Category: Reflections

         Out of the depths I cry to you, O Holy One.
                   —Psalm 130.1

Not from gleaming heights of piety,
but darkest deeps I cry to you.

I bring you the gift of my tears,
the openness of my excuseless hands.

I offer to you the treasure of my confession,
the intricate art of my fractures.

If you judged, we would fail.
But you only bless, and forgive.

And so I wait. I sit in this darkness,
longing for your dawning in me,

longing for the dawning
that is surely coming,

that has already begun in my east,
and I watch.

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

June 25, 2021

There are those for whom life
is little better than a frat party,
all pose and flirt and “hold my beer,”
a refined science of pretending and denying.

To stand for the truth, for that silent thing
that most kindly haunts us,
feels like leaving the party for a time out,
going into a cold, dark room alone.
How many times have we chosen
the lights over the loneliness?

Only when we put our hand on the doorknob,
only when we walk through that narrow door
do we find there

the friendship of the truth,
the real world, its warm company.

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

June 24, 2021

         She had heard about Jesus,
         and came up behind him in the crowd
         and touched his cloak.
                   —Mark 5.27

Jesus, even without knowing,
you offered your power to her.
Without justification
you met her reach.
Without knowing why,
you enabled healing.

You do not require
explanation or deserving.
By the overflowing of your grace
you can’t judge or withhold.
You don’t even know of her
before you’ve healed her.
Such is your love.

She reached out.
And this—this—you call faith:
not the believing, but the reaching.

Jesus, I do not understand.
I do not know the outcome.
I only reach out.
I reach for the hem of your garment.

Breath prayer:
Jesus … I reach

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

June 23, 2021
.

The first day of summer,
my calendar said,

though for some it is winter.
But that was yesterday.

This is the first day of today,
this, the first moment of now.

The migrating bird, the pulsing star
know their cycles without counting

so instead they can just dance.
Look: even now this moment

is looking at you with that look,
beckoning you out onto the floor.

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

June 22, 2021

         If I take the wings of the morning
                  and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
         even there your hand shall lead me,
                  and your right hand shall hold me fast.
                   —Psalm 139.9-10

Sometimes it’s actually good
to settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
where there is nothing but God’s presence.

Free of all requirements or expectations,
removed from “what we’re worth”—
there is the sacred worth of our being, apart from our doing.

Sabbath is not a prohibition— can’t do this, can’t do that—
but freedom—freedom from what’s asked of us,
freedom from being identified by what we do,
or even how we’re doing,
freedom to simply be—
and finding there God’s gracious accompaniment.
The farthest limits of the sea.

I’m going to take the wings of morning
and take a vacation from Unfolding Light for a couple weeks.

In my absence from this work we both
will find God’s presence.
Look for it.

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

June 4, 2021

         Where can I go from your spirit?
         Or where can I flee from your presence?
                   —Psalm 139.7

Holy One,
Holy All,

you are infinite;
the universe is less; and within you.

I am in you. Where I am, there you are.
Even my deepest absence—your presence.

You are in all that I see,
all whom I meet.

Your mercy is unfolding,
your justice flowing.

I waken to your presence.
Your presence creates me.

I breathe you. I am you.
I serve you.

Breath Prayer:
Infinite … here

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

June 3, 2021

         “Whoever does the will of God
         is my brother and sister and mother.”
                   —Mark 3.35

In a culture where family is right up there
with God, maybe higher—
Jesus says, “Yeah, family is it.
But family isn’t blood.
It’s love.”
Without, by the way, a “father,”
an authority figure. Just God.

No more tiny family,
with my little fence around who I care for,
who I’m responsible to.
Instead you give me this infinite family.
All those who follow you differently than I do—
I belong to them. We are one.
I am to care as much about strangers as my own sister,
respect opponents no less than my own brother,
honor people so unlike me as my own mother.

And this miracle: though it seems hard
to love them all as if they are mine,
when I do—
I come home.

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

June 2, 2021

You who tremble at injustice
take heart.
Jesus, the Gentle One,
has bound up the strong man
and plundered his power.
Satan’s militants still roam the earth
but they serve a master who has already lost,
and their power is no match
for the power of love.

Those who would divide
and those who would conquer
wallow in their error.
They cannot imagine
we are all the children of God.

Trust in the Peaceable One.
Do justice, love mercy,
and walk humbly with God.

[Mark 3.22-27]

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

June 1, 2021

         Jesus said to them, “Is it lawful
         to do good or to do harm on the sabbath,
         to save life or to kill?”
         But they were silent.
                   —Mark 3.4

Jesus breaks no commandments,
dismisses no law.
He radicalizes them,
distills them down to their essence
and magnifies them.

The laws of God are not rules to follow,
they’re the way of resisting harm
and giving life,
not merely avoiding moral error
but doing good.

There is no neutral position,
no bystanding. Silence in the face of evil
is evil.

The good news is
it is lawful to do miracles.

God, help me
to join in your life-giving work,
not to avoid mistakes,
but to bless, to heal,
to plant the seeds of your grace,
in your Spirit, to do miracles.

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

May 31, 2021

Soul, do you feel a tinge of awe?
Praise the Holy One, who is.

Do you feel the balm of an unseen companion?
Thank the Son, who is present.

Do you feel the courage, the rising of love?
Honor the Holy Spirit, who breathes in you.

Soul, do you sense the mystery that can’t be sensed,
the giving that is a gift,
the Beyond that is within you?
Bow down and leap up,
for the Holy Trinity
has found space to rest and dance in you.

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

May 28, 2021