed myself to be forgiven.
May your will be done, your love find home.
and assure me again.
Christ, have mercy. …

Gentle One, shine the light of your love
where I have not forgiven.
Heal me of my blame;
release me from the burden of my judgment.
Help me be as forgiving as I am forgiven.
Love, have mercy. …

In the name of the One who broke bread with his betrayer,
in the Spirit of the One who forgave his torturers,
I pray for the gift of forgiveness.
Amen.

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

When we’re hurt we naturally seek
to offload the wound or loss in blame,
as if the pain might stick to the fault, in someone else.
So we’ll even curse the coffee table—
“Stupid thing!”—for being there.
But of course projecting our pain doesn’t shed it;
it only buries it deeper, and in fact becomes
a way of hanging onto it.

Blame is a heavy load to carry,
the careful accounting, the accrual of debt,
care for the scaffolding of deserving,
the work of keeping the pain unfinished
because of someone else’s fault.
As much as I insist otherwise,
even when the other continues in evildoing,
refusal to forgive is never about the other but about me,
and my invisible chain to the past.

It’s a tough ask,
to lay down my burden and accept my pain,
but that’s how I get free:
accept myself as hurt, flawed, broken—
wronged, even.
So to forgive someone
is really to forgive myself.
Free to love myself, flawed as I am,
I am free to love the other, flawed as they are,
to know they too were moved by hurt they couldn’t bear.
Though I don’t condone or even trust them still,
I let go of debt. I free myself from the account.

In forgiveness I am free to love even my enemy;
only then am I truly free.

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

Resentments
are the ticks and burrs
from the meadow of life
that stick to you.

No one suffers from them but you.
You’re no more noble or deserving
for wearing them.
Pick them off, every one.

You may have to revisit some hurts,
but, friend,
clean yourself up.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Listen to the audio recording:

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I am there

           “Where two or three are gathered in my name,
           I am there among them.”

                           —Matthew 18.20

God is love.
Wherever there is love there is God.
The Holy Trinity is relationship.
Wherever there is relationship there is God.
The one, the other, and the energy between.

Loving your neighbor and loving God are one.
Every encounter is a holy encounter.
Every conversation is prayer unacknowledged.

Every hurt is a crucifixion,
every kindness is a hymn.
Every word, even a casual greeting,
is a gift left at the altar.

The Immense One is here,
disappears into the vibrations between us
and shimmers there,
singing, pleading, blessing.
Listen.

Meet your neighbor worshipfully.
Love reverently.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Owed and owing nothing

           Owe no one anything, except to love one another.
                           —Romans 13.8

And consider yourself owed nothing.

In the culvert of consequences,
there are no surprises.
In the machinery of commerce
everyone is indentured.

But the meadow of grace is alive
always and only in the present moment.
New creation. No mortgage.
Owed and owing nothing.

Renounce your claims

and everything is a gift.

This is the scandal of grace.
Nobody owes anybody anything.
It’s all gift.

Your hard earned cash
or the next breath, all of it.

In the fresh present
there is only freedom and miracle,
wonder and gratitude,
receiving and giving with joy.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Listen to the audio recording:

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Go to them

           If one sins against you,
           go and point out the fault
           when the two of you are alone.

                           —Matthew 18.15

Talk with people, not about them.

Don’t underestimate the power of this challenge.
To do this you stand on your own legs.
You renounce having others speak for you.
You take responsibility for your feelings
and don’t sublet them for another to control.
You honor your heart, your experience and its integrity.
You rely on God’s grace rather than your own comfort.
You trust your worth regardless of another’s reaction,
your belovedness regardless of others’ discomfort.
You free yourself from imagining
that you can manage another’s discomfort.
Knowing your dignity is untouched,
you subject it to your love.
You express your love for them
by not shielding them from the truth.
You respect them by not speaking ill of them to others.
You go to where you know you may have to forgive.
You open yourself to hearing how you also have sinned.
You open the door to reconciliation,
which opens no other way.

To be so honest, so forthright, gently but clearly,
you are transparent to the gospel.
You are free, and not afraid.
You are light and not shadow.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Listen to the audio recording:

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Adoration

This mountain I climb,
does it feel my tiny, astonished footfalls?

This river I wade in, does it notice
what of me it carries to the sea?

The stars, they don’t have any idea, do they,
of my admiration?

The bee working the blossoms
doesn’t suspect, does it, my gaze akin to worship?

And you, are you aware of the Mighty One
stooping to adore you?

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
Listen to the audio recording:

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