Journey into the Heart of God...One Breath at a Time

With every breath we have a choice. With every breath I have a choice. Breathe in. Breathe out. With each breath something enters and something leaves. It is part of my life quest to learn to breathe in God's breath and to expel everything else. Since all of creation is born of God and since God loves, embraces, and infuses all of creation, one might think breathing God would not be a difficult thing to do. What a silly assumption that would be.

In the first steps of faithful living we invite God into our lives. We seek to put God at the center of our lives. But a deeper faith challenges us to live in God, for us to move more deeply into God. This is a never-ending journey. We can always move further into God. In a deeply faithful life, there are no such things as laurels upon which to rest or pride on which to rely or even a separate self to preserve. The mystic, the contemplative, the lover of God learns how to die to self in order to fully become self, to be emptied in order to be filled, to die in order to be raised. This is the paradox of faith. Such a life requires measured, meaningful, thoughtful, and intentional breath. In it, there is no room for anything other than God because there is nothing other than God - at least nothing real. God is the ultimate reality.

To live in such a way demands that we relinquish certain holds the world has on us. Yet, I admit that many of those holds are hard to break. They are like lint that won't shake off, like that piece of toilet paper trailing from the bottom of the shoe, like a piece of spinach that just won't dislodge from between those two teeth! From our early years, we are taught that the strong survive and thrive, that competition bears the best fruit, that comfort, money, and success (to one degree or another) are the standards of a life well lived. That, of course, doesn't mean that all of us strive to be millionaires or that we are all driven by unchecked greed or that we don't love neighbor. But, for the person who seeks to move ever more deeply into the heart of God, even the weakest forms of these self-seeking tendencies need to be faced and relinquished. That is my struggle. Sometimes I would prefer to play a video game than quiet my heart and sit in communion with God. I sometimes prefer to be distracted by a movie than experience silence. Sometimes I just don't want to breathe in God. I'd rather not think about my breathing at all. Sometimes.

The hardest part of seeking to live inside of God's own heart - at least for me - is to love as God loves. Wastefully. Fully. When I feel that I've failed, it's when I've not been able to fully love. Judgment, anger, impatience. These three form the triumvirate challenge of my spiritual life. Impatience and judgment run a close race for leader of the pack. When I leave work thinking badly about the day, usually I know that I did not fully surrender to God - that I did not listen deeply enough because I was distracted, that I did not spend enough time with someone because I was impatient, that I did not allow a process to emerge in its own way because I was so certain of how it should be. When these things happen, I have been an obstacle to God rather than God's faithful servant. And, I am reminded how important that silence I resist really is and how important breathing in God's breath really is. When the day ends in joy, I can look back and name the moments when God used me - this broken vessel - in a way that helped another person. There was real humanity in that day, whether in tears or laughter or honest sharing. That's a holy and wonderful day.

We live in a world of pain, hurt, fear, despair, war, environmental crisis, violence, and isolation. We live busy lives that are full of appointments, children, pets, houses, gardens, friends, work, sports, events, volunteerism, passions, and laughter. All around us and from within us there are voices competing to express themselves and to be heard. But, for us to be attentive to them - really attentive - we must also take breaks from them so that we might move further into God. Otherwise, the world and its cacophony threaten to overwhelm us.

Tonight when I breathe in, I choose to breathe in God's holy breath, the breath which Jesus breathed into his disciples when he said, "Peace be with you." I choose to breathe out that room I didn't get cleaned, the tasks I didn't complete, and the impatience that pulls me out of the 'now'. Tonight when I breathe in, I pray "Christ have mercy." I breathe out everything else.

Saint Catherine of Siena said, "We must live in simplicity, with neither pretensions nor mannerism nor servile fear. We must walk in the light of a living faith that shines in more than mere words- and always so, in adversity as well as in prosperity, in times of persecution as well as in times of consolation" (Letter to Blessed Raymond of Capua).

She also said,

"Eternal Trinity, you are a deep ocean, in which the more I seek, the more I find; and the more I find, the more I seek. You satisfy my soul, yet leave it hungry, for in your depths my satisfied soul desires you still more and yearns to see you, the Light, in your own light.

I tasted and in my mind's eye, with the aid of your light, I saw the abyss of yourself, eternal Trinity, and the beauty of your creation. Therefore, clothing myself in you, I saw myself as your image, filled with your power, Eternal Father, and with the wisdom which is your Son, Your Holy Spirit gave me a will that I might love" (Dialogue on Divine Providence).

Thank you, St. Catherine, for your prayer. I'll just breathe it in, too!

Confession - Ability, Humility, and Giftedness

I am heading home after a difficult day at work. Nothing bad happened. I actually accomplished a lot. The snow didn't drive me homewards. I wrote a letter of recommendation, talked to someone about a wedding, prepared for and led a church meeting, worked on a jurisdictional event, prayed, and did general office work. Yet, sometimes I wonder what gifts God has given me, and I am never sure if I use them to the best of my ability. I've been struggling with living a much deeper spiritual life - trying to stick to fixed hour prayer, praying an hour a day for my church, and being more intentional about my body and health. For all of that, and it has been fantastic, I still struggle with things. Are they idols I won't let relinquish? Or, is it humility that I want only the best for the people I serve and to whom I attempt to minister?

As I look back on this note, I notice the word "struggle" is overused, but it is the correct word in every place. What is this struggle about? And, how can I stay in it to the end where I, hopefully, will find a new strength and trust in what I can do, find strength in what I actually do, and trust how God uses me in the world?

I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one I know who lives with internal struggles. Don't get me wrong: I'm strong-headed, pretty sure of my intellect, and I have firm beliefs about certain things. I'm not a pushover. But, in those deep places of the soul, there remains an uncertainty about a lot of things in which I believe I should be more grounded. On good days, this manifests as awe. I ask, "How is it that I serve a beautiful congregation that deeply loves God and yearns to serve the world?" I marvel that I've been entrusted with people's stories, their joys, their pain, and their hopes. On other days I doubt.

In a struggle for faithfulness, I hope that I am not doubting God. Yet, in a way, I know that must be what is happening. In doubting my giftedness, am I not also doubting God's ability to use this cracked vessel of a life that is mine? I suppose that this is a confession: "Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief." Perhaps someday, maybe even tomorrow (?), I will face the world in awe instead of fear.

Grey's Anatomy Struggles with Faith

Last night ABC's "Grey's Anatomy" took a shot at exploring faith - why we need it, what it is, and what it does for us. While the primary story line was Chief Resident Amanda Bailey, her son, and her husband, each of the characters revealed something about their journey with faith.

Izzie Stevens wants faith in her skill - the same faith that she thinks Cristina Yang possesses. Alex Karev's lack of faith is challenged by a faith healer who recognizes how the pain of his childhood has robbed him of belief in goodness. Derek Shepherd loses faith in Meredith Grey but gains faith in himself which frees him to look for new possibilities in life. George O'Malley is confronted with the faith of his religious tradition and how his actions have fallen short of its expectations. Cristina Yang moves beyond her blind belief in skill and extends emotional and spiritual care to Bailey's injured child. Callie Torres speaks to her belief in love even though she has lost faith in many of her traditional religious beliefs. Other characters also muddled in the faith story this week as well.

Faith as belief that we belong to a larger story is a fundamental part of Christianity. It is also what seems to characterize most religions. We belong to a story that neither begins nor ends with us - a story that pulls us through the singularity of any moment into a future as yet unwritten. As Christians our story tells us that life is stronger than death and that love is stronger than despair and hate. I am surprised that a soap opera like "Grey's Anatomy" didn't' reduce faith to a list of dogmatic professions or supernatural events.

Last night's episode was called "Lay Your Hands on Me." You can watch it streaming online or via iTunes.

"speaking of faith" - a new link

"Speaking of Faith" is a radio program hosted by Krista Tippett through American Public Radio. It's a great program that explores all kinds of expressions of faith. I'm adding a permanent link to it on the sidebar. You can subscribe to the program on iTunes or you can receive the podcast via iTunes as well as through Yahoo. Check it out! It's a great conversation.

not because of fear: a god of wild love and wilder justice

This is a longer than usual post that comes in response to a couple of recent conversations. It deals with the importance of experience in our faith development. I meet more and more people - mostly people who fit in the "categories" of the GenX and Millenial generations - who would like to come to church, but the things they have heard in church keep them away. By and large I hear them say three things about Christianity that keep them outside of church doors.

1. They don't want anything to do with a God of fear. A God rooted in fear just seems too small. They have been told that the only reason to go to church, participate in Christian community, and learn the scriptures and traditions is to avoid a fiery pit in some other world. This makes no sense to them; fear doesn't speak to them. They have experienced some wonder in the world and have absolutely no desire to orient their lives around a belief system that begins with fear rather than this wonder.

2. Church has been a place filled with hurtful and meaningless platitudes. The concept that "it's all in God's plan" doesn't fit with their experience of the world. The sorrow they've felt in their own lives and tragedies they see around the world just don't fit with this view. If it's all in God's plan, God seems to be a pretty mean deity - sadistic even. They have heard, upon the death of a loved one, "It's all for the best." Or they have heard after some kind of tragedy that "It's all in God's plan." Wow! These platitudes hurt people and don't add meaning to life. People are looking for a place that will welcome honest and real questions about life, death, and all that happens in between. They are looking for a place that will welcome their doubts and offer a way to deal with them. They are not looking to have the most important and fundamental struggles of their souls dismissed.

3. The God of the churches they have known has been described as "all powerful." This means that God either makes all the bad things in the world happen or allows them to happen. This doesn't work with their hopes for a deity. It just doesn't seem right.

Of course there are lots of other reasons that people stay away from church, but these are some of the ones that I hear most about. And I have to say that if I had been raised in a church that promulgated them I probably wouldn't go to church, either. My experience of God - the Divine, the Ground of Being, the Source of All that Is, the Great I Am, the Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer, the Holy Spirit, the Great Love (you get my drift) is that our words will always be insufficient to capture the wildness of God. God is the wildness of love and the passion at the heart of justice. In them we find a holy combination that is magnificent and miraculous. God is personal and corporate. God is inclusive - radically so. And God convicts our sins - yes, I said sins. Sins of injustice, of apathy, greed, violence, fear, and hate. We do sin. We miss the mark all of the time, but my experience (thank goodness) is that that God's grace overwhelms my sins. God invites me into full communion with the universe and all that is in it. At the heart of Christianity is a radically inclusive and relational God who loves this world and burns with a passion for justice.

Here are some responses to the three reasons people stay away from church:

1. "Fearing God" - which is in the Bible quite a bit - is to hold the purity of God's holiness in awe. It isn't an invitation to be afraid. It is an invitation to hold God and all that God has made in wonder and to look upon it all with reverence.

2. My experience of God tells me that there are no easy answers to life, just an invitation to live. The sorrows that we experience aren't sadistic gifts from God, but through them we may find our ability to withstand grow stronger. Sometimes, though, they will almost destroy us. Our community is there to hold us up when we can't stand on our own. Christianity is a pathway and Jesus is our Way. Together we ask questions and stumble along.

3. God's power is overwhelming. I have experienced God's power is a lot of ways. Living the Pacific Northwest, it takes just a glance at Puget Sound, Mt. Rainier, or at the salmon making their way home to spawn to see God's power at work. When I see oceans spinning with hurricanes, I see God's genius at work as the Earth tries to right itself back into balance. But somtimes God's power lies in the tear of someone aching and mourning. God's power is not our power. It is divine. It is generative, invitational, convicting, and persistent. It is not coercive - at least not in my experience.

I have experienced God's love as something wild and God's passion for justice as even wilder. I tell those coming back to church - those who dare to step across the sanctuary threshhold - that God invites us into community to seek together what we haven't found alone. I tell them that church isn't perfect - it is political and flawed and filled with difficult personalities. Church isn't a place to come a order up a slice of personal fulfillment. Church is a community that stumbles together to discover over and over the wildness of God and ways for us to extend that love, grace, and justice into the world.

faith, budgets, and the small church

I have a great deal of faith in the power of God. I believe strongly in the presence of the Holy Spirit. And I know that Jesus invites us all into difficult places to do important work on behalf of God's peaceable kindom. So, if my faith is so strong, why do I totally freak out about my local church's budget? What is the right balance between 1) faith in God's call, the power and presence of the Holy and Spirit, and responding to Jesus' call to unwavering discipleship, and 2) responsible stewardship, responsible bookkeeping, and realistically understanding the reality before us?

The church that I serve is filled with wonderful people. We are getting younger and more active each year. Yet we also face the stranglehold of the high cost of building maintenance, the expensive nature of having a full time ordained clergyperson, and the associated costs of other staff. I have no idea how to sort through the interaction of faith and reality, of risky ministry and responsible stewardship, of moving forward boldly and maintaining the community already assembled.

Tonight I'm not someplace that I had planned to be. My stomach is too upset, and I know 100% that this is stress related. We will find a way through this year; that much I know. What I don't know about are following years. Further, I know that our work to pare down our budget to meet what we can spend entails the devastation of line items that support certain missions and all programs and activities that support growth. We must find a way to support growth, not just maintain what we have. Even small churches need some growth, even if they intend to remain small.

My church is small. The people want it to remain small. In the intimacy of this community many people find family, support, and community. They have no desire for this to turn into a place where they are lost. How do we do this and also have financial health?

good religion, bad religion

This post is similar to the one that I wrote just a few days ago, but the weariness of the people around me has been unrelenting. It seems that every time that I answer the telephone the person on the other end is stressed, tired, hurting, and guilt-ridden. And most of these folks have some bad religion to thank for it all. I thought that I would write a few thoughts to remind myself - and anyone who stumbles across these ramblings - that good religion exists, and that it invites us into the fullness of life and the wholeness of being.

Bad religion is everywhere. It tells us to give until we're depleted, deny the needs of our own souls, and "do" until we're dead. Bad religion coerces and threatens in order to get its way. I know that I fall prey to it more often that I'd like to admit. Sometimes my heart feels heavy, my soul empty, and my mind too full. These are results of bad religion making itself at home in me. It sets up shop. It guilts, coerces, and uses.

Good religion has no place for such things. Good religion invites us into the fullness of life and the wholeness of being. It invites us into Being Itself. Good religion begins with Sabbath. Sabbath is time for God and the standard for justice. Sabbath should never be skipped - yes, I'm "shoulding" on you. Sabbath gives us a rule that demands that we (and all who work for us, people and animals alike) rest from work. In a society in which we work all of the time, I wonder at the changes that taking Sabbath seriously would bring. When we begin with Sabbath, we give ourselves one full day a week to rest at the breast of God, breathing in God's life (ruach). Good religion begins with this concept.

Good religion has no place for violence, threats, and coercion. It doesn't need any of these things because its purpose is different from the purpose of bad religion. Whereas bad religion desires to consume us, good religion desires our perfection in love. Good religion invites us into the quiet of sanctuary and the stillness of prayer. In good religion, we live and move inside of the Holy. From this place of completeness we move into the world as God's witnesses and stewards. You see, whereas bad religion sends us empty into a wounded world, good religion sends us radically connected to Life Itself into the world. It makes a huge difference if we're starting with a full gas tank or an empty one.

I wonder what the world would be like - what we would be like - if we believed in a God that loves us rather than despises us, encourages us rather than threatens us, invites us rather than coerces us. God demands that we offer all that we have and all that we are to God. This offering, though, isn't the death of ourselves, it is our beginning. In the ackowledgement that the world and all that is in it belongs to God, we orient ourselves toward right relationship with the rest of creation. We don't give up on ourselves and give out. We fill up with the connection of life and the radicality of God.

Good religion is an invitation to Life. Sometimes I want to kidnap those around me who won't be still and allow Sabbath. And while my inclination toward kidnapping may be honorable, I believe that it is also a felony. So I pray. I pray that all who are weary, hurting, stressed, and guilt-ridden will experience Life radicalized in God. For those who struggle, I pray that the persuasive power of the Creator and Liberator will buoy them in their hard times and give them strength. I pray that God's grace will shower down upon all who are bending under the weight of their hearts and the pressures of the world. And for those who souls are empty and depleted, I pray for the awesome wonder of the universe to pour into them, the light of the stars offering warmth in the cold corners of their beings. I pray that we all learn to dance with delight completely assured that God is our dance partner, gently leading us through the moves.

why isolation and church shouldn't go together...remembering our baptism

Church is a place where people come together to seek spiritual nurture and to offer themselves for the transformation of the world. If there is one thing that the church absolutely has to be it is a place of connection, care, and challenge. Yet time and again I witness the isolation of people in church and those who work in churches.

As a pastor in a church, one of the great privileges of my job is to hear people's stories. It is a sacred and holy experience to sit with someone and to listen to their dreams, their histories, their joys, and their struggles. On the days during which someone has honored me with their story I come home fully aware of the Divine that exists in the sharing of our lives.

During these moments of self disclosure we live into the fullness of our baptismal covenant. In the baptism liturgy we promise to love and support one another through all of our days. In the liturgy we remember the fierce faithfulness of God and we celebrate the many times that God delivered God's people from hardship. In our liturgy we vow to place Jesus at the center of our lives and to resist the evil and oppressive powers of this world. We bless water - symbolic of the powers of chaos and deliverance - and we mark our foreheads to seal the promises that we've made to one another and to God. This ritual initiates us into covenant life. It is our entry into radical connection with God, with one another, and with the church universal. When we open ourselves through the sharing of our stories - through the sharing of our lives - we make our baptismal vows real.

Why, then, do so many people who come to church remain isolated and wounded? Why, then, do so many people drift away from church worn out, tired, and weary? These are sad questions to ask. And I ask them not only of the laity but of the clergy. Too many of us do not feel the care we crave. We do not experience the nurture we seek. We do not find the connection that lies at the heart of authentic Christian community.

Today I feel the same isolation. Despite presiding over the holy and sacred ritual of baptism only yesterday, today I feel defeated, alone, and tired. I know that my feelings will soon pass, but I also know that too many people who sit in the pews in my small church have these feelings all too often. They are real describers of people's experiences. My heart weeps at the woundedness, and my soul longs for healing for my community, for the people I know (and don't know), and for my own sense of isolation on this day.

I wait for the day when Christians will believe in the power of our baptism and offer our woundedness to one another, trusting that care and nurture await us. People would find a deeper connection to God and to one another through the sharing of hurts and fears with each other. We might actually surprise ourselves if we dared to step into our baptismal covenant with trust in the promises that we've made.

Progressive Christianity struggles, in part, because many folks who identify as such tend to be individualistic and intellectual in approaching life (and faith). The problem, of course, is that our faith is communal and our God is a mystery. Sharing our lives together is part of what church invites us to do - even demands that we do. This is a challenge for many people. It takes time and trust; it requires us to extend ourselves in faith to one another. But I believe that we would all find something unexpectedly sacred if we would extend ourselves in this way, if we would open ourselves up to one another with faith in our baptismal vows. Through the sharing of our pain, I believe that we would find hidden strengths that would surprise and awe us.

If you, like me on this day, are tired to the bone...if you, like me on this day, wonder how things will figure themselves out...if you need something to act as a reminder that God is ever present, ever caring, and ever moving in our lives, remember the power of baptism - God delivers us from the evils, the sorrows, and the oppression of this world and the people who assemble (the church) has promised to offer needed strength and care during hard and painful times. Whether we're busy because we have young children, are sad because someone we loved has died, are weary of oppression and marginalization that never relents, or are struggling with the demons inside of our souls, we all need some care, connection, and strength from another from time to time. It's okay. That needed connection lies at the heart of our faith and is what holds us up when we know that otherwise we might drown. I know that I'll spend time this evening thanking God for my baptism and asking God for the strength that I did not feel today.

I hear too many church people express that they feel isolated while they sit in the gathered assembly. Somehow church has become broken. We need to fix it. And the only way to fit "it" is to open ourselves to one another. Remembering our baptism is a good place to start...