"And when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done is secret, will reward you……"Matthew 6:6
Oh Lord, lead me through Your Psalms as I try to sleep.
Let me find that green pasture and still my mind like those restful waters, instead of the churning thoughts that crash and swirl preventing sleep.
Restore my soul to what it once was, let me find that unreachable place that just hovers out of sight. Remind me Lord that when I feel lost I don’t have to search for the path of righteousness on my own.
You have already provided the Path in Yourself. You are the ram caught in Abrahams thicket once for all. We have everything we need in You Lord. My cup runneth over with Your Spirit even though right now You lay so quietly in my soul.
I know you are there. And maybe this is the lesson you want to teach me. To trust even when my plate is empty. To hope even when shadows of death blow around me. To know that we have the victory.
The grave is nothing but an April fools joke for believers.
“My hope is in what the eye has never seen. Therefore, let me not trust in visible rewards. Let my trust be in Your mercy, not in myself. Let my hope be in Your love, not in health, or strength, or ability, or human resources.” Thomas Merton
Ash Wednesday reminds us of our universal frailty. At lease it should. We are all just walking dust, after all. Our waking lives are filled with equal measure of it. Frailty, that is. Being human means that in every given moment we can simultaneously feel “blessed” or “stressed” beyond measure. Haven’t we all felt that shadow of “dread” that can come upon us even when things are going well? It’s like the feeling of falling mentally. For those of us who feel the very real feelings of social anxiety it’s kind of a normal state of mind. It can be considered a weakness, but for me, it amplifies my dependance on God. I guess that’s kind of what the Apostle Paul felt about his particular “weakness.”
The Bible doesn’t say what that weakness is, but it’s been fodder for speculation in many discussions and Bible studies. Going back to Ash Wednesday, I like the tradition of wearing the ashes outwardly, although I have never actually gone to a church that supplies them for application. Most Protestant Churches don’t offer them, but maybe they should. I tend to wear mine on the inside.
I have recently had my anxieties amplified by going without alcohol for 30 days. It’s a bit like having the band-aid ripped off the rough edges of life. It was something I felt I needed to do for a time, after being prompted by lots of introspection (and prayer) brought about by the Bible study I started earlier this year. It was hard. Day 3, I was wondering if I could actually pull it off. A genetic predisposition of Alcoholism ran from both Grandparents on my dad’s side. My Grandmother died at a young age resulting from a love of the bottle, and my grandpa quit after being given an ultimatum by his second wife. It was a deal breaker, and he quit forever, to his credit.
It skipped a generation and landed on and my brother and me. We both shared a love of drinking. My brother died unexpectedly in 2023 as a result of many health issues, some of them accelerated by excessive drinking. So, this has become a part of my journey at this (late) time in my life. Better late than never, I guess. It was time. One my own personal thorns of the flesh that needed to be put to death. We are all in good company. Even the Apostle Paul wasn’t exempt.
As Paul said of his personal “thorn in the flesh”:
Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.2 Cor. 12: 7-9
So, this can be encouraging, whatever your weaknesses are. No one gets out of this life alive. But as Christians, even in the midst of our “ashes” we can be encouraged. For when we are weak, Christ’s resurrection power rests on us! I don’t know about you, but as I get older, I am more confronted with more and more weakness.
Today, I wear my ashes inside, carrying about the dust of immortality. Always, carrying about in my flesh the knowledge of how close I came to the licking flames of hell, but also knowing I have escaped it only because of the Cross and the terrible road Jesus walked for me.
This my friends, is cause for celebration. Easter is coming. And in the midst of this life, we can have joy unspeakable and full of glory!
Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; and though you do not even see Him now, you believe and trust in Him and you greatly rejoice and delight with inexpressible and glorious joy,1 Peter 1:8
Each evening the sun’s rays hit my Mom’s sheep and birdhouse at exactly the same spot. I never planned it that way, it just happened. Sometimes the cat poses along with the sheep putting himself squarely in the portrait. More than likely he’s only following the last bit of warmth before evening.
This morning I was leafing through my Dad’s Book of Common Prayer. He had written a note over part of the Eucharist seen below:
This made me smile. I know Dad was proud of his Scottish and English heritage. Since I did my DNA a few years back I’ve found that I’m 28% Scottish. I previously thought I was more English.
I read aloud and as I did, I recalled the soft murmur of voices in the chambers of my heart and memory. I remember the sounds in the old St. John’s church when it was on Lee Street in the middle of town. I heard the soft insulated thumps of prayer kneelers going up and back down. Dust motes floating through stained glass light; I heard us saying the words of the Eucharist all at once:
We lift them to the Lord
It is right to give Him thanks and praise
So many years later it’s as if I’m there. And there are so many other church services down through my youth, Baptist, Methodist, Non-denominational, weekend Church retreats, you name it. My folks were denomination hoppers for a while and now I’m glad they were. Because the common denominator running through them all was tradition, and community.
More than that, it was Jesus.
I remember faces, voices from the past, too many to count. I thought again how grateful I am to have this rich heritage of Churchgoing. Those memories hold you together in all those in between times in the desert of faith when you’re trying to recapture what you’ve lost.
What I am sad about is that I am wondering if my generation will be the last to remember the old hymns. I can still chime in with the melodies even if some of the lyrics are lost. I can see the value in churches holding fast to keeping their traditions alive. In a world that is spinning out of control, it’s comforting to know you can attend church and parts of it at least, will still ring true. Still hold to tradition.
The fundamentalist in me misses altar calls. Remember those? The closing music starts up, and the Pastor stands at the front, invitation open. Hopeful hearts pray while eternity waits. Then one courageous individual stands and scoots across knees out of the row and into the aisle. The most dramatic and personal moment in the church for me was that moment. I was fourteen. I grabbed Mom and she went with me.
And the great miracle is that as Christians, we carry this living cathedral wherever we go. Held safely in the shelter of our hearts. A turn of the key, sealed for the day of redemption. As parents, the most invaluable gift we can give our kids is something, or most importantly someone bigger than themselves.
To deal with life’s blows you need this.
In closing, join me in prayer for our war weary tear-stained world. For you, for me, and the Ukrainian people and (no doubt, many Russian people) many of whom are not in favor of what is going on.
God of the nations, whose sovereign rule brings justice and peace, have mercy on our broken and divided world. Shed abroad Your peace in the hearts of all and banish from them the spirit that makes for war, that all races and peoples may learn to live as members of one family and in obedience to Your law, through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
One good thing about all this rushing about, worrying about this virus, being selective about where we go and listening for new updates is that sooner or later we get tired of all that. We settle in, we tune out, we get creative about the things we can do instead of what we can’t.
And when we stop, something very Holy happens. We start paying attention to other things. We start talking more, we find closeness of a different kind. It looks like calling people. We are checking on each other more. We are remembering what it looks like to be a true neighbor.
Nothing like a pandemic to bring us closer. To make us realize we are all really one big family across the globe.
The most important things are still ours. It’s still Lent. Just underneath all the hubbub is a Spiritual pulse that beats stronger than ever. It’s the 25th Day of Lent. We are still leading up to the horrible awful (Good Friday) and the unbelievably wonderful (Easter).
And the best thing of all, is that in every challenge, every crisis we hear the thunderous echo of His last words. Those last words that changed everything, made restoration between God and man possible again. “It is Finished.”
That means everything is still possible. God is with us. I think the phrase I love most in the 139th Psalm is:
Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in Your book before one of them came to be. That one wiggles me every time.
Use this time my friends, for the good. Get outside where we can still go, marvel at nature. Learn something new. I was challenged with Suduko. I was always afraid of it but Elaine was patient. She kept telling me I could do it and now I find it extremely relaxing. She did scold me when I was talking out loud trying to figure it out. She said the rule of Suduko is the silent working of numbers. I laughed.
This morning I walked down to the river and watched the tops of the trees fill with light. I also saw the two wood ducks greeting each other. Two “V”s in the water merging as they traveled together.
And God saw all that He had made, and it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning–the sixth day. Genesis 1:31
As long as the earth endures, seed time and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease. Genesis 8:22
Peace, I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful. John 14:27
There are many marches going on right now in the U.S. and all around the world. Down through history people have marched for different things. Some of those marches had impact and affected real change. Some marches will have little lasting impact.
Today, on Palm Sunday we celebrate a small band of marchers that changed not only history and time as we know it, but changed eternity as well. A small band of people including Jesus walked toward Jerusalem and as Jesus approached the city He wept because He saw hearts that needed to be changed. Just like today.
He knew that He and He alone had the only cure for a terminally heartsick humanity. Just like today.
However zealous today’s marchers might be, they can never affect real lasting change. Real change can only come when people’s hearts are transformed by Jesus. Palm Sunday has always affected me. There is just something about Easter week and everything that goes with it. It’s like everything in the world that we think is so important can just wait. It all pales in comparison with what happened on the world stage around 2000 years ago. And largely, people back then had no clue about what was really going on. Just like most people today.
Jesus came. He vacated His seat in Heaven for this lowly grungy stinky planet. Does that get your attention? It should. And if not, why not?
People threw their coats down on the road where Jesus came riding in on the donkey. For most people, it was their only coat. One week later those same people screamed for His death. This week among all weeks is when we remember what God’s love cost Him. Everything.
Today was kind of comical but not really. We were irritated and circling the parking lot once again. We were too late for early church and way too early for late church. We hung out in the parking lot and watched people until 10:00 service started trickling out.
When the service started, however, it no longer mattered. To sing, “Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest” as little kids came down the aisles waving palm branches was enough to do me in. The world and everything in it melted away in those few minutes as it was just Jesus and me…….and us. An eternal family worshipping in church. A world away. A world together.
Later I got to decorate eggs with my niece and see my family……..later still, I worked in the yard with my bestie and it felt like Holy work. Something about working close to the earth reminds us of Eden I guess. Holy work for Holy Week.
I hope this week to remember to pause enough. Remember enough. Cherish enough.
You may have heard the story about the woman who attended a Bible study and wanted to know about the process of refining silver after she read Malachi 3:3. She writes of her visit to a local silversmith:
“As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; then she thought again about the verse that says: ‘He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.’ (Malachi 3:3) She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed. The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, ‘How do you know when the silver is fully refined?’ He smiled at her and answered, ‘Oh, that’s easy — when I see my image in it.’”
As I meditated on this story and passage I also thought of our part in it. How we must willingly stay in that fire. How many times have I been through something painful and sought only to relieve the pain not thinking or caring about the end result. It’s humbling. And it’s what I leave you with today. If you’re in that “refiners fire” today, know that He is surely with you. Right where you are today, know that He will never leave you or forsake you!
“Jesus often withdrew to lonely places to pray………” Luke 5:16
“Our conditioning as members of a consumer society prevents us from abandoning hope that, with sufficient planning, we might yet be able to see and do everything. To move slowly and deliberately through the world, attending to one thing at a time, strikes us as radically subversive, even un-American. We cringe from the idea of relinquishing, in any moment, all but one of the infinite possibilities offered us by our culture. Plagued by a highly diffused attention, we give ourselves to everything lightly. That is our poverty. In saying yes to everything, we attend to nothing. One only can love what one stops to observe. “Nothing is more essential to prayer,” said Evagrius, “than attentiveness.”
― Belden C. Lane, The Solace of Fierce Landscapes: Exploring Desert
I read this wonderful book years ago and it has remained with me ever since. I believe it holds a very important message for our times as the world and the people in it seem to be moving at a faster and noisier pace than ever before. What does it mean to be fully in the moment of our lives? Do we skim over our days not fully touching down until we collapse in bed and wonder where the time went?
Do I treat people like things to check off my to-do list or do I give them my undivided attention? I don’t know much but there are certain things I am absolutely sure of. I know that one day, I will give absolutely anything to hear a story I have heard a million times before and the voice I love telling it. I will hear the silence where they used to be and maybe my heart won’t be able to take it.
Listen to the stories, look into their eyes. Hear what they are saying, the desperation and earnestness behind it. Slow down long enough to honor them as individuals the way we would like someone to do for us. We don’t get to decide who’s worthy, God says we all are. That’s what real love looks like.
What makes a good day for you? For me it means that I was able to keep my finger firmly on the pulse of the day most of the time. I felt it from the time the sun came up until it went down. It made for a happy day, a fulfilled day. I rode my bike over ground I covered in childhood. I felt the bumps in the streets, I saw things, beautiful things. I took pictures so I wouldn’t forget.
I took care of Elaine who is recovering from carpal tunnel surgery. It was a joy to return a gift she has given to me many times. I got to go to the store with Mom and Dad both, one to the grocery and one to the pharmacy. I went to Lowe’s to look at flowers with my Aunt.
I was in the moment most of the day. I wish I could say I have this down, but too many times I fail miserably. But that’s why God knew we needed days. They are strung out like pearls until this life ends and eternity begins. The thing is, we can never be sure when one ends and the other starts.
I like how the King James Bible puts it here:
Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. Colossians 4:5
And this one:
Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due when it is within your power to do it. Proverbs 3:27
And just maybe I can try to repeat today what I did yesterday.
For behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land. Song of Solomon 2:11,12
The last time I wrote (if I remember correctly) I was in a bit of a funk. I was missing the doves that were a regular background noise of my prayer/meditation times in Arizona. I had seen them in the area and wondered why I never heard them. I discounted it as part of a necessary season I was going through along with everything else. Now, it seems I hear one several times a day. God has given them back to me, along with Spring and flowers everywhere. The sun has touched down and the earth is truly full of His glory. As I write a Mockingbird is singing its heart out, so loud it almost comical.
I am happy to say, my heart feels lighter. Maybe it’s as simple as the weather. We walked to the lake today. That even sounds amazing doesn’t it? As much as I have whined and groused about all the things that bugged me about my home state since moving back, to be surrounded by all this beauty (and of course being close to my family) balances things out quite nicely. When weather permits I go down to the little river shack to pray. My old faithful LL Bean robe gave up the ghost and I had to throw it out. That’s what I would bundle up and walk down in, but my friend found another online and surprised me with it. I think it must have cost her a bundle, it weighs 5 pounds!
Now that the weather is warming up, I will go down more mornings before work. We have had some BBQs here lately and that is a very welcome change, to be able to cook outdoors is something we missed so much. Here is what Elaine made for my Aunt, her old sink washstand was rotting so she rebuild a frame and added a little cooking space which works great. The old wood is in the wheelbarrow!
There is something Holy about creating something, isn’t there? It is truly a blessing to be able to work with your hands and make something better, give it a new life. After all, we are created in His image and God is the ultimate Creator. During Lent, we remember God’s great work of redemption, His greatest and most awful gift. Awful because it cost Him everything, great because it was the greatest act of Love He ever did and will ever do again.
He is our hope, our joy…..now and for all eternity. Nature reflects this, especially at the turn of the Seasons.
You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Henry David Thoreau
Life is grace. Sleep is forgiveness. The night absolves. Darkness wipes the slate clean, not spotless to be sure, but clean enough for another day’s chalking. Frederick Buechner
“I am leaving you with a gift–peace of mind and heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be troubled or afraid.” John 14:27
I am afraid I don’t have much in the way of encouragement today. I can’t give you the peace I don’t have. I seem to have lost it. Maybe I left it in Arizona. Or the beach. My soul feels like someone scoured it out with a scruffy pad. My joy has been elusive and I have not posted nearly as much because I have followed the old “if you can’t say anything nice don’t say it at all” adage.
I can however, give you Jesus peace. Jesus peace transcends feelings and that is what I offer you today. There are hard times in life when you have to lean on what you know, not on what you feel. Too many times I have looked at peace like an equation. “If I do thus and so and pray enough, read my Bible enough, make the right decisions, then I will have peace.”
“Then my anxiety will go away.”
“Then I will have joy”
“Then my fears will melt away”
“Then everything will fall into place”
I think maybe Jesus is trying to get me to let go and simply take Him at His word. To stop trying so hard. I feel like I have been spiritually wrestling with God and I am very tired. Tired of wondering if I made the right decision to move. Tired of wondering where my peace went. My peace is found in Jesus and nothing else. Like my old Pastor used to say, “It’s Jesus plus nothing”
So I give you Jesus today. At these words only, tears which have also been elusive come forth like Lazarus from the tomb. Lent is coming and it is with renewed joy that I write these words. I am relieved. Sometimes I just need to write myself out of the box I’ve stuffed myself in.
Maybe you are on the same kind of journey I am. Or maybe your life is going just the way you want it to. Maybe you, like me are tired of the second guessing about everything and you just want to let go and enjoy the peace of right here and right now.
Today, you can. Whatever decision you have made in life you can believe God led you there. I know that all steps have led me here, because I am here. Maybe it’s just as simple as that.
We’ll rest together you and I. And Jesus.
“For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” Matthew 18:20
Lori's Prayer Closet 