Author: Steve

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         

Only when you’ve run out of wine,
the wine life gave you, the dark red wine
that flowed through your veins,
only when the merest drop
of plain water would be enough,
only when you have nothing
to offer, nothing to save you,
does the unseen mystery occur.
When you’ve tasted the wine of death,
had your last meal day after day,
each breath, each moment becomes
an improbable gift, a miracle.
When the wedding feast is silenced
and you ponder being without,
when you’ve drunk the cup of grief,
then every one is dear.
When you quit your purification
for what gives life, then something new
flows beyond measure or belief.
When you’ve given away your blood
red wine, the Guest will see
to it that you are given the best.
Then even the later music, more dark
than before, the more difficult music,
the treacherous passages, the slow dance
into the night, even the sorrowful songs,
the tragic laments, are beautiful.
Among the crushed grapes, the losses,
the fermented sugars, none of the flavors
can be separated out of the dark wed wine
of joy.

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         
When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.”
                  —John 2.9-10

Each moment
is miraculous wine.
You don’t know
where it came from.

           •

The person who annoys you,
whom you judge,
is transformed wine
that you have not yet tasted.

           •

New snow
makes everything look different.
When it is gone,
will you see everything anew?

         
         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         
I’m thinking about water being changed to wine, the ordinary transformed into the glorious. I’m thinking about blessing, abundantly overflowing. I’m surrounded by it. Heaven spills out into this world. I’m exulting in this good news: my sister’s lymphoma is in remission. Her chemo goes on, but not the disease. I feel like the host at the wedding in Cana. How am I going to spend all this joy?

While I drink from these vats of gratitude, I also think about people I know who are not celebrating, who are looking for work, whose kids are struggling with addiction, who are beginning chemo without any assurance, who are facing the loss of loved ones. I’m rejoicing for my baby sister, but my wife’s baby sister just died. How can I dance for my sister while there’s so much suffering in the world? But how can I not dance for my sister? So I can feel like an awkward guest at the wedding. Why doesn’t everybody get the wine?

Well, everybody does. My sister’s healing is not a special order, but a glimpse of the natural order, the heart of the world. The “wine” is not that we get what we want, but the wondrous, mysterious glory of life. Everything is miraculous. God has turned the water of my sister-in-law’s life to wine no less than my sister’s. God’s grace is not in certain places, but at the heart of reality. The whole world’s water is changed to wine. The glory of God is hidden in all things.

The man who changed water into wine knew suffering. He never promised to excuse anyone from it, but changed it by sharing it with us on behalf of God. God is in every person and every moment and every life, and what we think is ordinary water is heavenly wine, and what we fear is not enough is more than enough. The wine may be relief of suffering or grace to endure it, but there will be enough of it. Sometimes we know it; most of the time we haven’t tasted it yet.

All of life is God’s wedding to us. Happiness comes and goes with certain gifts and losses, but nothing diminishes the joy of life, the wonder of this beautiful, painful, holy life, the grace of being alive. Every moment of this life is wine miraculously made from ordinary water, abundantly provided in love, consecrated for a holy sacrament. Drink it, and dance.

         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         

Oh, how we stagger and slouch
in habitual sleepy stupor,
while the clear air dances
in and out of us!

Oh, how we stumble and whine,
hung over with resentment,
blank and bitter, so sure, so sure,
while the new life leaps within us!

Oh, how we lie about,
limp and vague and unseeing,
our water changed, unknowing,
while God pours glory into us
from the miraculous pitcher of life!

         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

Who says God has to be so serious all the time? That God can’t have some fun, go on a lark, crack a good one? That God has to talk in King James or Latin, issue decrees carved in stone, and keep on frowning? Who says God can’t evolve a platypus instead of a woodchuck, or a flightless bird just as a joke? Or give you a gorgeous sunset just to see the expression on your face? Or invent laughter? Or remove a tumor without a trace just for the heck of it? Who says God’s passion is reasonable and not unrestrained celebration?

Even ponderous old John with his heavy-handed Gospel can’t miss the light: Jesus’ first miracle was a party trick. Pure fun. Wine from water. And really good stuff, too. And at a wedding, no less. It’s a parable of covenant faithfulness, and love, and an ironic reverse-foreshadowing of the Last Supper. It’s a parable of abundance and beauty and mystery and needless splendor. It’s about life, and about blessing, and about joy—way too much and too good, way more and better than we need. Ridiculous. Over the top.

God’s love isn’t sensible. It’s flagrant, overzealous, overgenerous, prodigal, out of bounds. It’s dancing on the table. Dancing in the streets. Dancing on our own graves. God’s will, decreed from the mighty throne on high, surrounded by dark clouds and glowering angels, is the joy of life—unexpected blessing, deep joy, wild delight, wine at a wedding—your wedding to God—the best wine imaginable. Just for fun. Why not?

Raise a glass! Drink deep.

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve
______________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail,
write to me at unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com.

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         

John the Baptist takes his ax down to the frozen river.
Black trees, scalpel wind, malignant cold, blades of light.
The gift does not come easy. Death comes first

in this season of longing and refusal, the denial of the ice.
We go by way of brokenness. The living wound, the surgery.
Offenses hacked wide open. The ax, the confession. Dig in.

(Under the ice the grave water, so lovely, so cruel,
the terrible rebirth. Even good news a shock to the system,
the chemo, the first step, the sword of the angel of life.

It makes you take a breath like you’ve never taken before
You come up out of the water grabbing breath,
gasping like a newborn, fierce for that given air.)

But first the ice, the breaking through, the ax.
You’ll bear the disappointment of the gift withheld,
and set your shoulders to the hard work of staying alive.

But look, there’s been a thaw: the ice has given in,
the brook is open. The ax is laid at the root of the trees.
Something releases. You sing in thanks with curling breath.

Beneath the ice the black water was always moving, telling you,
beneath the sin or cancer or despair a dark grace, constant,
flows: an opening. An offering. Remission.

Winter and its pain won’t disappear. The seasons roll
like breath drawn out and in, and death will come and leave
again like geese. But you can be amazed, and even grateful.

Now you hear the song of winter birds you hadn’t heard,
the faithful voice: “Beloved, ice will vanish and return,
but this light is forever. I am with you. You are mine.”

         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         

We have had babies
and even after a crappy day
of poop and wailing and baby snot
crept in on them sleeping
and gushed with love.

We have received bad crayon drawings
and put them on the fridge
and kept them for years.

We have stood by imperfect friends
imperfectly, accepting the endearing flaws,
for the sake of the love we love.

So why is it so hard for us
to trust the heavenly voice
of perfect, unselfish love
that never wavers, never varies?
“You are my Beloved.
In you is my delight.”

All those little things?
Seriously, just baby snot.
Nothing changes that delight.

         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

         
         

Holy One,
I am your vessel,
your cup, your picture frame.
I am the brush and you are the art.
I am the candle; you are the flame.
I am the school bus and you are the children.
I am the ship and you are my freight.
I am the body and you are my soul,
my heartbeat, my nerve, my breath.
You are the harp and I am the string;
I am the string and you are the music;
I am the music and you are the words.
Holy One, I am your life in this life,
and you are my life.
Bear me on
as I bear you
into the world,
O Holy One.

         

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

If I cup my hands and try to hold perfect darkness in there, it takes great effort and care. With the slightest wiggle I am apt to create some tiny crack somewhere, where the light gets in. I strain and contort my hands. I can’t actually see if the darkness is complete, if there is a little spot of light between any two fingers, so I am constantly looking, doubtful, checking, anxious, uncertain, tense.

Or I can relax and let the light in.

I can try to hold my soul just so, so that no sin enters, and feel anxious that it may happen, and awful when it does. Or I can relax and let the light in. I can trust that, yes, there are shadows, and yet light is there.

In prayer I can try to hold other things out. Or I can relax and let the light in.

That’s how we all get to heaven. God just relaxes and lets the light in.

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com

                  

You are my child: my Beloved,
         in whom I am well pleased.
My delight is in you, in your very being,
         not in what you have done, or how well.
That I create you breath by breath is my joy;
         that you live gives me pleasure.

Today I have decreed healing for you,
         and blessing in body and soul.
You belong to the grace of my hand,
         the wholeness of which I fashion Creation.

All that robs life in you I wipe away;
         all that dims your beauty
         I wash away in a flood of glory.
All that you have done that is hurtful
         is gone in the river of healing.
All shame and fear I carry away
         in the unrelenting current of grace.
All that is death in you I destroy;
         I drown it in life everlasting.

Your being sings with the power
         with which I made you.
Your breath is my Spirit;
         your life is my glory.
I give you my own sacred energy,
         to be blessing and beauty,
to shine with my love
         and the the victory of mercy,
the infinity of my delight
         and the death of death.
I make you my river, my dawn,
         and I give you life
that no one can take or diminish,
         that nothing can stop.
You are my Love forever.
         Go, then, and love, forever.

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight8(at)hotmail.com