More journey than event

When I write about forgiveness I am constrained to consider my own relationship with it.  That is, how am I following my own understandings?  Am I preaching to others while failing to follow myself?  Although this is often an uncomfortable internal conversation, it almost always proves to be a valuable one.

My most recent reflection on the subject led to this:  forgiveness is more journey than it is event.

I believe that it is rare that true or pure forgiveness occurs - complete and full blown - in a particular moment.  It is rare that one can confess and ask for forgiveness while the other receives the confession and offers complete forgiveness all in one moment.  It is rare that you can put a time and a place on a forgiveness event.

Rather, what we thought was forgiveness in the beginning doesn't really mature until time has passed and we have tested out our supposed forgiveness in many different situations.  As we journey down this road called forgiveness we recognize those by-ways where we get stuck, where old attitudes rise up and we re-act rather than respond to the other.  When we think back, we can remember the time and place of the original hurt, and it still hurts; it still matters and we realize that our forgiveness is still a work in progress.

Furthermore, the wounds that we cause one another are not interchangeable.  Some hurt more.  Some have longer term consequences.  Some hurts are inflicted on those we love rather than directly on us.  I might forgive you crashing my car a lot more quickly than if you had an affair with my husband.  I might forgive you undermining me at work more quickly than I would intentional lies to a potential employer which costs me a job.  I might forgive your demands for greater alimony much more easily than I will forgive the abandonment of our child.

Some stuff is REALLY hard to forgive because it was REALLY hurtful and the hurt is too big to swallow, and in truth, will never be forgotten.  So instead, we begin the journey of forgiveness.  We take just one step forward, perhaps we simply commit to eliminating negative comments about the other.  One step.  When we have mastered that one step, we try the next.  Then the next.  Then the next.

Don't fool yourself.  The steps count.  They move you towards a place which is more healthy for you and your soul; it is more healthy for the community around you, and in time, it will prove more healthy for the (not completely) forgiven other party.  When anger and resentment and jealousy are removed from the equation, however slowly, the world is a better place.

Forgiveness increases the grace quotient in the world, and that, my friends, is never a bad thing.

Something's a little fishy here..........

The liturgical season of Lent means fish to a lot of people.....and not always in a good way.  What is Lent?  You know, when Catholics have to eat fish.  In the circles I frequent, this wondrous insight is usually followed with, 'I'm glad I'm a Lutheran.  We don't have to eat fish.'

That's it?  That's Lent?  Fish?

However, you are right.  We Lutherans don't have to eat fish.  We don't have to pray or give food to the hungry.  We don't have to attend to acts of charity or read the Bible or even attend worship more frequently.  We aren't required to think about anyone but ourselves nor are we required to do anything but what we have been doing all the other days of the year.

For some all of that spells freedom.  Freedom from the oppression of the church.  Freedom from ancient and 'meaningless' traditions.  Freedom to worship God as we want.

Which is all well and good if 'worshiping God' is what you are doing and not simply avoiding the discomfort which comes with knowing that God is too often forgotten and the world too often in charge.

No, you don't have to eat fish.  It is only a strategy to remind us that God is the provider of all., and we give thanks. It reminds us that some of your neighbors will not be eating at all this evening, and so we give something extra to the food pantry.  It helps us think about God's creation and to consider how well we are caring for it and how we might change.  It gives us a specific time to give attention to our prayers for someone we know really needs God's help.

It's not about the fish.  But I guess you already figured that out.

Be blessed by this time of Lenten observation.  Use it to exercise your spirit and re-connect with God and neighbor.

'Wanting the manger to stay empty"

"This year, as I journey toward the pulpit on Christmas Eve, I do so as a pregnant woman. I am due in May, and holding my breath that this baby will make it and be healthy. I approach worship knowing that in my longest night, which ended up lasting for about two months a year ago, I was not alone. The people in my congregation, too, need to know they are not alone. I approach Christmas with new sensitivity to the pain of the people in the pews who may be faking their way through the joy of the season. But isn’t that really the way it is for all of us who observe the Christian year? Even as our Advent journey comes to a close at Christmas, we know that right around the corner is Lent. Our journey is beyond the stable and toward the cross. Joy tinged with pain, but also always surrounded above and beneath, behind and before, completely hemmed in by hope."

This beautifully written paragraph is the final one in a blog entry written by Emily Peck-McClain, an ordained Methodist minister who had, just the year before, miscarried 6 days short of Christmas (her second miscarriage).  Shared through the website www.youngclergywomen.org, her piece was entitled "Wanting the manger to stay empty."  

It is her gift to all who have walked this or a similar path.  A Blessed Christmas to all.

A difficult truth

"Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return"

That is the Church's way of reminding you that we will all die; this life is fragile, a gift.  No amount of running around or running for exercise will save you from this universal end.  You will return to dust.

Wednesday we will use ashes as the starting point in our Lenten journey; 40 days of renewing, deepening, and stretching our relationship with the Creator of All. 

Come and enter into the season of Lent where you can discover again for the first time the love of God.

Temptation your name is ......

Switching from Noah in the Old Testament to the gospel rendering of Jesus' baptism and temptation in the wilderness, moves us from water to desert.  Since we are in the year of Mark, we have already heard the baptism story at least once if not twice and this is the sparsest rendition of the temptation scene among the gospel writers.  (John has no early temptation/wilderness scene at all).

Temptation is such a good topic to start Lent with.  We all know it, intimately.  We all can name it (I would name it 'chocolate').  We all wonder about its pull on us.  Why can't we just walk away?

Mark's wilderness story has no dialogue between Jesus and the tempter (devil??).  But note that it is the Spirit, which Jesus received at his baptism, that drives....yes, drives.....him out into the wilderness for 40 days among the wild beasts.  Angels are mentioned as well.  Apparently there is some important work that Jesus needs to accomplish.

Without all the details that Matthew and Luke give, we are left with this simple fact:  after baptism comes temptation.  Coming to terms with temptation is an important - maybe even essential - part of Jesus' preparation for ministry. 

Perhaps that is all we need to know.  Following baptism, we will come face to face with temptation.  What we do, how we respond, where we take our failure to be 'strong' when we succomb to temptation....perhaps those are the more important questions.  For as Luther teaches us, we are all both saint and sinner.  The water of baptism makes us saints, beloved children of God.  But we will have one foot in this world until we lay down for the last time, and so we continue to experience and practice sin each day.   Temptation is our constant companion.

And we don't get to face these temptations out in the wilderness when perhaps we are able to give it our full attention.  Oh no.  The temptations comes when the laundry needs to be done, groceries bought, year end reports completed, taxes filed, a baby's diaper changed  (you get the idea). 

So maybe it isn't the wilderness that makes the temptation, but the temptations that make the wilderness.  Perhaps if we give in to every whim and desire that comes alone, without thought, without calling on the name of the Lord, then we will surely end up in our own wilderness - where we will thirst after God's presence and the Spirit's power. 

Now that would be a wilderness I would want to avoid.    Peace.