* The preacher’s words today belong to The Rev. Dr. Kayko Driedger Hesslein, Hordern Professor of Theology, at Lutheran Theological Seminary in Saskatoon. Dr Kayko is an ordained pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC) and provides a personal perspective in this sermon for Easter 7B, May 12, 2024 — Mother’s Day. Thank you, Dr. Kayko.

Well, today is Mother’s Day, and no doubt you’ve seen the cards thanking mothers for all the sacrifices they’ve made, for their boundless love, for the hugs and kisses they’ve shared, for all the work they’ve done for their families. You’ve probably seen the commercials on TV and heard them on the radio – “This Mother’s Day, show her you care, buy her…” whatever they’re selling – jewelry, a camera, a drill from Home Depot (that’s my favourite) – the list is endless. And of course, you’ve noticed the flowers and balloons in the store, covered with hearts, saying Happy Mother’s Day.

Even the church takes part in this celebration of mothers, although it’s not a specifically Christian holiday. Churches proclaim mothers to be God’s angels and saints – the epitome of selflessness, role models of self-sacrifice. Luther himself called motherhood the highest vocation and calling for women – a proclamation that was revolutionary at a time when motherhood was seen as a punishment for Eve’s transgression in the garden of Eden and nowhere near as valued as any of the “actual” vocations that men fulfilled. Since then, in the church, Mother’s Day has been a time to talk about the holiness of all mothers––about Mary, Jesus’ mother, who bravely answered God’s call to carry the Saviour in her womb and then to give him up to die; about Sarah, the wife of Abraham and the mother of Isaac, who carried Isaac in her old age and fulfilled God’s promise of making Abraham the father of generations of the covenant. We hear about Leah and Rachel, about Hannah who wept in the Temple because she couldn’t have a child, about the two mothers in King Solomon’s court––one who couldn’t cope with the loss of her baby and the other who would rather give hers up than watch it die. We heard Jesus’ words last Sunday, words that God has given us, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I loved you,” and it seems a natural step to connect this to mothers. Who else but a mother could love this way? A mother’s love is the closest many of us get to God’s love for us.

I’ll tell you a secret about mothers and Mother’s Day, though. And maybe this changes the longer you’ve been a mother, and maybe not all mothers feel this way, but this has been my experience. Mother’s Day, as lovely as it is to get cards and flowers and a break from cooking and to hear about other mothers in the Bible, also makes mothers feel a little bit… guilty. Or inadequate. Or maybe a bit ashamed. You see, mothers never feel that we’re doing as good a job as others seem to think we are. Mothers tend to walk around with this pervasive sense of guilt that we are not the mothers we wish we were. We hear about how wonderful other moms are, and we hear God’s commandment to love our children as God loves us, and we know that we don’t. The most common feeling that mothers share is guilt––over things done and left undone––and what those things have done to our children. Often we feel guilty that: 

• We’re too hard on our children and they’re going to rebel against us.
• We’re too soft on our children and they’re going to think they’re entitled to everything.
• We don’t protect our children enough and they’re going to be hurt by someone or something.
• We’re overprotective of our children and they’re not going to know how to handle the world.
• We don’t give them enough independence and they’re not going to be able to handle real responsibility.
• We try to make them too independent and they won’t be able to form close relationships with anyone.
• We treat them in ways they don’t deserve.
• We don’t treat them the way they do deserve.
• We don’t spend enough time with our children. 
• We don’t spend enough time for ourselves. 
• We don’t give them enough. 
• We give them too much. 
• We don’t do enough of this. 
• We do too much of that..

The list goes on, and so does the guilt.

Working mothers, stay-at-home mothers, student mothers, single mothers, married mothers––we come to this day with mixed feelings because we know that we have never been able to love and mother our children the way we wish we could: perfectly, as Jesus loves us, as God commands us. All mothers, no matter how well-intentioned (and, truthfully, there are some mothers who have not been well-intentioned), no matter how many sacrifices we have made (and there are always sacrifices), know that we fall short, and on Mother’s Day, this feeling lurks persistently at the back of our minds. We are never always and fully the mothers the cards say we are. We all have had our times of anger, and impatience, and annoyance, and negligence. We have all fallen short of the perfect love God commands from us.

Well, today is Mother’s Day, and so I say specifically to those of you who mother, “As a called and ordained minister of the Church of Christ, and by his authority, I therefore declare to you the entire forgiveness of all your sins.” Now, we may smile a bit, but I am serious. Mothers do not hear very often that we are forgiven for falling short as mothers. And so I proclaim to you who mother that the forgiveness that is granted to all Christians through Christ is also granted to you. To you mothers specifically. You are forgiven for all of the mistakes you have made as you mother. You are forgiven for the things that you have done and left undone. You are forgiven for not loving your children as yourselves. You are forgiven for being too strict and for not being strict enough. You are forgiven for not protecting your children from harm and for being overprotective. You are forgiven for not giving them enough and for giving them too much. Through Christ, whom some of the Reformation women called our mother, God forgives you.

God forgives you and God loves you. Even more than we find ways to forgive and love our own children, despite their failings and mistakes, despite the hurt they have caused us, God forgives and loves us, despite our failings and mistakes and the hurt we have caused. It isn’t that God doesn’t see the ways we have failed – it is that God has seen them, and God, who loves our children even more than we do, forgives us and loves us, too, because we are also God’s children.

I have one last good word to share with you today. As mothers, we always hope that our children will not be hurt by the mistakes we have made. We hope that our children will be able to move past the ways in which our mothering has held them back. The last good word that I want to share with you is that God makes this happen. We have heard over the last few weeks of this Easter season, that God makes the branches bear more fruit, and causes fruit to grow that will last. God gives to those who mother the responsibility of watering and feeding and caring for the seeds that we have been given, and more often than not, we don’t get it right. Mothers are human. But God works through and beyond our own efforts, or lack thereof, and loves them in ways that we can’t, sending the Holy Spirit where we have fallen short, and being more committed to them than we possibly could. As mothers, this is our salvation – that God takes better care of our children than we do, and that despite our mistakes, despite our inability to live up to the Hallmark cards’ description of us and despite our failure to love our children as God loves us, God loves our children, God loves us, and God forgives us. Thanks be to God. Happy Mother’s Day. Amen. 

Last summer I camped with a couple of friends on Cedar Lake in Algonquin Park. We were fortunate to get on the one beachfront campsite on a large island in the middle of the lake. The campsite was on the west side, facing the setting sun.

On the last day we were there, we wanted to satisfy our curiosity to see what was on the other side of the island, on the east shore. And there wasn’t a sandy beach to follow all the way around. So, we had to hike straight across.

There was no trail, no clearly marked path. We had to bushwhack our way through the thick underbrush and dense wood. There was deadfall we had to clamber over, swamp we had to wade through, prickly bushes to push away and mosquitos the size of buses to swat.

By avoiding some of the pitfalls in hiking across it was easy to get turned around and head in the wrong direction. So, occasionally I stopped to check the compass on my watch to keep us headed east. And we eventually found our circuitous way. After enjoying the breeze at the water’s edge on the east side we made a different albeit equally challenging path back to our campsite. All, thanks to my compass.

God gives us instructions. The word “command” appears often in the bible. But these instructions are not to be understood in a command-and-control kind of way that we must mindlessly obey. Commandments are a compass (W. Kimmerer, 2015). A compass gives us an orientation to life, not a map. The work of our lives consists of creating our map using the compass God gives us.

Love is the main theme of Jesus’ speech in the Gospel for today (John 15:9-17). The word appears several times in this short passage. Jesus says, ¹²“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” The writer of First John, in the Epistle reading today, echoes Jesus’ words: “²By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. ³For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments” (1 John 5).

The commandment to love is a compass Jesus gives you. You are given the orientation. And it’s up to you now to forge a path forward through the thickets and challenges of life.

Hopefully, not alone. The arduous journey across the wilderness island was possible only because I was not alone. I probably wouldn’t have done it by myself.

In an ethics course I’m now taking, we read about what it means to be in a helping profession. In a relationship of care, the caregiver places their full attention on the interests and needs of the other.

The person in the relationship receiving care determines the agenda, not the caregiver. The caregiver’s needs, though important, are put aside to focus on what the client or patient is bringing forward. The effectiveness and quality of the caring relationship depends on how safe the person feels in the relationship to share with the caregiver what is truly on their hearts.

In practising an active and deep listening, helpers and caregivers also fulfill one of the main ethical principles identified in professional caregiving: “societal interest”; that is, part of all we do for other individuals is also a responsibility we have to act in the best interests of society as a whole (Sorsdahl et al., 2023, p. 8). I was surprised to read this in a secular manual because it aligns with the Gospel of Jesus.

Agape love – the kind of love Jesus taught and modelled – is a servant love. Loving one another, bearing fruit, calling us friends – these phrases speak about community and a responsibility to all people. The Holy Spirit fell on the Gentiles as well (Acts 10:45). God so loved the world (John 3:16-17) not to condemn it but so that all may be saved.

And that is why the church on May 5 recognizes the National Day of Awareness for Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls and Two Spirit People[1], who have been subject to disproportionate violence in Canada. This day is otherwise known as “Red Dress Day” inspired by Métis artist Jaime Black’s REDress Project installation, in which she hung empty, red dresses to represent the missing and murdered women.[2] Red dresses have thus become symbolic of this “hidden crisis”[3] in our country.

The Red Dress display has travelled across the Eastern Synod this past year. We are fortunate to have the display today on the actual May 5 National Day of Awareness. Last week it was at All Saints Lutheran Church in Guelph and next Sunday it will be at Redeemer Lutheran Church in London, Ontario.

Our church is not just about meeting our own, individual needs, or seeking what’s best only for ourselves. The church, the Gospel, the mission of Christ is to love the world. This is our orientation, our compass. And, admittedly, creating our map and path across this proverbial island is hard work, not easy, and takes us out of our comfort zones. The compass calls us to exercise humility when we make mistakes and exercise perseverance to forge ahead.

In his letter to the Ephesians (5:1-2), Paul writes, “Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that. (Peterson, 2021).

It’s appropriate today to give the last word to an Indigenous voice, Melanie Florence, who wrote a picture book with François Thisdale titled, Missing Nimâma, or My Missing Mother.

I’ll read just two scenes from the book. The first is a conversation between the child Kateri and her grandmother. And the second scene is years later when Kateri is grown up and participates in a public memorial for Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls.

Both scenes include two voices: The first is Kateri’s voice. And the second is her lost mother’s voice.

“Where is nimâmâ, my mother?” I ask nôhkom [my grandmother].

“Lost”, she says. Lost?

“If she’s lost, let’s just go find her.”

Nôhkom [Grandmother] smooths my hair, soft and dark as a raven’s wing.

Parts it. Braids it. Ties it with a red ribbon. My mother’s favourite colour.

“She’s one of the lost women, kamâmakos.” She calls me ‘little butterfly’. Just like nimâmâ did.

Before she got lost.

Taken. Taken from my home. Taken from my family. Taken from my daughter. My kamâmakos. My beautiful little butterfly, I fought to get back to you, Kateri. I wish I could tell you that. And when I couldn’t fight anymore, I closed my eyes. And saw your beautiful face.

…

I wasn’t expecting to see so many people here. Holding signs. Wearing t-shirts. Sharing stories. I’m surrounded by the faces of so many Aboriginal women who never came home. Stolen sisters. I hold my own sign. My own lost loved one. Nimâmâ. Missing. Aiyana Cardinal. Lost.

So many faces. So many lost souls. So many people left behind. Wondering if their loved one will ever come home. Or having to live with the knowledge that they never will. Too many lost and not enough who care. (Florence & Thisdale, 2015)

—

References:

Florence, F. & Thisdale, F. (2015). Missing nimâma. Clockwise Press.

Peterson, E. (2021). The Message: The bible in contemporary language. NavPress. www.messagebible.com

Sorsdahl, M. N., Borgen, R. A., & Borgen, W. A. (Eds.). (2023). Ethics in a Canadian counselling and psychotherapy context. CCPA.

W. Kimmerer, Robin. (2015). Braiding sweetgrass: Indigenous wisdom, scientific knowledge, and the teachings of plants. Milkweed.

[1]  Two-Spirit People

[2] Details about Red Dress Day: https://www.jaimeblackartist.com/exhibitions/

[3]  Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls 

Many thanks to my colleague the Rev. Kimber McNabb who provided most of the ideas and words for this sermon. You can read the original at her blog —https://revkimber.blogspot.com/2024/04/jesus-proclaims-i-am-to-each-forest.html

In the Gospel of John, Jesus proclaims a variety of I AM statements: I AM the Bread of Life, I AM the Light of the world, I AM the Door, I AM the Resurrection and the Life. I AM the Good Shepherd. I AM the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The final I AM appears in today’s Gospel: “I AM the Vine.” (John 15:1-8)

Why is this image the last I AM revelation from Jesus? And why is it included as one of the Easter Gospel readings?

Martin Luther’s words can get us started. He wrote, “Our Lord has written the promise of Resurrection, not in books, but in every leaf in springtime.”

It’s interesting, isn’t it, how often Jesus uses the natural world to describe God’s realm and truth. Admittedly, the Gospels were written in a predominantly agrarian culture. I suppose Jesus could have talked about the tallest buildings in Jerusalem and how they were built. He could have talked about the Roman aqueducts and the ingenuity involved. He could have talked about the Roman chariots and their power. But that’s not what we have a record of in the Bible. We have stories of seeds, birds and trees.

The vine metaphor is quite relevant for us today. Recently I read about a beautiful living practice that expresses a vine and branches idea. It expands the ‘I AM the vine’ into our context today. “I AM the Vine” speaks hope and resurrection to a people living in a world today in crisis.

I AM the vine – resurrected in DAISUGI.

Daisugi is an ancient Japanese forestry technique developed in the 14^th century in the Kitayama region of Japan. It is an example of silviculture; the science and art of growing and cultivating forest.

The practice chooses an established old growth tree, usually a variety of Japanese cypress. This mother tree is cropped straight across, removing its top canopy. Cedar shoots are grafted onto the cropped branches of the mother tree. These shoots are pruned every few years to ensure straight and knot free lumber come harvest time.

So the picture is a large tree trunk with strong branches reaching up. From what would be the middle of the tree there is a straight line. From here a whole forest grows on top of the other tree.

The cultivated forest takes 20 years to mature. At harvest time the strong established mother tree remains ready to grow the next forest.

Forests that are nourished from Mother Tree mature quicker and produce more wood than other cedar forests. The wood is more flexible, denser, and stronger than standard cedar. This process has created a sustainable supply of raw material for over 700 years.

Revisiting Jesus’ statement, I AM the Vine, during the season of Easter, brings forward the promises Jesus spoke before his death and brings them into the realm of resurrection. This opens a myriad of possibilities for life, for resurrection appearances amid whatever the suffering and crisis of the day.  The All Creation Sings hymnbook concludes one of its creation prayers:

“In the name of the one who from a wounded tree birthed a new creation”—pg 47ACS

So, the question, “What difference does this image make as the last I AM revelation of Jesus?” From a wounded tree – from the cross – I AM did not die. I AM rooted in all that was, and is, and is to come, is resurrected – I AM alive!  I AM a hearty vine with energy and love and wisdom to cultivate a forest of branches to produce abundant fruit.

Canadian forest ecologist, Suzanne Simard, in her book “Finding the Mother Tree” discusses the interconnectedness of trees and how -rather than competing for resources- they share nutrients and resources with each other. Mother Trees are relational, with vast underground networks connected over the centuries. They are energy and the source of ancient life.

Jesus saying, “I AM the Vine,” takes us back to Genesis with I AM moving over the waters in creation and the Word creating by speaking “let there be.” In the garden was the Tree of Life, a Mother Tree, connecting all the way through to I AM the Vine; connecting all the way to today.

The Tree of Life – Mother Tree, to the tree of the cross, to a rooted vine, to a faithful forest.

When I heard about the living practice of daisugi I was excited. I am a lover of trees. When I think about growing a whole forest on top of one tree, I am filled with so much hope for the earth’s future and its health. The abundance of this practice is astonishing. And to know that that forest matures faster, stronger, more flexible and durable, because of the sustenance flowing from the Mother Tree – amazing! And to know that the growing of a new forest can be done continually. Wow!

When I hear about the living practice of daisugi I am excited. I am a lover of Jesus. When I think about baptism and being grafted into God’s family, I never considered being grafted onto the vine as being that which has roots to the Mother Tree. Because of Jesus rootedness, the disciples matured – strong, durable, flexible- as they shared Jesus’ story with others. The early church grew quickly by their witness.

In our context, consider the living practice of daisugi as one to be practiced in the church. Would we be less fretful of what is and more hopeful of what will be, if we understood and experienced rootedness? If we considered our present congregation as one forest, in a line of consecutively cultivated faith forests on the vine, the Mother Tree, I AM?

Can we wrap our heads and hearts around the living practice of every 20 years the beautiful straight and knot-free trees bearing fruit? Meaning cut into lumber; fruit is distributed and used, as the next forest begins to grow. It means that every 20 years we let go, in some way we let the church of the day give up its life to be resurrected again; resurrected strong, durable, and flexible.

Sometimes we get stuck trying to keep the old forest growing, rather than harvesting the forest, sharing the fruits and letting the next forest grow. We forget that the forest was never meant to be permanent, only the trunk – the Source of Life- which continues rooted and grounded and full of life.

The I AM the Vine is spoken as the final I AM because it is Jesus’ proclamation that branches will come, bear fruit, and die. But the Vine remains, as does the life that comes from the Vine – for it has a deep ancient source, the Mother Tree.

As Easter people we bear witness to resurrection appearances. We have witnessed life and death and life.

On this side of Easter, 2000 years later, we bear witness to the millions of forests that have grown from Mother Tree. The forests have embraced, believed, and lived the promises of Jesus brought forward into the resurrection. Jesus proclaims I AM! To each forest, Jesus proclaims I AM the Vine, therefore, you are!

Thanks be God. Amen.

[Jesus said] “My Father has a great love for me, for I lay my life down to take it back again. No one takes my life from me, for I lay it down on my own. I have the right to lay my life down and the right to take it back. It is my Father who gives me this right” (John 10:17-18; First Nations Version, 2021).

The Ottawa Lutherans online book club just finished reading about going on a pilgrimage. Specifically we read Tim Moore’s book about his pilgrimage to Santiago (Moore, 2004).

But what sets his book apart from all the other Camino books is that Tim Moore completed the 800-kilometre trek with a donkey, named Shinto. The entertaining account centres on this relationship between man and donkey, and their many adventures.

Shinto was by far my favourite character even though, of course, he doesn’t say a word. Shinto’s intentions, aversions, foibles and reactions are all revealed by his behaviour and physical expression.

If you have walked the Camino de Santiago, you may recall the many bridges you crossed on this journey through northern Spain, from narrow foot bridges over shallow streams to large, urban multi-lane highway bridges spanning major rivers.

But one thing Shinto would never, ever do is walk over any body of water. He would just dead stop right before the bridge and there was very little anything Tim could do to goad, force, shoo, push, haul that beast across. Shinto won that argument most of the time. And so, for much of the Camino, Tim would have to lead Shinto the long way around in order to avoid crossing those bridges.

As you can imagine, it was the source of major friction between the two of them. Shinto’s stubbornness caused Tim so much exhaustion and frustration.

Nearing the end of the Camino, Tim was joined by his family for a few days, including his young daughter, Lilja. Tim Moore describes a moment when the three of them approached the next bridge:

“…There was a bridge over an irrigation culvert, a sheet of galvanized metal which sang like a saw when I planted a boot on it. This sensory experience had a predictable effect on Shinto, and with a sag of the shoulders I turned around.

“’What are you doing?’ asked Lilja.

“’We’re going back to find another way,’ I said, lightly massaging a tender spot on my right temple, and at this stage of the day I had no wish to expose my daughter to scenes incorporating adult language and strong graphic horror.

“As I’d seen so many others do, she grimaced sceptically at first donkey, then bridge. ‘But it’s really small.’ I nodded vacantly, then set about wheeling Shinto round. ‘Have you tried holding out some of his favourite stuff from the other side?’

“’I’ve tried everything.’

“She twisted out a frond of alfalfa from the pathside. ‘Can I try again?’

“I suppressed a sigh. ’Quickly, then.’

“Lilja looked at Shinto in mock reproach, one hand on hip and the other proffering the vegetable lure. Then she leant forward, and whispered, ‘Now, Shinty, it’s only a little bridge.’ His ears shot up and without hesitation or deviation he clanged straight over” (p. 229-230).

Tim Moore doesn’t explain his daughter’s gift of having that special connection with Shinto, apart from observing Lilja successfully do “her donkey-whisperer thing” (p. 234) for a few more days on the Camino.

And I don’t know why I thought of Shinto when reading the perennial Gospel text for this fourth Sunday of Easter. Today is traditionally called Shepherd’s Sunday. Jesus is the good shepherd. I think of the metaphors describing Jesus’ relationship with us in terms of animals, and sheep no less. What’s about those sheep, and what’s about God who knows how to relate to us?

Maybe the sheep in the gospels are there to remind us that we cannot control matters of faith in our relations—divine, human and non-human. And maybe that’s the point. We cannot force the issue, make others do things we are convinced are right. There is something here beyond our capacity to manage and control. And that’s what makes our faith journeys, individually and in community, such a challenge and such a joy!

Because love begins in freedom. Love is not love unless it starts in freedom. Jesus “lays down” his life and “takes it up again” of his own volition, his own freedom. This is the basis of the Father’s love for him.

Jesus “lays down” his life for the sheep. When you can’t force, control or manage outcomes, you’re giving up without giving up. You have to, like many beasts of the field, “center down” and trust God.

How do we do that? Jesus says that the sheep “will know my voice”. There was something about Lilja’s manner and the sound of her voice that convinced Shinto to cross the bridge. Shinto’s ears are a prominent feature in Tim Moore’s descriptions throughout the book. Listening for the deeper truth, the deeper reality. And trusting in it.

A story is told about Howard Thurman—20^th century American author, Christian mystic, civil rights leader and theologian. “As a seminary student walking home late one night, Howard Thurman noticed the sound of water. He had taken this route many times, and he had never heard even a drip.

“The next day Thurman discussed his observations with one of his professors, who told him that a canal ran underneath the street. Because the noises of streetcars, automobiles, and passersby were absent late at night, Howard could discern the sound of water.”

Later, “Thurman equates these sounds … to the inner chatter within our minds that prevents us from being aware of God’s presence. Quieting the surface noise in our minds is what Thurman urges us to do when he instructs us … to ‘center down’” (Coleman Brown, 2023, pp. 121-123). 

For most of our wanderings in life, we are probably not aware of what is underneath us and how deep it goes. We can’t hear it. And when we’re faced with challenges in life, meet obstacles on the journey of faith, and we begin to sense what we’re walking over, maybe like Shinto we need to stop.

But here’s the crux of the matter, potentially the turning point of our lives. We don’t need to stay frozen in place. And we don’t always have to turn around and go backwards. In that moment of uncertainty, we can “center down” and listen. Listen to her voice, the whispering voice of God’s Spirit reaching deep into our hearts, to urge us forward in faith.

We wonder today how to witness our faith, how to relate in faith to our children and grandchildren. Maybe we need to be reminded again that Jesus doesn’t force us to do anything. Because God loves us and gives us the freedom and the responsibility to respond however we will. Following God does not come from willfulness but from listening (Palmer, 1999, p. 4).

And we, in turn, don’t will ourselves or will others into ways of being. Our task is first to listen. And trust in the ever-present movement of God’s Spirit flowing through, underneath and all around all our relations. Amen.

References:

Coleman Brown, L. (2023). What makes you come alive: A spiritual walk with Howard Thurman. Broadleaf Books.

First Nations version: An Indigenous translation of the New Testament. (2021). InterVarsity Press.

Moore, T. (2004). Travels with my donkey: One man and his ass on a pilgrimage to Santiago. St. Martin’s Press.

Palmer, P. (1999). Let your life speak: Listening for the voice of vocation. Jossey-Bass.

A large extended table centred the crowded dining room. Three times a day, at least, and hours in-between, this table was our gathering place, our home-base. 

Even when we travelled into the mountains of the south, or the cities toward the northeast, when we came back this was the first place we went to in the house. Up the stairs, by the kitchen, across the hall and into that dining room to that table.

The trip to Poland last Fall was like a homecoming. Not so much for me, individually. Home for me is here — Arnprior, Ottawa, the Ottawa Valley. Not Poland.

But the trip to Poland last Fall was a homecoming of sorts. For my mother, more so. It was, from a family point of view, a pilgrimage into a land that birthed my family history, a return to the land that culturally conditioned me. After years and decades of absence, with a few exceptions, it felt for me like a return to a place of genesis. Reconnecting with cousins and uncles thrice removed, etc., who personally knew my father and mother, I was plugging again into the source.

And that table upstairs in the dining room of my aunt’s and uncle’s house was the magnet force. Around food and drink, we came back here, no matter how far afield and distant each of us may have stretched the proverbial rubber band, here we snapped back and gathered, again.

I’ve reflected on the meaning of the last week in the events of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and I keep coming back to the table. Let’s just pause at the first sentence of this perennial Gospel text for the Easter season recounting Jesus’ first post-resurrection appearance:

When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” (1)

Like for theologian Diana Butler Bass, this phrase popped out for me: “The house where the disciples had met.”(2) What house?

Of course, it was the house where, just a few days before, the disciples had met with Jesus to celebrate the Passover meal. It was the upper room of the house where Jesus had washed their feet and called them friends. It was around the table in that house where they had shared bread and wine.

After Jesus’ crucifixion at Golgotha, and in the wake of the outlandish reports from Mary Magdalene of Jesus in the garden, the frightened disciples had gone back to the upper room in that house. Why?

Maybe, to grieve. Maybe, to await what they expected would be their own arrest. But perhaps they went back to remember. They had gone back to the dining room with the table. Their last place where they had all gathered.

This was the place where memory was encoded into their hearts, a place of sharing food and intimacy. And it was here where Jesus first showed up on the night of the resurrection, to be with his friends. On Easter, Jesus went from the tomb back to the table.

Those three holy days last week started at table. And when all was said and done, those three holy days ended up back at the table.

We normally think of Maundy Thursday as the run-up to the real show on Good Friday. And because we have placed such an emphasis on Good Friday we interpret Maundy Thursday through the events of the cross, the meal prefiguring Jesus’ broken body and the shedding of his blood for the forgiveness of sins.

But what if his disciples didn’t see it that way? What if they weren’t thinking about a cross or a blood sacrifice? What if they saw Good Friday through Thursday’s meal? After all, they came to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. They were in Jerusalem “with friends and family (not just twelve guys at a long table – sorry, Leonardo).” They were in Jerusalem “at a big, busy, bustling holiday meal to commemorate God freeing their ancestors from slavery.”

“Passover is a joyful meal” and as such the disciples were “thinking about their history and their future, and they were enjoying the supper together.” Jesus loved meals, and they knew that. They had shared so many with so many people.

In the resurrection stories, as it had always been for Jesus and the disciples, the table was the point. The table was, and is, as Diana Butler Bass claims, “the hinge of history.”(3)

What are your table memories? Where do you go, literally or in your heart, to return home, after a tumultuous season in your life? Entering a new chapter of life, where is your anchor-point, your homeland, so to speak, or home-base? 

To take the metaphor further, in this Easter season as you worship the risen Lord, recall those special experiences in those special places.

“Can you remember a moment when you experienced God, in a surprising way, in a vivid way, in a way that changed you? A moment when you were in touch with God and with the deepest, wisest part of yourself?

“Perhaps this was a moment [or place] in childhood, or a more recent moment, in nature, in church, looking at an artwork, or dancing. A time when you had a feeling of ease or transcendence or oneness with something outside yourself. Feel this moment. Taste it. What does it feel like in your body? What are the sights and sounds that you associate with this feeling? 

“Let’s make some space [these Easter days] … for that part of yourself that you are feeling and tasting. Spend some time with it and reflect on how to nurture and protect it. [And if you can’t bring such a moment to bear] … just now, I invite you to simply trust that God is at work in the way you have made the effort to come [to church] … today, and open yourself to this … experience [of worship].”(4)

And come to the table, just as you are. Pull up a chair. Because Jesus is alive! Christ is with us here and now!

——

(1) John 20:19-31

(2) Diana Butler Bass, “The Holy Thursday Revolution: Pull Up A Chair”, The Cottage. https://dianabutlerbass.substack.com/p/the-holy-thursday-revolution-pull 

(3) ibid.

(4) Lindsay Boyer, Centering Prayer for Everyone: With Readings, Programs, and Instructions for Home and Group Practice. Oregon: Cascade Books, 2020. p. 72.

How do our lives reflect God? How do we give witness to God? How do our lives show that we are “sanctified in the truth”, as Jesus prayed for us?^[1]

On my phone I have at least three different map apps. When I am in a place for the first time – a new city, a new trail – and trying to get from point A to point B I make sure to consult all three different digital maps in my hand. I take these maps to be fairly reliable because all three use location services to show me where I am in relation to the map that I’m looking at. 

However, not only are there slight discrepancies between the maps themselves. More troubling is a frequent inconsistency between the displayed configuration of streets, trails, roadways on the map, and the actual reality in front of me. There isn’t a roadway where the map says there is, for example. There are discrepancies all over the place, literally. And if I depend only on the maps to guide my way, I will often spend a lot of time on a street corner trying to make sense of it all before going anywhere.

Jesus, in his final prayer for his disciples, acknowledged the discrepencies we experience living in this world. He prayed that, like him, his disciples “do not belong to this world”.^[2] I take this to mean that often our world will challenge a life of faith. The pandemic is such an experience. When the way we have practiced our faith is no longer possible and we have to find other ways, we can feel lost and disoriented. And our impulse is to consult our ‘maps’. And even escape into the ‘map world’.

When Adam Shoalts made his famous canoe trek across the Canadian Arctic a few years ago, he memorized his route, based on the maps he studied beforehand. Blessed with a photographic memory and spatial cognition, he could visualize in his mind all the lakes, rivers, bays and portage routes even before he entered each stage of his planned route. And with success. Shoalts rarely got lost.

He memorized the way primarily to save time, despite having these maps on hand. If he had taken the time needed to consult his maps and satellite tracking each time he entered every lake, river or portage route on the four thousand kilometre journey, he could have jeopardized getting to his destination in time before winter.^[3]

When we experience significant challenges in our lives in this world, it’s important not to stick our heads in the sand. It’s important that we don’t stick our heads in the pages of books alone to escape our experience of reality now. We can’t afford to lose time doing that. I think our faith is less than it can be when we see the movement of our finger on a map as making the journey itself.^[4]

We may not have memorized all the pages of the bible. We may feel, consequently, not strong enough in our faith to make the journey. But the pages of the bible are not where we live our faith. Our witness is strongest when we do not hide our vulnerability but takes risks in faith. Our testimony is strongest when we are authentic, when we are honest with who and where we are – lost, making mistakes, or still finding our way. 

The good news is that God’s greatness speaks in word and deed, through imperfect individuals and efforts.

Jesus Christ, the Gospel shows, lived our human weakness. Jesus shows the “greater witness”^[5] in the lowliness and humiliation of the cross.^[6] Jesus lived and died our human weakness. And from the reality of our very humanity he prayed for us.

What does this mean? It means our lives participate in the truth of Jesus’ life today, and for all time and in every place. We make God “a liar”^[7] – in the words of the scripture writer—when we don’t believe in God’s very life in and through us, when we don’t believe that Jesus Christ lives and breathes through and in our very own experiences, our very own human lives.

In a few weeks we will have the confirmation of three young people who will affirm their baptism and their trust in God for life. The service will not look like any other confirmation service of the past. Believe me.

But confirmation services are not just about repeating back the ‘beliefs’ of the church. Confirmation services are not just about packing the church building to spectate young people confess some doctrine in robotic fashion. 

Rather, to affirm one’s faith is to bring something of your own heart into it. It is to express, in some simple, unique way, the connection you and your life are making with God in this time and place. And whenever that happens in the experience of living, it is the work of the Spirit of the living God, bringing it all together into the shared humanity—and therefore, unity—we have in Christ Jesus.

^[1] John 17:19

^[2] John 17:14

^[3] Adam Shoalts, Beyond the Trees: A Journey Alone Across Canada’s Arctic (Allen Lane, 2019).

^[4] The metaphor of the map I adapt from Han F. De Wit, The Great Within: The Transformative Power and Psychology of the Spiritual Path (Boulder: Shambala Press, 2019), p.146,191.

^[5] 1 John 5:9

^[6] Willie James Jennings, “Theological Perspective 1 John 5:9-13” in David L. Bartlett & Barbara Brown Taylor, eds. Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary Year B, Volume 2 (Louisville: WJK Press, 2008)    p.538-542.

^[7] 1 John 5:10

It goes without saying that we have come to depend heavily on our smartphones and social media connections. Especially when physical connections are limited in pandemic public health guidelines, much of our socializing happens on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube and the like. As a result, our social media behaviour—good and bad—has been amplified in a year of coping with more alone-time and cocooning in our homes.

In the comic strip, “Agnus Day”, two sheep friends stand side-by-side. The first reflects on Jesus’ commandment to love in the way Jesus loves—laying down one’s life for the other. “I don’t think I can love like this,” she says. Her friend replies, “It’s hard work but your calling is to love like Jesus loved.”

Reflecting some more, the first sheep says, “What if I just ‘liked’  the way Jesus loves?”^[1]

I don’t think I’m alone by confessing how good it feels when whatever I post receives many ‘likes’. Even church attendance has recently been tracked simply by the number of hits or visits our YouTube services get. Relationships in our virtual world can operate on the thin surface of this kind of interaction.

And then the irony of it: Research in recent years has suggested a direct correlation between social media use and feelings of social isolation.^[2]How can we be loving in this digitized environment? How can we love others in the way of Jesus?

The pandemic is causing us to re-evaluate and re-imagine what the love of Christ looks like. COVID has shocked us into considering anew what love (‘agape’ in Greek) means in our day.

In the life of Christ which Christians celebrate during this Easter season, we renew our relationship with God, with ourselves, with others and with creation. What is at stake, it seems to me, is the quality of those fundamental relationships. What we renew is the way in which our relationships transpire and grow in the love of God.

And it takes a little bit more than clicking on the ‘like’ button.

Last week Jessica and I were walking through the Grove in Arnprior. And we found a rare woodland flower amidst the stand of old growth Alders, Pines and Hemlock trees. Red trilliums are hard to find and spot. They take a long time in the ground—five to seven years—to germinate before producing the rich, dark-red flower.

To grow red trilliums requires a multi-year commitment before the fruits of creation’s labour are realized and enjoyed by others.

I thought about how these flowers can serve as a reminder of how God’s love in Christ grows in us and in the world. The trilliums need the warmth and light of early Spring to trigger a verdant flowering. They do best when the ground in which they are planted can receive direct sunlight before their competitors can take hold. 

Their growth is dependent on many factors. Their flowering is truly a gift. A miracle, you could say.

On Mother’s Day we give thanks and pray for all who offer mothering love. Our prayer aspires to a kind of love that extends beyond her own needs alone for the sake of another—even one who is not yet born! Of course, this love is not gender exclusive. And this kind of love does not render the giver a doormat whose own needs are shucked. 

Rather, love happens when our goals will aim beyond our own lifetime. Loving, in Christ, is a long-term commitment that reaches past our own self-interests and pre-occupations. Unlike social media which can keep us locked in self-centred narcissism, the love of Jesus expands beyond the preoccupations of any one individual of any one time. This love is a gifting for all people of every time and every place to behold.

And when we feel overwhelmed and incapable of this kind of loving, as poor Agnus the sheep confessed, let’s remember we are not Christian because of anything we do, but because of what Jesus did and who God is. “You did not choose me,” Jesus says, “I chose you …”^[3]

The love that grows from our heart is a gift from God. In the final say, we are not Christians because of our words or deeds, our actions or inactions. We are Christians because in our baptism, God said that we are. Our delight is to live into that calling to love others—devotedly, humbly and as we are.^[4]

^[1]www.agnusday.org (John 15:9-17)

^[2]https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/316206

^[3]John 15:16

^[4]Sarah Ciavarri, Finding Our Way to the Truth (Minneapolis: Fotress Press, 2020), p.112-113

What’s going to happen after the pandemic? This question comes to mind these days. What’s going to happen when public health guidelines eventually relax and we can meet face-to-face again? How will things feel and look like in our gatherings?

Jesus often uses images from nature to articulate truth about God and our world. In today’s Gospel, it’s the image of a vine.^[1]In that imagery we have a description of what is– which is comforting:

Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. This is a wonderful image of how we are in Christ, that Christ is in us. This natural-world metaphor of a vine suggests that we grow from Christ, our source, in an organic, gracious sort of way. Feels good.

But not everything in this image is easy and comfortable. We also hear echos of what may sound threatening.

There are moments, yes even seasons of time where we feel dislocated, disrupted and even disposed of. We feel like we are being pruned, ripped off and maybe even thrown away—thrown into the fire and burned. 

Isn’t COVID one of those times? Just like Jesus says, when we feel like we bear no more fruit in our lives, or the world bears no more fruit, the doom-and-gloom messages threaten to overwhelm and overtake us in grief and despair.

What’s going to happen after the pandemic? Truth is, no one knows what the future holds. No one ever did. The only thing we know is what we’ve been through in the past fourteen months, and how we continue to struggle with COVID’s effects on our collective life today.

One thing the natural world from which Jesus took many of his stories can teach us is how to appreciate the natural rhythms of time passing through the seasons. In marking time through this pandemic, we experience what has changed and what we’ve lost. The extraordinary changes have come alongside all the ‘normal’ griefs and losses of life. It’s just that these natural pains and struggles are felt more intensely in COVID times.

There is also such a thing as sacred time. Sacred time operates similarly to nature’s timing which grounds us, literally, in the present moment. In this sacred perspective, “there is no past, present or future. God holds time without reference to what has been and what will be.”^[2]When we put our hands in the soil, there is only that moment that matters. The implication of seeing time in this sacred way is that the most fruitful course to engage the difficult questions of our time, is to focus on now.

Both the good and the bad. Now. Where is God speaking to us, now? Not for some distant future. Not from some pre-COVID past reality. But now, amdistall that has changed and continues to change around us, what is God up to?

How can we come to appreciate the grace in the present moment? Well, the way we pray and the way we read the bible is the way we live our life. So, wherever in the Gospels we encounter vivid imagery of end times or firey  descriptions similar to what we read in today’s Gospel, let me ecourage you to examine your response. 

For example, when we read about wars, earthquakes and famines in the New Testament, what do you first feel? I suspect most of us regard this message as a threat. True, anything that upsets our normalcy may be a threat to our egos. But in the Big Picture, it really isn’t. 

Hidden often in this imagery is the assertion that those times are just the beginning. In Matthew 24:8 it says, “All this is only the beginning of the birth pangs.” Perhaps the best way to understand this time is that “we are nearing the end of the beginning.”^[3]

In other words, this language in the bible is for the sake of birth not death. 

In Luke 21, Jesus says right in the middle of a catastrophic description: “Your endurance will win you your souls.” When we acknowledge and feel the pain of our dislocation and disruption from the pandemic, it is for the sake of renewal, not punishment. We know what it feels like when things fall apart around us and in us. But what if it’s for a good purpose? When Jesus says, “Stay awake”, what he means is: “Learn the lesson that this time has to teach you.”^[4]

The point of these scriptures that feel threatening is not to strike fear in us as much as rearrange our imagination for the new, good thing God is doing right now. It’s not the end of the world. It’s not a threat. It’s an invitation to depth. It may be what it takes to wake us up to the real, to the lasting, to what matters.

Our best response, I believe, is to see with the mind’s eye, the heart’s eye, reality-as-it-is. What if we dove into this sacred time positively, preemptively, praying, “Come, what is; teach me your good lessons”?  What if we said yes to “What is” rather than getting trapped in the negative past year, or escaping into a fanciful future?

Abide in Christ. The life Jesus gives is the life we draw from now. Saying yes to “What is” brings us into that divine space where God finds us, and renews us.

^[1]John 15:1-8

^[2]Diana Butler Bass, “Religion after Pandemic” in The Cottage (blog accessed on 26 April 2021)

^[3]Ibid.

^[4]Richard Rohr, “This Is an Apocalypse” in Daily Meditation (www.cac.org, accessed 26 April 2021)

After the resurrection of Jesus not only are we confirmed siblings of Jesus—we learned last week—but Jesus redefines what it means to be a friend in Christ.

Good, healthy religion helps us recognize and recover God’s image^[1]in everything. It is to mirror things correctly, deeply, and fully until all things know who they truly are.^[2]Whenever I hold up a mirror to myself there’s no hiding the image of myself that I see. The mirror conveys truth, whether it makes me feel good or not.

Christ the Shepherd Sunday—normally recognized on the Fourth Sunday of Easter every year—is about our image of Jesus, indeed our image of God. What is our image of God? How do we envision, imagine, God, in Christ Jesus?

One way we understand our image of God is to hold up a mirror to ourselves, and the church. Not that we are God. But we reflect God’s image, as the creation story from Genesis declares. We might not be altogether and always pleased by what we see.

Well, what image does the Gospel reveal about the ‘Good Shepherd’? Let’s start there. The first thing I’d point out is what the image of ‘Good Shepherd’ doesn’t suggest.

Often we fall into the trap of romanticizing our friendships in the church or as Christians. The Good Shepherd image can indeed lead us astray when it blurs the boundaries in caring relationships. That is, we strive to be ‘nice’ at the expense of being truthful. When caring means avoiding difficult yet necessary conversations. When caring means overstepping emotional boundaries and forgetting how responsibility is shared in a healthy relationship. When caring means side-stepping a challenge because we are pre-occupied by pleasing others at all cost.

Unfortuanately the ‘Good Shepherd’ image of God can keep the church stuck in this romanticized picture of Christian relationships.

And who are these sheep? “I just wanna be a sheep Ba-Ba-Ba-Ba” we like to sing with the children. The image of sheep, on the surface, suggests that the sheep are all alike. That the church ought to be populated with like-minded individuals who all conform to the same beliefs and behaviour. To be part of the sheep pen, you all need to be the same.

Yet, the truth is far from this idealistic, romanticized view. The truth is that no individual creature on this earth – whether animal, plant, human, geological – is perfectly identical to another. Each of the sheep under the care of the shepherd has unique attributes unlike any other.

What is more, from the stories of the Gospels about sheep and Jesus the Shepherd, we see that Jesus will go after the one sheep who does not conform.^[3]We have called this story, “The Lost Sheep”. But I would see this story as part of the larger Gospel theme pointing to the resurrected Christ who honours and celebrates the wonderful differences in our humanity. It’s our uniqueness that reflects a healthy religion and community, not the pressure to conform. In recognizing our diversity, then, we can truly celebrate our unity in Christ.

In the Gospel for today, Jesus says, “The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep … I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also.”^[4]The Good Shepherd is all about including others who for whatever reason are different.

Brian McLaren, Christian writer, theologian and pastor, shares a story about making true friendships in Christ – not a utilitarian friendship (what’s in it for me?) nor the religious version of ‘network marketing’ (how can I peddle my wares?). He writes about making a genuine friendship, friendship that translates love for neighbours into knowing, appreciating, being curious about, liking and enjoying another person in all their uniqueness. One of the most dramatic of these friendships began in the aftermath of 9/11/2001:

“Like a lot of churches,” Mclaren writes, “our little congregation held a prayer service. While praying, I felt a voice speaking, as it were, in my chest: Your Muslim neighbours are in danger of reprisals. You must try to protect them.The next morning, I wrote and made copies of a letter extending, belatedly, friendship toward Muslim communities in my area, and offering solidarity and help if simmering anti-Muslim sentiments should be translated into action. I drove to the three mosques nearby—I had never visited them before—and tried to deliver my letter in person. . . .

“[At the third mosque,] I clumsily introduced myself [to the imam] as the pastor from down the street . . . I then handed him my letter, which he opened and read as I stood there awkwardly. I remember the imam, a man short in stature, slowly looking down at the letter in the bright September sun, then up into my face, then down, then up, and each time he looked up, his eyes were more moist. 

“Suddenly, he threw his arms around me—a perfect stranger. . . . I still remember the feeling of his head pressed against my chest, squeezing me as if I were his long-lost brother. . . . My host welcomed me not with hostility or even suspicion, but with the open heart of a friend. And so that day a friendship began between an Evangelical pastor named Brian and a Muslim imam we’ll call Ahmad. . . .”^[5]

Our enemies and friends, where do they exist? The fact and truth that Ahmad—or anyone— is a friend to one person and an enemy to another should make us think. Where is the enemy? Where is the friend? In our own lives—what’s inside of us—has more to do with the answer to those questions. And maybe it takes a lifetime of struggling with that question to come finally to the throne of grace, where the Good Shepherd welcomes and affirms not only you and your kind, but all who have been shown the love of God in Christ Jesus.

On earth, our task is to reach out in loving friendship. This year, again, Multfaith Housing Initiative in Ottawa is holding its annual Tulipathon walk.^[6]As a patron of MHI, I have participated in this annaul event which raises needed funds to provide safe, affordable housing for newcomers to Canada, the vulnerable and homeless. I invite you to support me and Jessica walk three kilometres on May 30 as we walk as Christians in loving solidaridity with all people of faith.

^[1]Genesis 1:27

^[2]Richard Rohr, “God Is Not Only ‘Over There’”, Daily Meditation (www.cac.org, 18 April 2021).

^[3]Matthew 18:10-14

^[4]John 10:11,16-18

^[5]Cited in Richard Rohr, “Making New Friends”, ibid., 15 April 2021.

^[6]www.multifaithhousing.ca

We did a poll in our confirmation class last week over Zoom. From a multiple choice list, the confirmands were asked to identify what made them happy during this pandemic. Several of them, about half of the class, chose being with family or a close friend.

Family indeed has becoming forefront in our experience of life during this difficult time for us all. Some of us live alone and our yearning for connection with loved ones may be acute. Some have experienced this time of isolation with family as stressful. Others have deepened their relationships with family members making good use of video and phone calls, or just spending more time with a spouse, child, or parent.

Before Jesus death and resurrection, the Gospels make reference to Jesus’ family. In addition to his parents, Mary and Joseph, Jesus had brothers and sisters.^[1]

But, interesting, afterhis resurrection the Gospels of Matthew and John record Jesus’ special instructions to the women at the empty tomb. He tells them to go tell his ‘adelphoi’^[2]to meet him in Galilee.^[3]Here, Jesus directs this word reserved normally for members of a household family, now to include his disciples, his friends, his followers.

After the resurrection a new relationship of intimacy with Jesus has been made possible. After his resurrection, Jesus expands the circle of whom he considers his ‘adelphoi’ – his siblings, his family – to include those not just connected by blood but by faith. Because of the resurrection, you and I are not just his followers, or even his friends. More than that, we are all now Christ’s siblings. We’re of one flesh! And that is quite stunning news.^[4]

In the Spirit, Jesus has a deep and intimate connection with us. We’re not just soldiers with marching orders to follow someone far ahead of us. We’re not just cogs in a wheelhouse of incessant activity called the church’s mission. We’re not just detached parts of some mechanism running on its own power far removed from us. No, we are of one flesh with Christ. Christ in us. Christ through us. The power of the resurrection lies within us and all the faithful. And that is, indeed, quite stunningly good news!

In the Gospel for today,^[5]Jesus shows his disciples that faith in Christ is an embodied faith. Having a personal relationship with God now is not disconnected from human flesh. Jesus says, “A ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” Then, in front of them he eats some fish.

A meal, shared together with his siblings constitutes the faith. The embodied presence of God in Christ, in us, is the power of the resurrection that expands outward “from Jerusalem” to include the whole world and all people. And that is why eating the Holy Meal, the Holy Communion, is so integral to our life together as Christians. For every time we celebrate this Holy Meal we participate, our very bodies, in the very life of the living Lord Jesus. The body – the Life – of Christ, given to you!

The confirmands have some homework to do for our next class: They have to consider something that represents hope, love, life in their lives now, and ‘place’ it in the empty egg. After all, the Easter egg symbolizes new life.

In the Zoom poll, there were listed other things that bring joy to us, even in COVID-time: In addition to family and friends, the good weather that beckons us outdoors, a new hobby, pets and learning new skills, to name a few more. 

Especially these days, you might have to work a bit harder to uncover that awareness of new life, because the egg shell can be discouraging. The egg shell looks lifeless from the outside. Like a stone, the shell is cool to the touch and feels hard.

New life is, at first, hidden and buried, like Christ in the tomb. Yet behind the shell a small gift of life is just waiting to come out, to be seen, to grow, to be lifted up and celebrated. How is the presence of the living Lord manifested in yourlife?

After the polling, the confirmands practiced writing prayers in the class last week. Let me close with the words of a couple of young women in the family of God who offered these words of prayer:

The first writes:

Dear God,

I have been anxious lately about school and everything that is happening in the world right now. It seems as if nothing is going right. But thank you for giving me hope and a reason to smile everyday by seeing by best friend at school and being around loving and caring family. Thank you for all the good things that have come with the bad things. Amen.

And another:

Dear God, 

This year hasn’t been the best year there have been ups and downs but I am so grateful to still have a roof over my head, food to eat and everything I have. Please just watch out for and take care of the people that have been struggling and that have lost their jobs.  

Amen.

^[1]Mark 6:3; Matthew 13:55-56

^[2]in Greek, translated most often into English as ‘brothers’ but meaning siblings of a household family; see Bronwyn Lea, “Scripture Says, ‘Sisters, I’m Talking to All Y’all’” in Christianity Today (April 9, 2019).

^[3]Matthew 28:10; John 20:17

^[4]Br. Geoffrey Tristram, “Intimacy” Brother, Give Us A Word (Society of Saint John the Evangelist, www.ssje.org, April 8, 2021)

^[5]Luke 24:36-48