Category: Reflections

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         
This weekend our son is getting married. As Pastors, Beth and I have performed hundreds of weddings, but as parents we’re rookies. This one will be outside, on a farm in New Jersey. Maybe it will rain. Showers are possible. But even if it’s a downpour, it will be lovely: even if his tux is soaked and she falls in the mud and the goats eat her flowers and the cake is soggy and the tent collapses and the band sneaks off to the barn and eats all the food and the cows get out, he will still say “I do,” she will say “I do,” and the pastors will say “Amen.” That’s what’s going to happen. The rest is pictures.

Of course we hope for nicer pictures than all that. But the point is that this is a celebration of Dan and Jill’s loving faithfulness, not the weather.

Loving faithfulness is always what it’s all about. Reality itself is an expression of God’s love. “All things came into being through the Word.” The good news is repeated over and over: “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.” Some people think God is objective about us, undecided, a bit distant, and could condemn us or ignore us. But our Heavenly Lover has made a Covenant with us, a promise of unconditional love, regardless of the weather around us or within us. God isn’t waiting till we die to decide whether to be with us forever. God’s goodness isn’t dependent on ours. God is in love with all Creation, and wholly devoted. Life is the Beloved’s marriage to us. The whole world is God’s wedding ring, given in steadfast love and fidelity. Every sunrise is wedding music. Every breath is God’s “I do.”

We hope for all sorts of smaller blessings—good weather, good food, good hair, good health, good feelings, good parking. But deep down you know how minor those things are. Our deepest hope is for God’s good love, God’s unfailing presence. And that’s a done deal. A promise. None of life’s uncertainties can change that—the delights and disasters, the marvels, the suffering—none of it changes The Absolute: that God loves us like crazy, will be faithful to us forever, will give us everything God owns and do anything to be with us, will die for us; and that even suffering and death will not part us, but bring us closer. We are God’s. God holds us close. And what God has brought together, no one can break apart. That’s the good news—this weekend, and to the end of time.

_________________
Weather Report

Unconditional love,
despite variable conditions:
faithful, steady love and grace,
with a chance of scattered showers
of fear, sorrow, hilarity, tragedy,
exuberance and hail.
One hundred percent chance
of divine presence.
This is not a prediction.
It’s a fact.

         •

         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

        Job said, “I cry to you and you do not answer me;
                I stand, and you merely look at me.”

        Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind:
        “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
                Tell me, if you have understanding.
        Who determined its measurements—
                surely you know!
        Or who stretched the line upon it?
                On what were its bases sunk?
        Who laid its cornerstone
                when the morning stars sang together
                and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?
        Or who shut in the sea with doors
                when it burst out from the womb?”
                          —Job. 30.20, 38.4-8

We want answers.

God gives us presence,
but not answers.
Loving attention, gazing at us from within,
faithful companionship,
walking with us through this amazing Creation,
all of it fashioned in a love and wisdom
that we can’t comprehend,
with wild art and crazy beauty
and boundless love–
this Creation that holds us and births us
and cherishes us even in our mortal unravelings,
offers us delights in its steady hands,
even in our tragedies–
reverence that ours can’t even imitate,
purpose that the human mind can’t read
any better than the poetry of the time before time,
forgiveness, mercy and delight–
but not answers.

Beyond all suffering and pleasure,
reason and meaning,
our desperate clutch at making sense,
the love God gives us
doesn’t need to become any less
than perfect mystery.

No answer,
just God.

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 unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com.

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.
         
         
         The Human one came not to be served
         but to serve.
                  —Mark 10.45

You who seek the Almighty
high above you
and are disappointed,

whom you must serve
and please, and makes you
nervous in your failure,

look beneath
for the Humble One,
your servant,

who makes no demands,
displays no power,
but makes your life possible,

endures the dirtiest jobs for you,
bears the most brutal burdens,
covers the darkest shame,

offers you the cup of life,
makes your soul shine,
loyal, submits to you,

waits for you
attentively
inside your breath.

         
         
Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

.       “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own,
.       and give the money to the poor,
.       and you will have treasure in heaven;
.       then come, follow me.”
.                —Mark 10.22

 

The one thing you lack is whatever you need to let go of.

Once you have unclenched your fists from your money
there is your health and your family,
your faith, your assurance, your feeling good.
The Beloved waits for you, while you are encumbered
with whatever you’d rather have than God.

The one thing is to go beyond your fear.
Whatever you are afraid to let go of
is what stands between you and coming to God
with open arms and empty hands,
trusting that what you’ve lost you will receive
a hundredfold in this age,
and in the age to come eternal life.

Take off that bulky coat of fear.
Allow yourself to come to a place
where what you treasure is paltry
compared to what you receive.

Thread the needle.
Let go of everything, now, in this moment.
In the perfect poverty of prayer
walk away from it all to God,
poor and naked, alone and without recourse.
Utterly needy and dependent, fall helplessly
into God’s waiting arms,
where you will receive,
Beloved,
you will receive.

 

 

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

 
Heavenly Lover, Holy One,
you who are the dearness of the world,
and the dearness of my soul,

you are here, and I am in you;
this moment flows from your heart
like light from the sun.

I am the speaking of your Word,
this world is the singing of your song,
each moment the blossoming of your love.

I give you my mindfulness and all my heart,
that this moment, and all this day
I may be lovingly present to you.

Every sound calls me to prayer;
every silence is your speaking.
Clothed in all eternity, you are here.

I am the meadow where you play.
Each word and deed is your window
out of me onto the world.

You sing in me, and my living is my listening.
I live in harmony with your grace,
your light unfolding in me.

 

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

Indeed, the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. Before God no creature is hidden, but all are naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom we must render an account.
—Hebrews 4.12-13

The “piercing” is not violent assault, but skillful surgery, perfect knowledge of what is inside us; the “dividing” is not cutting us apart but discerning, distinguishing between what is eternal and what is passing, what is true and what is false. The Word is God knowing us deeply. God’s Word is the act of paying attention, more like listening than speaking. The Word of God is a presence—indeed, a person— who knows you, who understands what moves you, who feels your reality form within you.

The Word knows the difference between what is truly you and what is false, imposed, and needing to be removed. God’s knowing presence, God’s judging, is not cruel, not against you (you’re still thinking of that sword). God looks on you only with reverence and love. God sees you, with the eyes of “mercy and grace,” of one who can “sympathize with our weakness… who in every respect has been tested as we are” (v. 16, 15). God’s Word is the living presence that loves you from the inside out.

I think of my sister’s cancer. She needs (and receives) from God a love that knows her true self, that treasures her soul, her absolute being—and who sees clearly and exactly what is false and life-diminishing in her, what is not really “her,” and needs to be removed. To have life and have it abundantly, she needs a listening Word that pays attention, a discerning Word that knows what it’s doing, a sharp Word that can cut out the killing stuff from her and set the rest free.

The living and active Word listens you you deeply. Let that Presence pierce you. Let that Listening lay bare the intentions of your heart, so that you can see yourself clearly, as God sees you. Let that Love sink deep to the marrow of your fears, the bone of your desires, not to cut you up, but to see what does not give you life and free you from it, so that you become more truly and wholly yourself, for the sake of your lovely, precious, holy life.

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

 

The word of God is living and active.
—Hebrews 4.12

 

Not a written down thing,
a carved somewhere thing,
an already told you thing.

More like a murmur that God
is still saying, still making up,
that you’re only now hearing,

if you’re listening now,
this moment, for what
God is saying to you, in you,

maybe a kind of word,
an idea you can name,
a feeling you can have,

but more likely like nerves waking,
a beauty rising in you,
a touch, a nudge, a look,

a moving in you like your unborn
kicking, like falling
in love, a certain way

of adoring you that God has.
A kiss, and the still moment
that follows. What God most wants

you to know just now, like
“Let there be light,” only more
like “Let there be you.”

Listen. God is only just now,
in this stillness,
speaking.

 

 

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

Dearly Beloved,
Grace and Peace to you.

 

 

The tribes in you that thrived
before the others came and colonized,
the songs, the dances and the people
dancing them weren’t perfect, not at all:
they stole and fought and failed.
The histories they told that others buried,
the stories in the languages they banned,
the songs that someone other
than the prairies silenced
weren’t ones the others
should have traded for their own,
but they were true.
The fenceless land that spoke to them
was not some gilded Eden,
any more than they were those
the movies said they were.
It’s not that it was better,
though much of it was better,
but this: that it was yours,
and it was silenced.
That still the speaking land is there
beneath your paving and your walls,
a whole, great, vibrant people,
singing still, and dancing,
telling stories in your land.
That you don’t have to sell this island
one more time.
Walk this path and listen for them,
weeping, maybe, just at first,
along that trail of tears,
but singing, too, still singing,
dancing life in one great circle
in a song that all the armies in the world
can never conquer, never have.

 

 

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

To you, O Holy One, I give myself;I pour my soul into yours.

I am as safe as a star
shining in your sky;
the destroyers of my life
can never reach me.
Sitting with you in stillness
I fill with glory.
Those who would assault me leap
and fall into an abyss.

Beloved, you are my truth; lead me.
You are my path; take me.
Be my mind, my heart, my will;
for you alone are my life.
You are all I wait for;
every moment is an opening to you.

Heavenly Lover, your whole heart is mercy;
your will is steadfast love:
source of the world, it has never failed
in all of time or before it.

You see me not through my sins,
but through your steady love.
You are free from my past,
steadfastly faithful to your goodness.

I am alone in the room of my affliction,
yet you are present within me;
your grace breathes beneath my troubles
and bears me out of this narrow place.
You know the corpse in me.
Bring it to life.

You save us, O God,
in all our troubles.

(Ps. 25.1-7, 16-18, 22)

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com

 
  “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them;
for it is to such as these that the realm of God belongs.
Truly I tell you, whoever does not
receive the realm of God as a little child
will never enter it.”
—Mark 10.14-15

 

Mother of the Universe,
Father of the Poor,
Lover of the Little Ones,
I am one of them; I am yours.

I pray that I may be playful
on the knee of your delight;

helpless and dependent
in the arms of your grace;

hungry, receptive, grateful
at the breast of your world;

vulnerable, trusting in your hand
in this rough place;

learning voraciously
in your shadow as you work;

your toddler, one hand high in yours,
learning to walk;

belonging without question
to your love.

Birth me again this moment,
born into your hope.

My source, my life, to you I pray,
I and all your children,

all your children,
your image and flesh,
offspring of your grace,
joy of your womb.

 

 

 

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

To subscribe to Unfolding Light by daily e-mail write to unfoldinglight5(at)hotmail.com