Through Stained Glass: A Mid-Week Reflection-Sunny Celebration

Sunny Celebration

It was a glorious day.

No one could have picked a more perfect Sunday to celebrate the joy of Easter.

I remember hearing the birds sing during the Sunrise service.

The sun made her way over the horizon (read:  the jr. high) just as we said our final ‘Amen’ and greeted one another once more, “Christ has risen indeed!”

Our 40 days in the wilderness and our slow march during Holy Week turned into a bright hour of song and celebration as we celebrated the gift of resurrection during worship at 10am.

Sunday, was, well, pretty perfect.

Easter has come and gone now….

Or has it?

As many of you know, Easter isn’t but 1 Sunday. No, it is actually 50 days! Thus, for the next 6 or 7 weeks we will hear stories of the post-resurrected Jesus.

We do this to remind ourselves that we are in fact an Easter people!

The work isn’t done. Rather, now is the season and time for us to celebrate the life we receive from God’s grace. Now is the time to celebrate the sunny days and the joy of laughter. Now is the time to thank God for life—for today—for our friends and family—thank God for

YOU!

Creation isn’t done with ‘resurrection’ either. Trees are blooming; daffodils are opening; and grass is growing. Before you know it, the slow process of re-creation will have completely consumed our neighborhoods.

This work, this re-creation, is also happening in you.

Everyday God is shaping you into the person who God wants you to become. Believe it. Trust it. Embrace it. As an Easter people we are reminded that God has never given up on us and that not even death could keep God’s love for us down.

So friends, I encourage you to practice resurrection in the coming days. Celebrate the gift of a new day…this new season.

Easter has not passed us. Rather, it is just beginning.

Also, in honor of national poetry week, I want to share a poem by my favorite writer, Thomas Merton that has set my course for this Easter season.

Take thought, man, tonight. Take thought, man tonight when it is dark, when it is raining. Take thought of the game you have forgotten. You are the child of a great and peaceful race. You are the son of an unutterable fable. You were discovered on a mild mountain. You have come up out of the godlike ocean. You are holy, disarmed, signed with a chaste emblem. You are also marked with forgetfulness. Deep inside your breast you were the number of loss. Take thought, man, tonight. Do this. Do this. Recover your original name. This is the early legend that returns. This is the legend that begins again. Remember the ancient dances. (He has remembered the whole world at peace. He has remembered the world of villages, of maize, of emeralds, of quiet mothers. He has lifted up the world.)

May you during this Easter season, discover your original name.

Through Stained Glass: Advent Word[s] of the Day-Whirlwind & Wonderfully

Day 14:  whirlwind

God answered Job out of the whirlwind…[Job 38.1]

 To say these last 48 hours have been a whirlwind would be a major understatement.

My Sunday morning began at 4:30am when I woke up wide-awake. I tossed and turned until 5:00am but then finally overcame my bodies desire to get up and did just that.

I made coffee. Sat down at my writing desk. Finished my sermon. Updated the baptism liturgy. And had a moment with the 2 golden dogs.

That was the last bit of peace I experienced that day.

Now, this isn’t to say Sunday was bad. Actually, it was opposite of that. Sunday,

December 14^th was one of the most beautiful days I’ve experienced lately. As mentioned above, our church baptized one of our own, little 3-year-old girl who has the most beautiful smile and an energy to her that is contagious.

I’ll chalk-up my inability to sleep to my excitement about this most joyful occasion in the life of the church!

There is nothing I love more than being able to declare God’s promise to someone in the waters of baptism. There is nothing more life affirming than to look the child in those sweet big eyes and say “You are a beloved child of God. You are beautiful. You are good. God loves you more than you will ever know. We have been here, we are here, and we will always be here. We are making this promise to you, little one. We love you!”

In the name of the Triune God of love, the waters swirled and ran down her head, neck, and shoulders, she was baptized and reminded that God is as close to her as her own breath.

My heart was delighted. The eyes of the congregation were swollen from the tears of joy elicited by the beautiful hymn I was There to Hear Your Borning Cry. There was such good, positive energy pulsating through the pews.

The whirlwind continued as I went from church to Sunday school, from Sunday school to lunch, from lunch to a birthday party. Surrounded by a half dozen Elsa’s and a giant Olaf balloon, I found myself smack dabbed between 12 or so 3,4,5,6, & 7 year olds helping my little niece celebrate her 5^th birthday. I loved hearing their high shrilled screams as they played hide and seek; my nieces smile at each of her Frozen gift brought a smile to my face; and hearing the little boys laugh as they played dodge ball warmed my heart.

But then, that is when the whirlwind of a good day ended with a sad tone.

The birthday party was at a church. Not in town. Not anywhere around here.

As the kids were running and hiding, screaming and playing, I ventured into the sanctuary to gain some ideas. I love visiting other churches to see how they set up sacred space.

Like most churches who are not from the mainline tradition and want to be sensitive to seekers, this space had screens and no crosses, a iMac and no pews, drums, guitars and no organ.

Knowing the Mac computer is where the pastor’s sermon was probably controlled, the slide show and what not, I went to see if I could find a bulletin. Instead of the bulletin I found the pastor’s sermon.

I was hesitant to read it. If for no other reason than I don’t like when others read mine.

I wish I didn’t read it.

In fact, I wish I didn’t snoop at all.

What I found was a sermon using scripture to declare our differences as sin and not to celebrate our diversity as something beautiful.

Instead of some of God’s children being “fearfully and wonderfully” made [day 15’s word] they were portrayed as less than, seen not as a human being but by the prejudices ascribed to them.

My heart was broken.

I wanted to cry.

How could a place be so hurtful, so unwelcoming, so mean—especially a week after a 12-year-old boy took his life because of bullying he endured for being on the cheerleading team?

How quickly we forget the Hebrew teaching about caring for the stranger.

How quickly we forget the Hebrew concept of sanctuary is rooted in the tradition of the cities of refuge.

How quickly we have forgotten Jesus’ greatest commandment because of our number driven obsession and mis-interpretation of the great commission.

How quickly we forget God is not the god of hatred and bigotry, but of radical love.

Advent is a time reminding us we are all in need of healing. But it is also a time when we contemplate and celebrate God taking on flesh.

God in the person Jesus speaks to how every human being is a dwelling of God—man or woman or child, Christian or Jewish or Buddhist or Muslim, addict or honor roll student. As Elie Wiesel reminds us, in his article The Refuge, “Any person, by virtue of being a son or daughter is a living sanctuary whom nobody has the right to invade.”

For the real “real reason for the season” to take hold of our communities, we must become a community that practices God’s Welcome and hospitality by boldly proclaiming and celebrating the inherent goodness, that divine spark, all peoples posses.

As people come to our churches on the 24^th, let us remember that God’s hospitality in a world of difference and danger is the source of our life, and it’s not an optional action for us or our churches. After all, as Letty M. Russel notes, “the table[s] we gather around is a symbol of God’s hospitality in welcoming the strangers, persons who are on the margins of our churches and cultures.”

I was reminded over the last 48 hours that in the whirlwind waters of baptism, we are claimed and named by God, and am God’s beloved who is fearfully and wonderfully made…

Day 15:  wonderfully

I am fearfully and wonderfully made… [Psalm 139.14]

Not only was Olaf at the birthday party, but he was front
and center at the baptism as well!

Through Stained Glass: Advent Word of the Day-Laughter

Day 5:  laughter

Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me.” [Genesis 21.6]

Humor is infectious. The sound of roaring laughter is far more contagious than any cough, sniffle, or sneeze. When laughter is shared, it binds people together and increases happiness and intimacy. 

But what about those days when we can’t seem to find anything to laugh about?

When we see more pain than anything else.

When we see more tears from hurting so much than from laughing too hard.

When the news pundits proclaim more bad news than the angles proclamation on Christmas day.

What about those days?

I wish I had an answer. But today, I don’t. I wish I had a joke that could help ease the pain of those who hurt but I don’t.

I wish I had a knock-knock joke that could wipe away your loneliness, but I don’t.

I wish I had a riddle that could distract your worried mind for a hot second, but I don’t.

Instead I want to share with you a picture from a lunch I had yesterday with some of the most wonderful people I know.

This is the Women’s Association of our church. 4 of them are over the age of 90.

I don't trust anyone who doesn't laugh.
~Maya Angelou

I’ve come to appreciate my time with these women. Not only because they laugh at my corny jokes, but because they’ve all lived interesting lives and can tell a good story. I love to listen to how they found their way to our church and then why they stayed. I love to listen to the progress they’ve witnessed. And I love to hear how they believe and trust that God is about to do something new.

I’ve come to appreciate their laughter which is full of life and wisdom.

Advent is a time to dream about the fulfillment of God’s promise. It is a time to dream daringly. Advent is a time when we listen again to the promises of God—and we may want to laugh the same way Sarah laughed at God’s promise of a child. Even when the world grows dark with despair, here is comfort to be found in the dismissive laughter of Sarah and the belly laughter of a baby—for both remind us that in our doubts and in our fits of happiness, God makes good on God’s promises.

Laughter is a powerful antidote to stress, pain, and conflict. Nothing works faster or more dependably to bring your mind and body back into balance than a good laugh. Humor lightens your burdens, inspires hopes, connects you to others, and keeps you grounded, focused, and alert.

I think Presbyterian minister Frederick Buechner was onto something when he said:

“Laugh till you weep. Weep till there’s nothing left but to laugh at your weeping. In the end it’s all one.”

If you don't want to read but need a good laugh, here is a video of Chloe from when she was but a pup: