Unfolding Light

             No one who puts a hand to the plow
             and looks back
             is fit for the realm of God.
                                      —Luke 9.59

The journey’s joy will sometimes fade;
the labor will be hard.
Hold on, my friend. Hold on.

The cynical will mock your faith,
the angry will assault your place,
and doubts will rise. Hold on.

The road is rough, the goal is far,
the shouts of war, the jailer’s door
will echo loud. Hold on.

To what you know, and how you’ve been
brought through, and what you’re cradled in,
stay true, my friend. Hold on.

You won’t achieve great milestones,
but won’t give up on kindness.
Hold on, my friend, hold on.

Our hands are joined, our hearts are one;
these millions with you struggle on,
and you are held. Hold on.
Hold on, my friend, hold on.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests,
             but the Human One has nowhere to lay their head.
                                            —Luke 9.58

Humble One,
to follow you I have to unpack more than I carry;
not much fits in my little bag of faith.
Here is my sense of entitlement, my expectation
that I will belong and be accepted and tended to.
I leave it behind.
Here is my attachment to comfort and security,
and my favorite things. They don’t fit.
Here’s my expectation that I’ll accomplish great things.
Way too heavy. And look—
crammed in the bottom of my overstuffed trunk,
my secret belief that I’m at the center,
that the children of Gaza or the immigrant
or the uncertain trans kid or the MAGA radical
are not mine—that I have a separate place,
a little nest, a safe foxhole. Nope. Gone.
All that fits in my little bag of faith is you,
and your passion for the whole world, all of it.
All that fits is trust, and kindness.
OK. I’ve unpacked. I’m ready.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             “Boss, do you want us to command fire
             to come down from heaven and consume them?”

                         —Luke 9.54

Oh, the triple temptation:
to think you can,
to think you should,
to think it would work.

Since Eden
one law has held:
to live together.
To eliminate others is to fail.

But, oh, the urge
to call down fire
on those who call down fire.
To think we are the ones.

Flame of Pentecost, come down
from heaven and consume
our rage, our pride, our violence.
Remind us which side of the cross we’re on.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             They did not receive him
             because his face was set toward Jerusalem.
                        —Luke 9.53

The Samaritans are thinking:
He’s not one of us,
and we won’t treat him like he is.
We reject him for failing to reject the right people.

The disciples are thinking:
How could they not receive us?
Don’t we have a right?
Don’t we automatically belong?

Our egos are thinking:
How can I be “in” if there’s no “out?”
I’m better than somebody, right?
There must be some line between me and them.

Jesus is thinking:
Blessed are you who are excluded
for refusing to exclude,
for even God is spurned for this very reason.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Before you despair give thanks.
For the miracle that you are here,
that your flesh has sustained you.
For all those who have loved you,
even poorly, along the way,
mostly unnoticed.
For all those who do not despair,
and the grace sustaining them.
For the people who were the words
of the Teacher written for you, and those
who were merely the blackboard.
For all the beauty in the world,
every bit—not just the sunset
but the earth, the sun, the eyes.
For your own forgiveness (it’s a fact,
don’t argue, write it down).
For all those little moments that showed
what you were hoping for:
the unexpected gift,
the healing of a wound,
the little wren that came close,
the child’s laughter that once
broke the balloon of your sorrow.
For Emily Dickinson and the color green
and thumbnails and that whales sing,
give thanks for each one—
don’t leave any out, list them all.
Perhaps your despair will forget
what it wanted to say.
But if it remembers, give thanks
for the grace to despair and carry on.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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To honor the Sabbath is not just to take the day,
but to honor the holiness of open time,
pausing, holding your hands empty of all but God.

Empty your time: give room for God to act,
for grace to enter, for wonder to surprise,
for what is becoming to become.

Vacate your importance. Sweep clean
the world’s dependence on you. Accomplish
nothing; make room for the infinite Unseen.

Even amid the cries of the world and the fireworks
of Pentecost, you can step aside and be still.
Others will sing while you take a breath.

The greatest sign of hope is to act for love;
the second greatest is to let God. Vacate,
take sabbath, and the emptiness will be divine.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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Pentecost gets us all fired up to speak…
but the world is aching for us to listen.
The miracle of Pentecost likely began
in the disciples listening to the heart-cries
of those gathered around them.

How many souls are silenced?
A story that’s never been told,
a song that’s never been heard all the way through.
A voice in so many languages, none of them words.

The cries from the crib of one’s soul, unheard,
can fester, become anger, become taunts.
But deep listening is good soul soil.
The cries of the oppressed are a powerful good:
they listen, and know their own song.

Neither correcting nor congratulating,
but purely listening, creating a nest
where another’s heart may shelter,
offering the gift of being tended to,
ties the thread the world is made of.

It may seem you are doing nothing,
but in your listening
the bright flame of Pentecost quietly burns.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light www.unfoldinglight.net
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             One who believes in me
             will also do the works that I do
             and, in fact, will do greater works than these.
                                      —John 14.12


Dear one, I have given you light.
It takes courage to hold the fire,
but courage I have also given you.

Do not be afraid.
I have given you an inextinguishable flame.
People can hurt you,
but they can’t harm the light.
Darkness is powerless against light;
it can’t help but welcome it.
Even in the deepest night love abides.

In the darkness it is me
you hold in your hands, radiant;
and I am also the darkness.
If you are beset, I am with you.
When you are alone, I am in you.
The mystery at the center of your soul
is an eternal flame.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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             And how is it that we hear, each of us,
             in our own native language?
                                      —Acts 2.8

I crave chocolate, but that doesn’t matter.
Years ago my wife craved carrots.
She ate so many her skin turned orange.
We found out it was because her body
really craved beta carotene
because she had cancer. (She lived.)

Sometimes we hear what we want to hear,
and un-hear or mis-hear the rest.
But maybe on Pentecost they heard
because it was something they knew they needed,
something their soul, not just their ego, craved.
Not just a treat, but life.

Sometimes we crave chocolate from God,
hoping to hear what we want.
But deeper, trickier, more silent,
sometimes even more foreign sounding,
is the real Word that we crave.
Your deepest craving is probably true.

Imagine that we are given
not just what people think they want,
but what their souls most deeply crave,
and we are give the power to share it,
so they hear, in their own language,
the grace of God.

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