Sorrow on Sorrow

Sorrow on sorrow on joy on joy.

Do you feel the world is broken?

Do you trust the light is come?

Prayer and thanksgiving.

Groanings and song.

And we wait, oh we wait,

for our Hope to be made sight.

Sorrow on sorrow on joy on joy.

...

"The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it."   John 1:5

It is finished

Do you see? The weight of the wrath of God that Jesus took on in my stead is the difference between
"You are my beloved Son, with You I am well pleased." Mark 1:11
and
"My God, My God, why have you forsaken me." Mark 15:34

Do this in remembrance of me.

Maundy Thursday

Reading in John chapter 13. Jesus removed his outer garment, knelt at his disciples' feet and served them, washing away the dirt. Then he rose, clothed himself once more and took his place at the table...just as he was about to do before the whole world and for the whole world.

In the Old Testament, over and over again as God-the mighty God of Israel who is my God-worked salvation for his people, time and time again he would institute a remembrance. A feast day. An altar of stones beside a river. And he would say, when your children ask why this is done, tell them of the mighty acts of your God. In the same way, as we receive communion Sunday after Sunday, if your child, your friend, the world asks why, hold up the history of the mighty acts of your God, and especially the incredible work he has done to allow us to live redeemed and as his own children.

"The blood shall be a sign for you, on the house where you are. And when I see the blood I will pass over you and no plague will befall you to destroy you." Exodus 12:13

"For Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast." 1 Corinthians 5:7-8

Tomorrow is Palm Sunday

I'm reading today in John, chapters 11 and 12. Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead and Mary anoints Jesus's feet. The tension builds. Tomorrow is Palm Sunday.

Jesus said, "Leave her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you will always have with you, but you do not always have me." John 12:7-8

For a moment, perhaps, it is a relief the the man-who-was-God that there is one person who seems to know what is coming. He is not alone in the knowledge of his coming death for a moment. Just for a moment, maybe, it is good to share the burden with another.
For the God-who-was-man, for just a moment one woman is moved to celebrate him, and in a moment of clarity give him an honor he deserves even as his disciples continue to miss the truth of it all. So, honored and prepared for death, perhaps there is one moment of relief and pause as he journeys to the cross.

Tomorrow is Palm Sunday.

Stand in the Gap

I had forgotten my call was to stand in the gap. Forgotten is too kind, I had ignored the call, preferring instead to link arms with the saved in the safety of where we stand-Praise God-but oh, my weakness!
I have been reminded by an artist so alight with the obeying of the call that it spills from work, from acts, from speech with out a doubt as to the message he sends. GOD. IS.

I have been reminded by another, seasoned in the practice of the standing, the reaching, and the sending.
"Let us find meaning in showing others what it means to have meaning."

To my neighbors: sincere kindness and love.
To the students: sincere kindness and love.
To the stranger: sincere kindness and love.

I can at least begin there. It doesn't come from me, but we can have that conversation later.

Almost a year ago

"I arise, I arise today in the spirit of the Trinity"

I absolutely understand Moses asking the Lord to show him His Glory. When I sit before a kiln there is a great heat, a rumble, a bright light and I can picture: THIS IS GLORY

But oh how small this, compared with a Glory which shakes the earth, which causes the face that sees its back to radiate with terrible light. How small, to a Glory which in absence causes darkness at noon and a groaning of the earth. There is no night where the Glory lives!

This kiln before me eases the groaning of my soul for a brief time in the wee hour when the world is still enough that I can stand near and let the heat burn my skin, the rumble fill my ears, the light strike my eyes and my mind and, just for a moment, I grasp eternity. This is why I come back I think. I play at the vocation of the Creator, making things of dirt then visiting the sacred fire which I pretend to control, all so I can feel near to him,

Sometimes I am amazed at the grace which has brought me to sit right here.

Wonder

When man looks at a wing
and wonders
there is an awakening
a consciousness
that the cathedral's architect aspired to
with his Gothic arches
the vaulted ceiling and gilded apse
the mind is lifted up
up
up
just as the layman's eyes traveled toward heaven
he wonders
of flight and wing
the boning the stretching the lifting
the thrill
the gasp in the chest altitude
and wonder is worship
the priest at the altar
the prophet on the mountain
hide me in the cleft and show me
Glory
the gift of the Creator
to man.