Tag: Advent

We Are Not Alone: Forgiven

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He who is devoid of the power to forgive
is devoid of the power of love. . . .
We can never say, ‘I will forgive you,
but I won’t have anything further to do with you.’
Forgiveness means reconciliation, and coming together again.
~Martin Luther King from The Gift of Love

I was your rebellious son,
do you remember? Sometimes
I wonder if you do remember,
so complete has your forgiveness been.

So complete has your forgiveness been
I wonder sometimes if it did not
precede my wrong, and I erred,
safe found, within your love,

prepared ahead of me, the way home,
or my bed at night, so that almost
I should forgive you, who perhaps
foresaw the worst that I might do,

and forgave before I could act,
causing me to smile now, looking back,
to see how paltry was my worst,
compared to your forgiveness of it

already given. And this, then,
is the vision of that Heaven of which
we have heard, where those who love
each other have forgiven each other,

where, for that, the leaves are green,
the light a music in the air,
and all is unentangled,
and all is undismayed.
-Wendell Berry “To My Mother”

It’s no wonder that this culture quickly becomes littered with enormous numbers of broken and now irreparable relationships. Politics itself becomes a new kind of religion, one without any means of acquiring redemption or forgiveness. Rather then seeing some people as right and others as mistaken, they are now regarded as the good and the evil, as true believers or heretics.
~Tim Keller from The Fading of Forgiveness

The heart’s reasons
seen clearly,
even the hardest
will carry
its whip-marks and sadness
and must be forgiven.

So few grains of happiness
measured against all the dark
and still the scales balance.

The world asks of us
only the strength we have and we give it.
Then it asks more, and we give it.
~Jane Hirschfield from “The Weighing”

photo by Bob Tjoelker

Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
Luke 23:34

To think of the love God shares through His forgiveness,
granting infinite grace that knows no bounds:
this is a heaven where even mere reflected moonlight heals
the tangles and knots we make of our lives.

His Light rises to illuminate and soothe our sorrows and regrets,
as our sins are unraveled, smoothed, forgiven, and forgotten.

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

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We Are No Longer Alone: Unfolding

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If God is adding to our spiritual stature,
unfolding the new nature within us,
it is a mistake to keep twitching at the petals
with our coarse fingers.
We must seek to let the Creative Hand alone.
~Henry Drummond from Beautiful Thoughts

photo by Josh Scholten

The unfolding of your words gives light;
it gives understanding to the simple.
Psalm 119:130

…they soon forgot what he had done
    and did not wait for his plan to unfold.
 In the desert they gave in to their craving;
    in the wilderness they put God to the test.
Psalm 106:13-14

I look for the forms
things want to come as

from what black wells of possibility,
how a thing will
unfold:

not the shape on paper, though
that, too, but the
uninterfering means on paper:

not so much looking for the shape
as being available
to any shape that may be
summoning itself
through me
from the self not mine but ours.
~A. R. Ammons, from “Poetics” from  A Coast of Trees

In the infinite wisdom of the Lord of all the earth,
each event falls with exact precision
into its proper place in the unfolding of His divine plan.
Nothing, however small, however strange,
occurs without His ordering,
or without its particular fitness for its place
in the working out of His purpose;
and the end of all shall be the manifestation of His glory,
and the accumulation of His praise.
B.B. Warfield

What is revealed by the unfolding of our faith
is the depth and width and height and completeness inside.

Unfolding means no longer staying hidden and unknown,
but opening ourselves up for all to see.

We become the page upon which God writes,
the palette upon which God paints,
the instrument that God plays,
the song that God composes.

We become beautiful unfolding,
each one of us, slowly, surely, gently,
in the Hands of our Creator God.

He knows how each of us began
as He was there from the beginning.
He remains the center of our unfolding forever.

AI image created for this post

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

Alleluia! Alleluia!

A spotless rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winder,
And in the dark midnight.

The rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary purest maid;
For through our God’s great love and might,|
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.
Alleluia!

How do I grieve what I can’t let go?
It’s got a hold, it’s got a hold on me
How do I mourn what I cannot know?
It’s got a hold, it’s got a hold on me
Jesus Christ, I don’t know what I am
Am I a lost little lamb or a wolf in sheep’s clothing?
Oh, my God, I don’t know what this was
Am I the child of Your love or just chaos unfolding?
How do I keep what I cannot find?
I’m letting go, I’m letting go of You
I’m letting go How do I love what I left behind?
I’m letting go, I’m letting go of You I’m letting go
Am I just chaos unfolding? Am I just chaos unfolding?
Unknowing!

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We Are No Longer Alone: Quickened

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Oh, then, on that spontaneous, light-filled day, the world 
will begin singing again after our dim, silent millennial waiting— 
—you and me and every one of us. After the dark days 
the sun will be no longer reluctant in his shining (we’ll 
lift our faces to him, believing him to join with us, jubilant, 
peering from behind the heaving clouds). Then will our old limbs run and climb again with new vigor, and even the ancient barns, 
settling deeper in their fields, will sway and creak their praise in 
unison with the thunder, and the storms of wind and hail, while 
the old horse nickers in his stall, shaking his white mane at us, 
we standing by the barn door to greet him, full of joy. We’ll even 
see fish leaping and eagles soaring, ascending the sun-glanced air.

At the autumn in-gathering, the ground will boil with fallen apples, 
their fermentation making the feeding cattle tipsy. And in the frost-whiskered creeks, swimming the in-creeping tide, wood ducks will 
once again nudge each other along, making beatific bird music. And then—Spring! When it is all, everything, thawing, leaping, calling us back in time, in tune, as we, with the whole passionate earth chorale, will practice our scales for the ultimate performance. We’ll be, every one of us, overflowing with a brilliant, unstoppable, alleluia joy, singing songs that we’ll need not rehearse, since by then we’ll know all the tunes and words by heart, with love brimming over our souls’ rims, like wine. And together, leaping, rampant with a vertical energy, and freshened voices and a brand-new score, and well-tuned, enthusiastic instruments, and our almighty Lord leading us, we’ll sing, and keep on raising heaven’s roof without ever needing to stop.
~Luci Shaw “The Quickening” in Christian Century

Great are thy tender mercies, O Lord:
quicken me according to thy judgments.
Psalm 119:156

…because of the tender mercy of our God,
    by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven
 to shine on those living in darkness
    and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the path of peace.
Luke 1:78-79 from the Song of Zechariah

So it is written: “The first man Adam became a living being”;
the last Adam, a quickening spirit.
1 Corinthians 15:45

Some women have described it
as a fluttery feeling,
the separate life announcing itself
with months to go before making its entry
into the outer world.

I like to pretend that I remember that sensation,
My womb, your chrysalis,
your new energy making its presence known
washing over my heart
like a silky wave.

Soon, you may wonder
what was that?
Mark that moment well—
it is the first of many steps that he will take
moving away from you.
~Marietta Calvanico “The Quickening”

photo by Lennart Nilsson from A Child is Born

There is a distinct and memorable moment in pregnancy, around 16 weeks gestation, when there is an undeniable awareness of movement within the womb–initially a fluttery feeling, but then over the next few days, there are irresistible tickly sensations, then rolling, then pushes.

This is referred to clinically as “quickening”–an emphatic evidence of life within–and a profound acknowledgment that one’s life is no longer one’s own. It is now shared.

Jesus is called the “second Adam” through his death and resurrection, a quickening spirit now shared with us, so much more than the simple life and breath of the first Adam.

The Spirit lives and breathes within us, fluttering and rolling, pushing us from inside. We are startled by its presence, amazed by its insistent touch from within. Pregnant with possibility due to God’s tender mercy, we will never, never be the same again.

AI image created for this post

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

Come, O come, Thou quickening Spirit,
God from all eternity!
May Thy power never fail us;
Dwell within us constantly.
Then shall truth and life and light
Banish all the gloom of night.

Grant our hearts in fullest measure
Wisdom, counsel, purity,
That we ever may be seeking
Only that which pleaseth Thee.
Let Thy knowledge spread and grow,
Working error’s overthrow.

Show us, Lord, the path of blessing;
When we trespass on our way,
Cast, O Lord, our sins behind Thee,
And be with us day by day.
Should we stray, O Lord, recall;
Work repentance when we fall.

Prompt us, Lord, to come before Him
With a childlike heart to pray;
Sigh in us, O Holy Spirit,
When we know not what to say.
Then our prayer is not in vain,
And our faith new strength shall gain.

If our soul can find no comfort,
If despondency grows strong,
And the heart cries out in anguish,
“Oh my God, how long, how long?”
Comfort then our aching breast,
Grant it courage, patience, rest.

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We Are No Longer Alone: Opened

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What next, she wonders,
with the angel disappearing, and her room
suddenly gone dark.

The loneliness of her news
possesses her. She ponders
how to tell her mother.

Still, the secret at her heart burns like
a sun rising. How to hold it in—
that which cannot be contained.

She nestles into herself, half-convinced
it was some kind of good dream,
she its visionary.

But then, part dazzled, part prescient—
she hugs her body, a pod with a seed
that will split her.
~Luci Shaw “Mary Considers Her Situation”

Wide open, then it happens:
A glance, a blow, error a kind of cleaving—
Of? Or to? So something else can enter.
Open wide then. 
~Katherine Coles from “Annunciation”

…the child that will soon form
inside her body, this loss by which we come
to bend before the given, its arms that open
unexplained, and take us in.
~Laurie Sheck from “The Annunciation”

We know the scene: the room, variously furnished,

almost always a lectern, a book; always
the tall lily.
Arrived on solemn grandeur of great wings,
the angelic ambassador, standing or hovering,
whom she acknowledges, a guest.

But we are told of meek obedience. No one mentions
courage.
The engendering Spirit
did not enter her without consent.
God waited.

She was free
to accept or to refuse, choice
integral to humanness.

____________________________

Aren’t there annunciations
of one sort or another
in most lives?
Some unwillingly
undertake great destinies,
enact them in sullen pride,
uncomprehending.
More often
those moments
when roads of light and storm
open from darkness in a man or woman,
are turned away from
in dread, in a wave of weakness, in despair
and with relief.
Ordinary lives continue.
God does not smite them.
But the gates close, the pathway vanishes.

______________________________

She had been a child who played, ate, slept
like any other child – but unlike others,
wept only for pity, laughed
in joy not triumph.
Compassion and intelligence
fused in her, indivisible.

Called to a destiny more momentous
than any in all of Time,
she did not quail,
only asked
a simple, ‘How can this be?’
and gravely, courteously,
took to heart the angel’s reply,
perceiving instantly
the astounding ministry she was offered:

to bear in her womb
Infinite weight and lightness; to carry
in hidden, finite inwardness,
nine months of Eternity; to contain
in slender vase of being,
the sum of power –
in narrow flesh,
the sum of light.
Then bring to birth,
push out into air, a Man-child
needing, like any other,
milk and love –

but who was God.

This was the moment no one speaks of,
when she could still refuse.

A breath unbreathed,
                                Spirit,
                                          suspended,
                                                            waiting.

______________________________

She did not cry, ‘I cannot. I am not worthy,’
Nor, ‘I have not the strength.’
She did not submit with gritted teeth,
                                                       raging, coerced.
Bravest of all humans,
                                  consent illumined her.
The room filled with its light,
the lily glowed in it,
                               and the iridescent wings.
Consent,
              courage unparalleled,
opened her utterly.
~Denise Levertov “Annunciation”

…yea, thou art now
Thy Maker’s maker, and thy Father’s mother,
Thou hast light in dark, and shutt’st in little room
Immensity, cloister’d in thy dear womb.
~John Donne from “Annunciation”

34 “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” 35 The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.“
Luke 1:34-35

We are puzzled when God intervenes in our lives in ways that are completely unexpected and sometimes downright inconvenient. We are touched in ways we have never been touched before, as His power “overshadows” us so deeply we can never possibly remain the same.

A transformation takes place and new life begins to grow in us.

When God touches our lives, He opens and fills us with His Spirit, even when we have been sullied from the mire of the world. What makes Mary unique is her complete and total surrender to His will for her life: 

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered.
“May it be to me as you have said.”

Let it be for us as well – our hearts made ready and opened wide.

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

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We Are No Longer Alone: Changed By Words

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All changed,
changed utterly:  
 A terrible beauty is born.
~William Butler Yeats from “Easter, 1916”


…just calm clean clear statements one after another,
fitting together like people holding hands...
a feeling eerily like a warm hand brushed against your cheek,
and you sit there, near tears, smiling,
and then you stand up.
Changed.
~Brian Doyle “The Greatest Nature Essay Ever”

In the beginning, was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, ad without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
John 1:1-5

Have you ever read words that made such a difference in your thinking that you felt changed? Words that hold on to you and won’t let you go?

The gospel of Jesus’ descent to earth is just such a story.

From the divinely inspired declarations of the prophets,
the joy and heartbreak spoken in the Psalms
~from His birth and ministry and death and rising~
Words linked from the very beginning of the universe,
to the here and now,
to what is to come.

Life can be a thick fog, leaving us lost without a sense of direction.
Scripture brings light and clarity in the darkness, so we might hold hands with all who have come before, and those after.

The Father immerses us in His Creation.
The Son, Word in flesh, walks alongside us.
The Spirit connects us when we feel alone and hopeless.

Changed.

Behold, I show you a mystery;
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,
In a moment, in a twinkling of an eye;
1 Corinthians 15:51

AI image created for this post

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

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We Are No Longer Alone: Visited

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The Visitation by Mariotto Albertinelli
Annunciation by Bartolome Esteban Perez Murillo

…we should not try to escape a sense of awe, almost a sense of fright, at what God has done. Nothing can alter the fact that we live on a visited planet…
We shall be celebrating no beautiful myth, no lovely piece of traditional folklore, but a solemn fact.
God has been here once historically, but he will come again with the same silence and same devastating humility into any human heart ready to receive him.
J.B. Phillips from Watch for the Light

Angels Announcing the Birth of Christ by Govert Flinck

I want to be like the visited Mary in her daily routine, awed yet accepting, as the angel interrupts her with an incredible announcement.

I want to be like the visited Elizabeth, overjoyed, along with the leaping baby in her womb, seeing her cousin Mary pregnant with her Lord.

I want to be like the visited shepherds, silenced and aghast, flattened with so much fear that they need the reassurance “do not be afraid” and immediately go to find the baby in a manger.

I want to be like the visited Joseph whose life would never be the same again, as my own self-sufficiency and sense of “how things should be” is shot through and leaking dry.

I too need interruption – to be overjoyed, aghast, my expectations upended, eager to find this new gift of life.

Only then is my heart ready to receive and welcome this visitor. 
Only then.

The Dream of Saint Joseph by Anton Raphael Mengs, 1773

This year’s Advent theme is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s sermon on the First Sunday in Advent, December 2, 1928:

The celebration of Advent is possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come. For these, it is enough to wait in humble fear until the Holy One himself comes down to us, God in the child in the manager.

God comes.

He is, and always will be now, with us in our sin, in our suffering, and at our death. We are no longer alone. God is with us and we are no longer homeless.
~Dietrich Bonhoeffer – from Christmas Sermons

1. This is the truth sent from above,
The truth of God, the God of love;
Therefore don’t turn me from your door,
But hearken all both rich and poor.

2. The first thing which I do relate,
Is That God did man create
The next thing which to you I tell,
Woman was made with man to dwell.

3. Then after this was God’s own choice
To place them both in Paradise,
There to remain from evil free
Except they eat of such a tree.

4. But they did eat, which was a sin,
And thus their ruin did begin —
Ruin’d themselves, both you and me,
And all of their posterity.

5. Thus we were as heirs to endless woes,
Till God the Lord did interpose
And so a promise soon did run
That He would redeem us by His Son.
~the Herefordshire Carol
Collected by E. M. Williams from Mr. W. Jenkins, Kings Pyon, Herefordshire, July, 1909. Music Noted by R. Vaughan William

and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.
John 8:32

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Leaving Ordinary Behind

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Days come and go:
this bird by minute, hour by leaf,
a calendar of loss.

I shift through woods, sifting
the air for August cadences
and walk beyond the boundaries I’ve kept

for months, past loose stone walls,
the fences breaking into sticks,
the poems always spilling into prose.

A low sweet meadow full of stars
beyond the margin
fills with big-boned, steaming mares.

The skies above are bruised like fruit,
their juices running,
black-veined marble of regret.

The road gusts sideways:
sassafras and rue.
A warbler warbles.

Did I wake the night through?
Walk through sleeping?
Shuffle for another way to mourn?

Dawn pinks up.
In sparking grass I find beginnings.
I was cradled here.
I gabbled and I spun.

As the faithful seasons fell away,
I followed till my thoughts
inhabited a tree of thorns

that grew in muck of my own making.
Yet I was lifted and laid bare.
I hung there weakly: crossed, crossed-out.

At first I didn’t know
a voice inside me speaking low.
I stumbled in my way.

But now these hours that can’t be counted
find me fresh, this ordinary time
like kingdom come.

In clarity of dawn,
I fill my lungs, a summer-full of breaths.
The great field holds the wind, and sways.
~Jay Parini from “Ordinary Time”

It can happen like that:
meeting at the market,
buying tires amid the smell
of rubber, the grating sound
of jack hammers and drills,
anywhere we share stories,
and grace flows between us.
  
The tire center waiting room
becomes a healing place
as one speaks of her husband’s
heart valve replacement, bedsores
from complications. A man
speaks of multiple surgeries,
notes his false appearance
as strong and healthy.
 
I share my sister’s death
from breast cancer, her
youngest only seven.
A woman rises, gives
her name, Mrs. Henry,
then takes my hand.
Suddenly an ordinary day
becomes holy ground.
~ Stella Nesanovich, “Everyday Grace,” from Third Wednesday

photo by Emily Gibson

The only use of a knowledge of the past is to equip us for the present. The present contains all that there is. It is holy ground; for it is the past, and it is the future.
~Alfred North Whitehead

This is the last day of “ordinary time” in the church calendar.
Yet nothing in this moment is ordinary.

What matters, happens right at this very moment –
standing in the grocery store check out line,
changing a smelly diaper,
sitting in the exam room of the doctor’s office,
mucking stalls in an old barn.
Am I living fully in the present now?
Am I paying attention?

We are sentient creatures with a proclivity to bypass the here and now to dwell on the past or fret about the future. This has been true of humans since our creation. 

Those observing Buddhist tradition and New Age believers of the “Eternal Now” call our attention to the present moment through the teaching of “mindfulness” to dwell fully in a sense of peacefulness and fulfillment.

Mindfulness is all well and good but I don’t believe the present is about our minds. 

It is not about us at all.

The present is an ordinary day transformed by God to holy ground where we have been allowed to tread with Him who comes to walk alongside us in our travails:

We remove our shoes in an attitude of respect to a living God.
We approach each other and each sacred moment with humility. 
We see His quotidian holiness in all our ordinary activities.
We are connected to one another through His Word and promises.

There will be no other moment just like this one,
so there is no time to waste. 

Barefoot and calloused, sore and stumbling at times, together we step onto the holy and healing ground of Advent.

AI image created for this post — I burst out laughing when I saw what AI came up with for “walking on holy ground”!! Maybe it really isn’t too far off, as much of the time, I’m not sure if I’m coming or going and this illustrates that dilemma pretty well!

Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua. Osana in excelsis. Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domina. Benedictus qui venit. Osana in excelsis. Agnus Dei, qui tolis peccata mundi. Dona nobis pacem.

Heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is he who comes. Hosanna in the highest. Lamb of God, Who take away the sins of the world. Grant us peace.

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Emptying Like a Cloud

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God empties himself
into the earth like a cloud.
God takes the substance, contours
of a man, and keeps them,
dying, rising, walking,
and still walking
wherever there is motion.
Annie Dillard from “Feast Days” in Tickets for a Prayer Wheel

Soon we will enter the season of Advent, an opportunity to reflect on a God who “takes the substance, contours of a man”, as He “empties himself into the earth like a cloud.” 

Like drought-stricken parched ground, we prepare to respond to the drenching of the Spirit through the Son, and be ready to spring up with renewed growth.

He walked among us before His dying and subsequent rising up.
He walked among us again, appearing where least expected,
sharing a meal, causing our hearts to burn within us,
inviting us to touch and know Him.

His invitation remains open-ended,
His heart preparing us for our eternal home.

I think of that every time the clouds gather, open up, and empty.  
He freely falls to earth, soaking us completely,
through and through and through.

AI image created for this post
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The Sunrise Shall Visit Us: What Our Good God Has Done

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The angel said there would be no end
to his kingdom. So for three hundred days
I carried rivers and cedars and mountains.
Stars spilled in my belly when he turned.
Now I can’t stop touching his hands,
the pink pebbles of his knuckles,
the soft wrinkle of flesh
between his forefinger and thumb.
I rub his fingernails as we drift
in and out of sleep. They are small
and smooth, like almond petals.
Forever, I will need nothing but these.

But all night, the visitors crowd
around us. I press his palms to my lips
in silence. They look down in anticipation,
as if they expect him to suddenly
spill coins from his hands
or raise a gold scepter
and turn swine into angels.

Isn’t this wonder enough
that yesterday he was inside me,
and now he nuzzles next to my heart?
That he wraps his hand around
my finger and holds on?
~Tania Runyan “Mary” from Nativity Suite

Now, newborn,
in wide-eyed wonder
he gazes up at his creation.
His hand that hurled the world
holds tight his mother’s finger.
Holy light
spills across her face
and she weeps
silent wondering tears
to know she holds the One
who has so long held her.
~Joan Rae Mills from “Mary” in the Light Upon Light Anthology by Sara Arthur

Madonna and Child detail by Pompeo Batoni

The grip of the newborn is, in fact, superhuman. It is one of the tests of natural infant reflexes that are checked medically to confirm an intact nervous system in the newborn. A new baby can hold their own weight with the power of their hand hold, and Jesus would have been no different, except in one aspect:

He also held the world in His infant hands.

We have been held from the very Beginning, and have not been let go. Try as we might to wiggle free to go our own way, He keeps a powerful grip on us.

We know the strength of the Lord whose hands “hurled the world” into being.

This is what our good God has done for us… He hangs on tight.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Advent 2023 theme
…because of the tender mercy of our God,
whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high 
to give light to those who sit in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Luke 1: 78-79 from Zechariah’s Song

Good people all, this Christmas time
Consider well and bear in mind
What our good God for us has done
In sending his beloved son

With Mary holy we should pray
To God with love this Christmas Day
In Bethlehem upon that morn
There was a blessed Messiah born

Near Bethlehem did shepherds keep
Their flocks of lambs and feeding sheep
To whom God’s angels did appear
Which put the shepherds in great fear’

Prepare and go, ‘ the angels said
‘To Bethlehem, be not afraid
For there you’ll find, this happy morn
A princely babe, sweet Jesus born

With thankful heart and joyful mind
The shepherds went, this babe to find
And as God’s angel had foretold
They did our saviour Christ behold

Within a manger he was laid
And by his side the virgin maid
Attending on the Lord of life
Who came on earth to end all strife

Good people all, this Christmas time
Consider well and bear in mind
What our good God for us has done
In sending his beloved Son

With Mary holy we should pray
To God with love this Christmas day
In Bethlehem upon that morn
There was a blessed Messiah born

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The Sunrise Shall Visit Us: Kindled and Consumed

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Earth’s crammed with heaven,
and every common bush afire with God
~Elizabeth Barrett Browning from “Aurora Leigh”

(Jesus said) I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!
Luke 12:49

It is difficult to undo our own damage…
It is hard to desecrate a grove and change your mind.
The very holy mountains are keeping mum.
We doused the burning bush and cannot rekindle it;
we are lighting matches in vain under every green tree. 
~Annie Dillard from Teaching a Stone to Talk

When I drink in the stars and upward sink
into the theater your words have wrought,
I touch unfelt immensity and think—
like Grandma used to pause in patient thought
before an ordinary flower, awed
by intricacies hidden in plain view,
then say, You didn’t have to do that, God!—
Surely a smaller universe would do!

But you have walled us in with open seas
unconquerable, wild with distant shores
whose raging dawns are but your filigree
across our vaulted skies. This art of yours,
what Grandma held and I behold, these flames,
frame truth which awes us more:
You know our names.
~Michael Stalcup “The Shallows”

I need to turn aside and look,
to see, as if for the first and last time,
the kindled fire that illuminates
even the darkest day and never dies away.

We are invited by name,
by no less than God Himself,
through the burning bush that is never consumed:
to shed our shoes, to walk barefoot and vulnerable,
and approach the bright and burning dawn,
even when it is the darkest midnight,
even when it is a babe in a manger
lighting a fire in each one of us.

Only then,
only then
can I say:
“Here I am! Consume me!”

Advent 2023 theme
…because of the tender mercy of our God,
whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high 
to give light to those who sit in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Luke 1: 78-79 from Zechariah’s Song

Within our darkest night,
you kindle the fire
that never dies away,
that never dies away.
Within our darkest night,
you kindle the fire
that never dies away,
that never dies away.
~Taize

I sit beside the fire and think of all that I have seen
of meadow-flowers and butterflies in summers that have been;
Of yellow leaves and gossamer in autumns that there were,
with morning mist and silver sun and wind upon my hair.
I sit beside the fire and think of how the world will be
when winter comes without a spring that I shall ever see.
For still there are so many things that I have never seen:
in every wood in every spring there is a different green.
I sit beside the fire and think of people long ago
and people who will see a world that I shall never know.
But all the while I sit and think of times there were before,
I listen for returning feet and voices at the door.
~J.R.R. Tolkien

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